UK folk of a certain age will remember Rag, Tag and Bobtail as characters from the eponymous BBC children's television programme. On the face of it we could be forgiven for thinking that the names were made up for the show, but, like Andy Pandy - which was clearly influenced by the name namby-pamby, Rag, Tag and Bobtail derives from an earlier phrase. The children's television The later form 'raggle-taggle' is an extension of 'rag-tag'. This was in use from the end of the 19th century, for example, in Sabine Baring-Gould's novel, Urith: a tale of Dartmoor, 1891: The third of the BBC's 1950s daytime pre-school series (after Andy Pandy, 1950, and The Flower Pot Men, 1952-54) took up a Thursday afternoon slot to form a Tue-Wed-Thur three-day schedule. The strand seemingly having reached critical

Rag, Tag and Bobtail may have ended up as the names of the cute and harmless nursery characters on BBC children's Television, but that naming was, probably quite innocently, derived from a less than savoury bunch. A New Dictionary of the Terms Ancient and Modern of the Canting Crew, circa 1700, lists the definition of Riff-Raff as: One of the puppeteers with the London Marionette Theatre was Jan Bussell. He formed Hogarth Puppets in 1932 with Ann Hogarth, and they subsequently married. Bussell became a BBC television producer, and began televised puppet shows in 1937, with the Hogarth Puppet Cabaret, although several other puppet companies were broadcast as well before the Second World War. During this period there were no regular children’s programmes on television, but there were performances of puppet shows for adults as well.Rag, Tag and Bobtail' is another one of those shows watched in my childhood on videotapes of very old shows (long after the show first aired), some of them with puppetry, that left a big impression on me at the time for its unique characters and ahead of the time atmosphere. Also one of those shows that was forgotten about for a while after it started to fade into relative obscurity. Then saw pictures of the characters somehow by chance when researching old puppet shows and decided to relive those fond memories. Music is easy on the ear and is never overused or bombastic. The theme tune is another catchy and charmingly written one. All the characters are endearing and charmingly quaint and don't come over as one-dimensional. That version of the expression is best remembered via the popular English folk song The Raggle-Taggle Gypsy. This was collected in Somerset by the founding father of the English folk song revival Cecil Sharp. With Charles Marson, Sharp published Folk Songs from Somerset, 1904: Although Andy Pandy had been regularly broadcast every week since mid-1950 (normally on Tuesdays), [3] and was joined by Flower Pot Men in December 1952 (normally on Wednesdays), [4] the name Watch with Mother was not adopted until April 1953, [5] shortly before the programming was expanded to three afternoons a week with the addition of Rag, Tag and Bobtail that September. [6] The "classic" cycle of shows was in place by September 1955, with the first showing of The Woodentops. [2]

The choice of Watch with Mother for the title of the series was intended "to deflect fears that television might become a nursemaid to children and encourage bad mothering". [2] Show cycles [ edit ] Rag, Tag and Bobtail is a BBC children's television programme that ran from 1953 to 1965 as the Thursday programme in the weekly cycle of Watch With Mother. The scripts were written by Louise Cochrane, [3] and the series was produced by Freda Lingstrom and David Boisseau. Narration was by Charles E. Stidwell, David Enders, and James Urquhart. [1] From April 1963, Watch with Mother was moved to 10.45am (with a further slot at 1.30pm from September 1963). Tales of the Riverbank joined the Watch with Mother Monday slot in December 1963, and caused worries that the original five shows would be replaced. [8]

The art of the puppeteer is an ancient one, so it is not surprising that this form of entertainment has a long history in broadcasting. Puppetry can be string puppets (marionettes), glove puppets, or other forms such as rod and shadow puppets. Most of those seen on television have been in the first two categories. Furthermore, the writing has a good deal of charm. It is very easy for younger audiences to understand, but does so without resorting to juvenile or dumb humour or using over complex terminology. Older audiences shouldn't find it a problem either, and find plenty to be amused by and be charmed by its simplicity. The stories are full of quaint charm and wisely keep things simple, they don't come over as too slow either. The childhood innocence is very strong and in a way that is immensely charming and hard to resist, without being too sentimental.

Between 1950 and 1955 came the debuts of Andy Pandy, The Woodentops, the Flowerpot Men, Rag, Tag and Bobtail and Picture Book, which became the five weekday inhabitants of a new slot called Watch with Mother. This was created by the Head of the BBC Children’s department, Freda Lingstrom, naming it in parallel to the radio series Listen with Mother. The title Watch with Mother came in during 1953, but was heralded at the end of the previous year, in a Radio Times article outlining the plans for young children’s programmes. By late 1955 every day from Monday to Friday had a different, filmed, Watch with Mother programme. Flower Pot Men(aka Flowerpot Men, and oftern referred to as "Bill and Ben") began on 18 December 1952. The series was based on characters created by Hilda Brabban, which had first appeared in Listen with Mother in 1951. The stories were narrated, and the main characters Bill and Ben voiced by, Peter Hawkins, in a nonsense language he devised called Oddle Poddle.

Categories

The three main characters are Rag, a hedgehog; Tag, a mouse; and Bobtail, a rabbit; five baby rabbits also appeared occasionally. All the characters are glove puppets, created and operated by Sam and Elizabeth Williams. The stories were simple and there were no catch-phrases as there were in other programmes in the cycle, but the series is still remembered with affection. Twenty-six 12-minute episodes were made, two of which were never broadcast, [1] each shot in a single take. Andy Pandy made his first appearance on Tuesday 11 July 1950, as part of an experimental run of four programmes. The narrator was Maria Bird, who also wrote the script and music, and designed the sets. In the first few episodes Janet Ferber sang the songs, then Gladys Whitred took over. The first puppeteer was Audrey Atterbury, and the puppet of Andy Pandy was based on her son Paul (in later years one of the experts on Antiques Roadshow). In later episodes she was joined by Molly Gibson, to help operate Andy and his friends Teddy and Looby Loo.