Hour long shows were a big staple of Saturday mornings in the 70's and 80's. Sometimes two to three shows would even be blended together for an anthology series:
- The Richie Rich/Scooby Doo Show
- Mork & Mindy/Fonz & The Happy Days Gang/Laverne & Shirley in the Army
- Little Rascals/Richie Rich/Monchichis
Then you'd have shows like Flintstone Kids, which have one half hour story, a ten minute story, a Captain Caveman short, a Dino short, and another FK short.
In the Real Ghostbuster's Third Year, it expanded to an hour and became SLIMER! & The Real Ghostbusters, sandwiching a RGB half hour ep with two to three Slimer Shorts per episode.
When CBS picked up Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, it ran for an hour for four seasons, with one episode being a typical 'Shredder tries to take over plot', and one episode being an episode focusing on a specific turtle.
The Smurfs ran from an hour to ninety minutes depending on the season, and NEVER ran for less than an hour during it's network run.
Muppet Babies also ran for an hour up until it's final seasons, as did Superfriends.