4/5 Great Memories
  by R. Ali
What a fantastic dvd combo, Who could forget Mr. Hooper's Store. This brings back great memories when i saw how young Bob and Louise were.And Kermits News Flash , forgetful Jones . Sesame Street 40 years of great television.

3/5 Before Elmo was king
  by Nicolette Clark (Washington)
This DVD set was nostalgic and at times almost brought tears to my eyes. For those parts (The ladybug picnic, The pinball counting to 12, the cartoon typewriter, the cast iron "I", etc) I would give it ten stars. Sesame Street literally shaped my life as a young child. I watched it religously until age seven (I'm thirty-five now). The reason for my three star rating is because of the lengthy songs and dull skits, which unfortunately took most of the time. Leena Horne singing didn't do it for me at five and she especially doesn't do it for me now at thrity-five. Sorry, but same to you Diana Ross. I wanted to see more of the aliens ("yep, yep, yep...nope, nope, nope"), Bert and Ernie, Super Grover, and the Tiddly-winks (who were suspiciously absent).

Watching this DVD made me realize how they should now call Sesame Street, just plain Elmo's World. That's who it's really all about now anyway. I loved the good old days when ALL the characters received equal billing. Now it seems like the first forty minutes of Sesame Street is just filler until Elmo, the big star, shows up. Don't get me wrong, I like Elmo, and so do my three little ones, but all the other characters have their own personalities and ability to teach as well. This DVD is a reminder of that.

So CTW if you're reading this, I would buy every single episode of Sesame Street from 1974-79 if you put it out on DVD. Stop teasing us with these short DVD releases showing only clips. To those of you who are thinking of purchasing this DVD set, I would get it, it is worth it. You're sure to see something that will bring back a memory.



2/5 Definitely NOT Old School.......
  by Kurt Zwicklbauer
I am/was a fan of Sesame Street, was born in 1971 and followed much of the show up until about 1980. As the Old School sets were released, I purchased them, and although they are not perfect by any means, they are a great look back at much of what made the show so magical. When I first learned about this DVD I was a bit hesitant thinking it would be repeating much of what is shown on the first 2 "Old School" sets, but because there were some segments that I felt the Old School sets were missing(The "O" song, Lowercase n and a few others), I thought I would give it a try. Well, sad to say, the first disc 1969-1989 is basically the best of the old school dvds crammed into one disc, sure there are some "new" segments, but much more that I would like to forget (Mr. Hooper surfing in Hawaii...was his back really that hairy?..some creepy Televisionmonster thing). So...if you are a fan of the Old School Sesame, then stick with the Old School sets, and skip this one. Hopefully they will eventually release complete seasons so we get to see ALL the good stuff.

3/5 Old School--Not so much. Roosevelt Franklin? Who was he again?
  by P. Costello
First, a proviso. I love Sesame Street. Love it. Or at least, I loved it from when I was a child--from its inception until approximately 1980. So, I write this review with a heavy heart.

Second, I was always looking for the Old School content on this DVD. I would rather Elmo and the post-racial rainbow kids had never been invented. Roosevelt Franklin, writers who met social, racial and class conditions head-on, the music of Joe Raposo--this is what I wanted.

How disappointing. There is a minimum of new material from the Old School DVD collections. And Joe Raposo's name is not even prominent (is it even mentioned?) in the book that accompanies the DVDs. I'll have to read it again, but Jon Stone is fronted and Raposo is definitely in the background.

Anyway, I'll just have to keep hoping that the marketing gurus at Sesame Wallet Project see fit in the future to release our childhood memories more systematically and completely. We trusted you. Now give us back what we invested in you!

5/5 What a wonderful DVD!
  by Amy S. Mcfarland (California)
I grew up with Sesame Street, and now that my kids are 1 and 3, I'm falling in love with Sesame Street all over again. This is a fantastic DVD! It's literally packed with wonderful songs, ABCs, counting, story time - all the things myself and my parents loved about the show when I was little. My son's favorite characters are Ernie and Bert, and some of the stand-alone DVDs I've bought for him over the past year barely mention them. With over 5 hours of Sesame Street on this set, Ernie and Bert get a little more screen time.
It's a good value too - the individual DVDs are ten or more dollars for 30-45 minutes, and this HUGE set is only 20. I'm very happy with my purchase.