Terranova47's Radio Serial Thrillers

Hello Woodsy,

Here is a book that might interest some readers; SERIAL THRILLERS by Charles Norton.

Mostly it covers BBC Radio serials; PAUL TEMPLE, DICK BARTON, JOURNEY INTO SPACE and from Radio Luxembourg, DAN DARE.

Some blog readers will no doubt remember PAUL TEMPLE from BBC TV in the 1960's. The radio stories began before TV service resumed in the UK.

I remember Dick Barton from my earliest childhood as it was broadcast Monday to Friday at 6:45pm and my parents were glued to the radio listening.

It had a theme tune that was extremely memorable and I still have a book published at the time for kids, which it turned out were the main group of listeners. It includes several of the earliest stories that I was too young to follow.

 A couple of movies were made of the characters one of which has Patrick McNee as a trench coated secret service member, pre Steed.

The time slot eventually was turned over to THE ARCHERS which I believe are still on the air. For me THE ARCHERS is best remembered for one of the funniest episodes of TONY HANCOCK that parodied it as THE BOWMANS. 

This can be found to listen to online and probably best listened to by readers that remember the character, Walter Gabriel.

Journey Into Space was also a comic strip long before the Andersons made space dramas. It had the recognizable voices of David Jacobs and Alfie Bass in the cast.

For me the book is invaluable in having the plots of DAN DARE. This was broadcast not on the BBC but at their commercial rivals, Radio Luxembourg.

The problem for me was that I lived in north London near Alexandra Palace and the BBC signal was so strong static made Dan Dare impossible to listen to.

This is the updated version of Serial Thrillers and it's recommended for anyone with memories of any of these shows.

Terranova47

USA