Ah, now we know the reason I couldn't find that Garfield article in the New York Times article. Because the piece was actually in the Wall Street Journal. Here it is — from June 1, 1993…
Cartoon cat Garfield is not only lazy and a glutton; it seems he has also been trying to cheat on his Nielsen ratings.
During the past three years, CBS has repeated seven times an episode of the Saturday morning animated program "Garfield and Friends," in which the cat opens the show saying, "Hi everyone, and a special welcome to Nielsen families."
The several-second greeting seems innocuous enough, particularly to Nielsen-naive kiddies who probably don't understand the reference to the ratings service, Nielsen Media Research. Innocuous or not, however, it's strictly forbidden as far as Nielsen is concerned, because of the potential it has to distort the television ratings.
In theory, the gimmick makes it more likely that viewers will remember to punch in with the Nielsen "peoplemeter" or to record their viewing of the cartoon in Nielsen's paper diaries.
CBS says it didn't know about the greeting. The felonious feline got away with the trick until Saturday, May 22, when a sharp-eyed viewer from rival NBC (presumably an adult) noticed the message and immediately protested to Nielsen, which then told CBS to desist.
A spokesman for Nielsen said there is no way to gauge whether the gimmick affected the ratings of the 9 a.m. program, which is top-rated among the two-to-11-year-old set. The show goes into its sixth season in the fall.
The ratings company won't take any action against CBS other than sending a letter to all of its clients notifying them of the situation. But a spokesman says, "Maybe we ought to string them up by their paws."
Lee Mendelson, "Garfield" executive producer, calls the greeting "an innocent joke," and says it never would have been included had the producers, United Media/Mendelson Productions and Film Roman & Claws Inc., known it was a problem.
Mr. Mendelson says he's mystified by the brouhaha. "Of all the problems in the world, I wouldn't put this at the top of the list," he says.
I'm pretty sure the article got the quote wrong. Garfield said, "…all you lovely Nielsen families." It also erred on the name of Jim Davis's company, which is Paws, Inc. And I do recall being told that Nielsen had agreed to drop that week's ratings out when they averaged the season, thereby voiding that week…which didn't affect the numbers at all. But the reporter was right on one thing I forgot: NBC didn't complain until the seventh time this episode had been run.
No one got the least bit mad at me, by the way. The reaction at CBS was bewilderment because even though it may technically be against some obscure Nielsen rule, that kind of joke does pop up from time to time on shows and no one ever complains. We had a not-dissimilar line in another episode and no one noticed or objected.
Thanks to the many readers of this site who took the time to go look for the piece and forward me copies. The first five were Vern Morrison, Bill Stiteler, Roger Green, Eric Newsom and someone whose handle is Proquest.