Scooby-Doo is an American cartoon series based around several animated television series and related works produced from 1969 to the present day. The original series, Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, was created for Hanna-Barbera Productions by writers Joe Ruby and Ken Spears in 1969. This Saturday morning cartoon series featured a talking Great Dane named Scooby-Doo and four teenagers — Fred Jones, Daphne Blake, Velma Dinkley, and Norville "Shaggy" Rogers — who solve mysteries through crazy antics and missteps.Hanna-Barbera and its successor Warner Bros. Animation have produced numerous follow-up and spin-off animated series and several related works, including television specials and telefilms, a line of direct-to-video films, and two Warner Bros.-produced feature films. Some versions of Scooby-Doo feature different variations on the show's supernatural theme, and include characters such as Scooby's cousin Scooby-Dum and nephew Scrappy-Doo in addition to or instead of some of the original characters.Scooby-Doo was originally broadcast on CBS from 1969 to 1976 when it moved to ABC. ABC aired the show until canceling it in 1986, and presented a spin-off featuring the characters as children, A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, from 1988 until 1991. The original series format was revived and updated for The WB Network's Kids' WB programming block as What's New, Scooby-Doo, which ran from 2002 to 2006, when another new series, Shaggy & Scooby-Doo Get a Clue!, began running on the The CW network until 2008. The current Scooby-Doo series, Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated, premiered on Cartoon Network in July 2010. Repeats of the series are broadcasted frequently on Cartoon Network and Boomerang in the United States and other countries.
Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! made its CBS network debut on Saturday, September 13, 1969 with its first episode, "What a Night for a Knight." The original voice cast featured veteran voice actor Don Messick as Scooby-Doo, Top 40 radio DJ Casey Kasem as Shaggy, actor Frank Welker as Fred, actress Nicole Jaffe as Velma, and musician Indira Stefanianna Christopherson as Daphne. Scooby’s speech patterns closely resembled an earlier cartoon dog, Astro from The Jetsons (1962–63), also voiced by Messick.Seventeen episodes of Scooby-Doo were produced in 1969. The series theme song was written by David Mook and Ben Raleigh, and performed by Larry Marks and Paul Costello.
Each episode featured Scooby and the four teenaged members of the Mystery, Inc. gang: Fred, Shaggy, Daphne and Velma, arriving to a location in the "Mystery Machine" and encountering a ghost, monster, or other supernatural creature, who was terrorizing the local populace. After looking for clues and suspects and being chased by the monster, the kids come to realize the ghost and other paranormal activity is actually an elaborate hoax, and - often with the help of a Rube Goldberg-like trap designed by Fred - they capture the villain and unmask him. Revealed as a flesh and blood crook trying to cover up crimes by using the ghost story and costume, the criminal is arrested and taken to jail, often saying something to the effect of "...and I would have gotten away with it, too, if it hadn't been for you meddling kids!"
A ratings success, Scooby-Doo was renewed for a second season in 1970-71, for which eighteen episodes were produced. Seven of the second season episodes featured chase sequences set to bubblegum pop songs recorded by Austin Roberts.
Souce : wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scooby-Doo