The introduction to Blue Peter Book 13 says "we're not superstitious! For us, thirteen is definitely a lucky number, because it means there's another addition to our collection of Blue Peter publications. And since our Twelfth Book, we've been able to print some of the very best of your Odd Odes which we've put in a paperback, so watch out for that, too".
Yes I certainly will, in fact its in a large plastic crate under my bed. Anyway, we'll save Odd Odes for another blog post, if I haven't done it already.
The 13th Blue Peter Book was published in 1976 and looks back retrospectively on the year of 1975, but no clues that 1976 would become the year that punk rock first burst on the scenes with the controversial appearance of the Sex Pistols on another BBC children's television programme, but I will come to that in a while. However, things were starting to feel a tad more contemporary with a three page feature about John and Lesley's appearance on a rehearsal shoot of the Generation Game, competing to reach Bruce Forsyth's conveyor belt where John Noakes managed to recall 12 out of the 18 prizes. Teas Made, cuddly toy, his and hers dressing gowns, etc. Sadly the prizes had to stay on the conveyor belt ready for the real recording of the show later that day. As they put on their coats to leave, Bruce turned to the lovely Anthea Turner and said "didn't they do well?"
If some of us had been uncertain for a few years about how Lesley Judd was fitting into the long-established team, Queen Valerie being a hard act to follow and Lesley's tenure still feeling a bit like the new teacher at school, 1975 was probably the year she stepped up proper, starting to kick some serious ass and nearly being battered to death by the waves of the Atlantic Ocean in the process.
For this was the year that Lesley was nearly dropped onto jagged rocks amidst the crashing waves around the Bishop Rock lighthouse six miles off the coast of Cornwall. This was after all, International Women's Year but even Lesley Judd, who had been gradually turning into the female version of Noakes would not have expected the events of 18 May 1975 when the canvas belt around her waist slipped and she was left suspended mid-air above the rocks, holding onto the winch rope for dear life with just her bare hands:
"My arms were being wrenched from their sockets and my hands were burning on the rope. I really was sick with terror and all the time I kept thinking - "if by a miracle I get there, I've still got to come back!"
But thankfully the former Top of the Pops 'Pans People' dancer did make it onto Bishop's Rock and recovered sufficiently to record a piece about this foreboding place miles from dry land. Plucking up her courage, she also made it back onto the boat via the same pre-health and safety era winch on which she had defied death by the width of one of Jason's whiskers, and lived to tell the story on the following Thursday's episode of Blue Peter though happily sparing us the flash of bruised bare backside which Noakes had treated us to when he came off the bob-sleigh the previous year.
I remember watching this particular edition of Blue Peter with awe and thinking that Lesley Judd had well and truly made it as a presenter of equal if not more impressive stature than the likes of Noakes, Singleton, Purves and Trace. Her right of passage well and truly accomplished.
Mr Noakes meanwhile was in his element, not just attending but competing in the 1975 Grassmere Sports or Lakeland Games. Billed as John Noakes of Halifax he was to wrestle with Charlie Younger of Throckton in the Cumberland and Westmoreland style, employing such moves and holds as the Inside Hyde, the Dog Fall and the somewhat dodgy sounding Cross Buttock. Having been defeated by Charlie's decisively operated Cross Buttock, John slunk off to watch the Hound Trail before volunteering to take part in the Butter Crag hill race which just so happened to excuse him from fighting 21-stone Wilf Brocklebank in the wrestling. Given the choice most of us probably would choose a heave up the Butter Crag over yet another session of Cross Buttock, this time with a 21-stone Grassmere farmer.
Euphemisms aside, Noakes completed his grueling run/crawl up Butter Crag, crossing the finishing line to the refrains of See the Conquering Hero Comes fittingly accompanied by a dog who had lost its way in the hound trail, trotting in beside him. There have been several Blue Peter action heroes following in the famous Halifax boots over the years, but none pulled it off with such perfectly delivered irony and the Yorkshire man's ability to send up oneself with an indiscernible combination of pathos and comedy.
It has to be said that the dashing Peter Purves, seemed quiet to the point of awol in this edition. Whilst Book 13 features an exciting four page spread firstly about creatures that might lurk on Mount Everest and then a piece on how Chris Bonnington's 1975 Everest Expedition planted a Blue Peter flag on the great mountain's peak, it is immediately followed by an article from Purves telling us how to make a tent for Action Man out of a coat hanger and some old cloth. Ouch! And as for Valerie, she doesn't get any coverage at all.
If we were to read into this a plot from Messrs. Baxter and Barnes to replace Peter and Valerie with some fresh new talent from the housing estates of London by the names of Steve Jones and Johnny Rotten, to name but two, alas in December 1976 the Bill Grundy Show beat them to it and children's television could never be quite the same again. Well, by that I mean we no longer had the short lived Bill Grundy Show.
Blue Peter would of course have it's own moments of controversy over the years, but even so has changed with the times and is still going strong in the year 2020. Whereas Johnny Rotten.... zzz.
But back to the 1975/76 annual, a great cover, even if a close-up inspection does reveal a bit too much make-up on all three presenters and another great book in the tried and tested formula. Amazing to think that back in 75/76 there was a whole shelf load of BP books still to come.
Bring back the Blue Peter annuals! If I had a petition I'd ask you to sign it.
No comments:
Post a Comment