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The Herbs and The Adventures of Parsley
On this page ..... All the official episode titles and original transmission dates .... confirmed for the 1st time.
The episode titles
The episode titles have often been misquoted. And sometimes just totally wrong.
Admittedly not something that's going to keep anyone awake at night.
But since this is The Herbs site let's try and get it sorted once and for all - if only for the sake of accuracy.
And let's start with the reasons for all the confusion ....
1} Neither series showed any on-screen episode titles in the opening or closing credits.
2} The Herbs ones were given titles in the Radio Times. But The Adventures of Parsley ones were not.
3} Episode titles for both series were sometimes included on VHS sleeves,and sometimes not.
And those episodes that were featured on more than one,often varied from one to another.Ditto the Dvd's.
4} And some different variations were also used for the books.
In other words .... it's all over the shop,and a bit of a Dill's dinner really. But ....
The proper,official titles are all confirmed here for the first time anywhere.
And that goes for the 1st transmission dates too [ which aren't exactly straightforward either ! ] ....
The 1st transmission dates
100% definite : -
All the 1st Broadcast dates for both The Herbs and The Adventures of Parsley are the actual ones.
It's the 1st time they've appeared anywhere and were sourced by me directly from all the relevant issues of the Radio Times.
As mentioned above,The Herbs episode titles were all printed.But The Adventures of Parsley ones weren't.
But the order they appeared in has been supplied by the Rights holders.
Although they couldn't supply the 1st broadcast dates,hence some of the following gaps ...
Still to be confirmed : -
- The last episode of The Adventures of Parsley called "Old Memories"
This one's very odd,because I can't find it anywhere.
And I've dug sufficiently deep into 1970 to conclude that it was never actually broadcast 1st time around -for whatever reason.
A conclusion that's also backed-up by it's failure to appear on any of the vhs releases - the only episode that didn't.
And whilst it did finally surface on dvd,there's clearly some sort of story to be told.
- The 1st broadcast dates for the last 3 Herbs episodes are also still unknown.
The first 10 are nice and sequential. Appearing every monday for 10 weeks straight.
But I've been unable to trace the last 3.
Although I can at least confirm that they definitely weren't shown in weeks 11 to 13,or in the immediate weeks thereafter.
1. Mon. 12th Feb. Parsley's Tail
2. Mon. 19th Sage's Nest Blows Down
3. Mon. 26th Belladonna the Witch
4. Mon. 4th March Tarragon and the Eggs
5. Mon. 11th The Chives Catch Colds
6. Mon. 18th Pashana Bedhi,Snake Charmer
7. Mon. 25th Miss Jessop Tidies Up
8. Mon. 1st April Parsley and the Circus Lion
9. Mon. 8th Sage's Singing Lessons
10. Mon. 15th Sir Basil's Fishing Expedition
11. Strawberry Picking See "Still Pending" above
12. The Show See "Still Pending" above
13. The Birthday Party See "Still Pending" above
The Herbs 1968
All these 1st Herbs broadcasts were shown in the same BBC 1 lunchtime,"Watch With Mother" slot.
Colour tv wasn't to arrive on the BBC for another year and a half,so they were all originally broadcast in black and white. Although,fortunately for all concerned,the producers did have the foresight to shoot them in colour !
The Adventures of Parsley 1970
1. Mon. 6th April Cowboys and Indians (Radio Times pic)
2. Tues. 7th Aunt Mint's Barbecue Party
3. Wed. 8th Toothache
4. Fri. 10th Dill's Who's Who Entry
5. Mon. 13th Parsley's Invention of a Mechanical Dog
6. Wed. 15th Holiday's at Home
7. Mon. 20th Parsley at a Loose End
8. Tues. 21st Dill's Restaurant
9. Wed. 22nd Sage's Birthday
10. Fri. 24th Buried Bones
11. Mon. 27th The Conch Shell
12. Tues. 28th Putting on a Show
13. Wed. 29th Works of Art by Dill
14. Fri. 1st May The Crystal Ball
15. Mon. 4th Dill's Day
16. Tues. 5th The Quiz
17. Wed. 6th Dill's Television Set
18. Fri. 8th Eggs and a Golf Ball
19. Mon. 11th On Strike
20. Tues. 12th The Pop Group
21. Wed. 13th Mahatma Dill
22. Fri. 15th The Art of Self Defence
23. Mon. 18th Parsley's Insomnia
24. Tues. 19th Parsley's Car
25. Wed. 20th Dill Learns French
26. Thurs. 21st School Prize
27. Fri. 22nd Dill's One Dog Show
28. Tues. 26th Dill's Garage
29. Wed. 27th The Endurance Test
30. Thurs. 28th Ugh Day
31. Fri. 29th Taxi Service
32. Old Memories See "Still Pending" above.
All the Advens of Parsley episodes made their debut in the same BBC 1 5.44pm slot,just before the early evening news.
And all were broadcast in colour,although many people still didn't have a colour tv license so would only have seen them in black & white. ( colour had only arrived on the BBC in the autumn of 1969,and was phased in gradually )
You'll notice that the dates are not all completely sequential. And the various reasons are as follows:-
1} They were only shown monday to friday.None at the weekends.
2} For most of the run,no episodes were broadcast on a thursday either ....
The length of the weekly Basil Brush Show meant there wasn't enough time to fit one in.
But when that series ended it was replaced by a different,slightly shorter programme which enabled the 2 late-in-the-day thursday appearances on May 21st & 28th
3} There was no broadcast on April 14th due to coverage of the Budget.
4} There was no broadcast on April 17th due to coverage of Apollo 13 ( which really sets the historical context ! )
5} There was no broadcast on May 25th due to the Bank Holiday "Grandstand" program.
