Official North Pole Seal. Frosty the snowman.

 

                                 Official North Pole Seal.

                                   Frosty the Snowman.

On Christmas Eve, Karen and her friends build a snowman after school. After several suggestions of names, Karen decides to name him "Frosty." A top hat discarded by inept magician Professor Hinkle brings the snowman to life. When Hinkle sees this, he takes the hat back despite the protests of Karen and the children. However, Hocus, the magician's pet rabbit, brings the hat back to the children bringing Frosty back to life. Feeling the temperature rising, Frosty fears he will melt and the children suggest he go to the North Pole. The group then parades through town on the way to the train station, shocking several townspeople, including a police officer who accidentally swallows his whistle. Because they have no money for tickets, Hocus, Frosty, and Karen secretly board a northbound train's refrigerator car while Hinkle schemes to get his hat back.

As the train continues northward, Frosty notices Karen getting colder. When the freight train stops to let a passenger train pass, the group disembarks in search of somewhere to warm Karen, with Hinkle following in pursuit. By nightfall, Frosty, Karen, and Hocus struggle through the forest where Hocus convinces wild animals to build a campfire for Karen. Fearing that fire will not be enough, Frosty decides to look for Santa Claus who they assume can save Karen and transport him to the North Pole. Hocus then goes off in search of Santa and, soon after, Hinkle catches up to Frosty and Karen, extinguishes the fire, and forcefully tries to steal the hat. Karen & Frosty flee and discover a greenhouse. The pair enter only for Hinkle to lock the door and trap them inside.

Hocus leads Santa to the greenhouse, only to find Karen crying over a melted Frosty. Santa explains that Frosty is made of Christmas snow and will return every winter. Santa opens the greenhouse door and the winter wind restores Frosty. Just as they are about to put his hat on, Hinkle arrives, again demanding it back. Santa intervenes, threatening to never bring him another Christmas present for the rest of his life if he steals the hat. After Hinkle runs home to write an apology letter, Santa brings Frosty back to life with the hat, drops Karen off at her house, and takes Frosty to the North Pole.

As the end credits roll, Frosty leads a parade with the children, Hocus, The narrator (Jimmy Durante), and the rest of the town, including Professor Hinkle (who sports a new hat). As the parade ends, Frosty boards Santa's sleigh and they fly off to the North Pole with the snowman promising to be back on Christmas Day.

 It is the first television special featuring the character Frosty the Snowman. The special first aired on December 7, 1969, on the CBS television network in the United States; it has aired annually for the network's Christmas and holiday season every year since. The special was based on the Walter E. Rollins and Steve Nelson song of the same name. It featured the voices of comedians Jimmy Durante (in his final film role) as the film's narrator, Billy De Wolfe as Professor Hinkle, and Jackie Vernon as Frosty.

The special's story follows a group of school children who build a snowman called Frosty and place a magician's hat on his head, which makes him come to life. But after noticing the high hot temperature and fearing that he would melt, Frosty, along with a young girl named Karen and a rabbit named Hocus Pocus, must go to the North Pole to be safe from melting.

Arthur Rankin Jr. and Jules Bass wanted to give the show and its characters the look of a Christmas card, so Paul Coker Jr., a greeting card and Mad magazine artist, was hired to do the character and background drawings. The animation was produced by Mushi Production in Tokyo, Japan, with Hanna-Barbera staffer Yusaku "Steve" Nakagawa and then-Mushi staffer Osamu Dezaki (who is uncredited) among the animation staff. Durante was one of the first people to record the song when it was released in 1950 (though at the time the song had slightly different lyrics); he re-recorded the song for the special.

Rankin/Bass veteran writer Romeo Muller adapted and expanded the story for television, as he had done with the "Animagic" stop motion production of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

                                          The song. 

"Frosty the Snowman" is a popular Christmas song written by Walter "Jack" Rollins and Steve Nelson, and first recorded by Gene Autry and the Cass County Boys in 1950 and later recorded by Jimmy Durante. It was written after the success of Autry's recording of "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" the previous year; Rollins and Nelson shopped the new song to Autry, who recorded "Frosty" in search of another seasonal hit. Like "Rudolph", "Frosty" was subsequently adapted to other media including a popular television special.

The song recounts the fictional tale of Frosty, a snowman who is brought to life by a magical silk hat that a group of children find and place on his head. Frosty plays and dances with the children until the hot sun threatens to melt him; he leads the children who constructed him throughout the town, only stopping once at a crosswalk when the policeman directing traffic orders pedestrians to stop. Frosty finally says goodbye to the children and comforts them, promising he will be back by Christmas Day.

Although it is generally regarded as a Christmas song, the original lyrics make no mention of the holiday (some renditions, like that in the 1969 Rankin/Bass TV special, change the lyric "I'll be back again someday" to "I'll be back on Christmas Day"). The song supposedly takes place in White Plains, New York, or Armonk, New York; Armonk has a parade dedicated to Frosty annually.