The concept of anthropomorphizing automobiles and other vehicles for use in children's programming is not a new concept, neither is it indigenous to the world of Pixar ('Cars', 'Planes', etc). In point of fact, I'm nearing my 40th orbit, and can say my childhood bore witness to several vehicular characters.
Some are still around, such as Thomas the Tank Engine ('Shining Time Station'). Others are long gone, such as 'Budgie the Little Helicopter', 'JayJay the Jet Plane', and 'Tugs'.
'Tugs'. Who remembers 'Tugs': that series that was effectively 'Shining Time Station', but with tugboats? Likely not many outside the UK, unless, of course, you happened upon a different (mostly cartoon-animated) series called 'Salty's Lighthouse'.
'Salty's Lighthouse' was one of those harmless, but forgettable series aimed at preschoolers. The series focused on Salty the Human and his (mostly) animal friends, learning basic life lessons from their playroom inside a lighthouse (which, really, wouldn't have much more than a staircase inside, but what do I know?). Anyway, whenever the lesson of the day required context and/or emphasis, Seymour (the anthropomorphic binoculars ...sigh) would show the kids a relevant story. This is where 'Tugs' comes in.
'Tugs' was produced by the same studio as 'Shining Time Station', but 'Tugs' didn't prove as popular a series. Not wanting the 'Tugs' series to sink (teehee!), the Shining Time people licensed their 'Tugs' characters for use in 'Salty's Lighthouse'.
The tugboat segments from Salty were not lifted directly from the original series (which was intended for slightly older children), so the tugboat plots and scripts had to be revised to appeal to Salty's demographic. So, effectively, same 'Tugs' characters written for a different series.
As for my take on 'Salty's Lighthouse' as a whole...
The very first thought I had upon revisiting this series (which, hitherto, I hadn't seen in 20 years) was 'Why does Salty look like a kindergarten Rugrat?'. :P
Getting past that, Salty is a little more interesting than I remember. Apart from the tugboat cutaways, the show also includes (what I can only guess are) public-domain animations and silent-movie clips set to original music and song (kinda like you'd see in 'Muppet Babies' or in a 90's Nickelodeon bumper). These certainly keep the show from being boring, albeit the pace of the episodes can suffer from it.
