The Herbs and The Adventures of Parsley

CLASSIC BBC KID'S ANIMATION DEVISED & WRITTEN BY MICHAEL BOND

ON THIS PAGE..... a set of 8 postcards printed by Arthur Dixon in 1969,and a party invitation variation.

These are actually numbers 1 to 8 of a larger set.With 9 to 26 featuring Camberwick Green.And 27 to 31 reserved for good old Basil Brush.

There's no mention on the backs of anything other than the details for that particular card.So presumably they weren't catalogued collectively as something like "BBC Children's Favourites".And it's possible they weren't even actively marketed as a set.

Ref. L6/8394  BBC 1 " Belladonna "

Ref. L6/8396  BBC 3 " Signor Solidago "

Ref. L6/8397  BBC 4 " Constable Knapweed and Dill "

Ref. L6/8398 BBC 5  "Lady Rosemary, Dill, Sage, Bayleaf, Parsley"

Ref. L6/8399  BBC 6  "Sage"  ( brolly torched by Tarragon btw )

Ref. L6/8400  BBC 7  " Rosemary,Knapweed,Basil & Belladona "

Ref. L6/8401  BBC 8  " Parsley "

Ref. L6/8395  BBC 2  " Tarragon "

I'm also wondering why these particular series were chosen over-and-above the other BBC kids' shows of the period. Apart from the fact that they're all puppet-based.......?

But if you're looking to start collecting a few bits and pieces from any of the series then some nice,glossy stills are pretty hard to beat.And you can still get hold of pristine,unused exampes for around a pound a piece,which can't be bad.

I'm pretty sure they were all specially staged stills too,rather than lifted directly from the broadcast footage.Either shot at the time of filming for general marketing purposes,or later just for these cards.

So,there are 18 for Camberwick,

8 for The Herbs and only 5 for Basil.

With Camberwick having a lot more characters to draw on of course,which also means they probably work better because they're generally 'busier" as a result.

And,sad to say,I reckon some of The Herbs ones are actually a bit dull by comparison.With the Tarragon and Parsley solo efforts suffering from too much incidental background and not enough subject -although they got it right with Sage.

And quite who you'd send a postcard of Belladonna to is another matter entirely.

Granny   ?   The mother-in-law  ?

This last one is a party invitation spin-off,produced at the same time.

Same image as above,just a slightly cropped version and simply turned into 2 pages with a perforated centre line.

The main pic below is the back -which I've only made that big to make the writing legible.And inset are the front & back and the interior.

As it's the only one I've ever seen,I don't know whether they replicated the full set of 8.And whilst logic says that they probably did,it's also entirely possible that it was a one-off.