LOGO Olympics—Light the Torch! on the Commodore 64
Commodore 64 LOGO – Turtle Graphics by Terrapin
In elementary school, we had Commodores for a short while, but they were soon replaced with Apple IIe’s. I discovered many of my first favorite games on the Apple, games like Snooper Troops, Odell Lake, and Oregon Trail. One great activity we had was learning the LOGO programming language with the Apple IIe version of Terrapin LOGO. We programmed a ‘turtle’ to draw shapes and play games on the screen.
At home I had a Commodore 64. I really wanted to experiment with Terrapin LOGO, but I think it was quite expensive and I could never convince my parents to get it. Instead I used the full-featured “Turtle Graphics Interpreter” from COMPUTE!’s Gazette magazine, written in BASIC by Irwin Tillman. It was a fascinating glimpse at the inner workings of LOGO, but as it was written in BASIC, the turtle moved excruciatingly slow (on today’s emulators, he can whiz along pretty fast, though!) Still, I yearned for the Commodore version of Terrapin LOGO.
Fast-forward 20 years! I began searching around the internet for Terrapin’s Commodore 64 LOGO, which was written by Leigh Klotz, Jr., (also the programmer of the Macintosh implementation of LOGO.) Scouring the web, I discovered only a few non-working or buggy disk images. Giving up the search, I bid on a real copy of C64 LOGO from eBay, which served me well temporarily.
In 2008, I received a working disk image of Terrapin’s Commodore 64 LOGO thanks to a mysterious benefactor named ‘El Comunicador.’ I’ve posted the disk image below, and now you can use C64 LOGO with any C64/C128 emulator or even transfer it to a real disk to use on a real C64/C128!
Below you can download an archive containing two manuals and five disk images in D64 format:
- Commodore 64 LOGO (Version 8)
- Commodore 64 LOGO (Version A, an older buggy curiosity)
- LOGO Utilities Disk
- an Example Disk
- Learning With LOGO Work Disk
(“Learning With LOGO” is a book by Daniel Watt. It’s very well written and approachable, and I highly recommend it to anyone interested in the language. Even without the book, you can play with the programs on the Learning With LOGO disk.)
Terrapin’s Commodore 64 LOGO has all the features of Terrapin’s Apple LOGO. It also includes sound commands and sprites. These disk images can be used with Commodore emulators, or they can be copied to real disks. (Keep in mind that emulator screens are often different proportions than a real TV screen; circles might come out as ovals. Look for the .ASPECT command in the manual to correct this.)
Click Below for Commodore LOGO downloads:
- Commodore 64 LOGO by Terrapin (This archive contains 5 disks, and 2 manuals)
- C64 LOGO – A Language For Learning (OFFICIAL pack-in manual)
- Kids Working With Computers – The C= LOGO Manual (primer manual for kids) (Link fixed, now in PDF format)
Additionally you can download some other LOGO-like programs:
- Turtle Graphics Interpreter from COMPUTE!’s Gazette magazine (software and docs)
- Elmer the Turtle from RUN magazine (software and docs)
- Turtle Graphics II from HES (manual only)
- If you know of other versions of C-64 LOGO, please let me know!
Please feel free to include any of these items on your site. They are here to share because I haven’t been able to find them anywhere else.
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Bits, Bytes, Oddities and Audio 
AWESOME!!! I have been looking online for a image of Jingle disk for at least 11 years! Found you by accident today! THANKS!!
And it is just as corny as it was when i got it as a 12 year old back in the early 80’s!!!!
Thanks again!
great,
thanks again!!!!
I have issues of Teaching and computers magazines…..
I began teaching BASIC when software was stored and retrieved from cassettes. My first Apple bore a 3 digit serial number ….
I have lots of old computer stuff that my husband would love to see me get rid of…..
Hi Jill!
If you find that you would like to sell any of your collection to a good new home, I’d be happy to add them to my collection. Thanks very much for your message and I hope you’ll keep me in mind!
PS I replied to the email in your message but it was returned to me as undeliverable. If you see this, leave another comment with your email and I’ll contact you. (Your email won’t be visible publicly)
Does anyone remember the educational games “Factory” or Seaway (boat locks)?
I’ve never heard of Seaway, but I remember playing Sunburst’s The Factory on an Apple IIe, where you are shown a design and have to put together an assembly line of machines to replicate the design. Very fun, although I couldn’t get my 7-year-old daughter interested in it. She’s more interested in Minecraft and Roblox.
I’ve been playing with computers since buying an OSI computer back when the 6502 was new. You are doing a real service by preserving these old programs — especially Toy Shop! I have a variety of things (some old Byte magazines) if you would be interested … and we could find a cheap way to move them. I am near Dayton, OH.
I just now saw your post, I’ll email you!
[…] school. Waaaay back at an early age. I still remember many of the things I was shown then. Remember LOGO? That triangle you could control onscreen? You make it go forward or backward, turn, lift the pen […]
Thanks for sharing this! Even though I still have my original childhood C64 Logo in a box (not sure if it’s the buggy version of not), it’s going to be much easier to get this emulated version running.