When a visitor arrives at Pipkins he is given food and drink as a treat. Pig has noticed this and thinks of ways of appearing himself as a visitor. Tortoise's cousin Turtle comes to visit him. He has been looking forward to having a chat about old times, but there is something odd about Tortoise: he seems too busy to talk to Turtle..... Mr Pipkin’s Workshop 1 st January 1973 This is Mr Pipkins Workshop. Come on in and look around. See all those puppets? Well, Mr Pipkin made them and they are rather special, for they can dance and sing just like humans.

Hartley is a poet, so the whole world has to know it-and he soon becomes very boring................. Oh yes, the chap with the saw is Johnny, Mr Pipkin’s assistant, who has just completed his first animal, an impressive dragon. Johnny and Hartley are going to make a garden swing for a child they know. They’re not too keen on Pig helping them, but yet when it comes to solving their biggest problem, Pig proves to be surprisingly helpful.The trouble with a washing line is that when it is high enough to dry the clothes, it's too high to reach when you want to get them down. Pig comes to the rescue with one of his machines, but creates more problems in the process... Peter visits Pipkins and after a few misunderstandings with Hartley soon becomes friends with everyone Bertha is worried because Mooney is asleep during the daytime. Nobody tells her that Badgers sleep during the daytime because they like her idea of putting on a concert to keep him awake…. Johnny left Pipkins around 1978, to be replaced by Tom (Jonathan Kydd, son of actor Sam Kydd, pictured below), who also moved on in 1980 to be replaced by Peter Potter (Paddy O’Hagan). In later years Sue Nicholls made regular appearances as neighbour, Mrs Muddle.

NIGEL Plaskitt was at drama school when he got a call from an old friend – her husband was a TV set designer with now the disbanded regional channel ATV, and they were looking for a puppeteer for a children’s programme. She and Plaskitt had worked through school weekends and holidays at the newly-established Little Angel Puppet Theatre in Islington, London, and she remembered he was good at voices. The bottom has fallen out of Tortoises world because a flower pot has fallen on his drum and broken it. Can his friends make him happy again? Hartley is spending a lot of time in his bedroom because he thinks there is a monster in the cellar............Johnny left Pipkins around 1978, to be replaced by Tom (Jonathan Kydd), who moved on in 1980, his place taken by Peter Potter (Paddy O'Hagan). In later years Sue Nicholls made regular appearances as the Pipkins' neighbour, Mrs Muddle. The name was somewhat ironic as she was always a calming, self-assured presence around the puppets. Out of a total of 333 episodes, only 135 have survived. The other 197 episodes no longer exist in any format, while two others exist on 625 line PAL colour videotape only as incomplete copies (possibly due to videotape damage caused by poor storage). Nigel Plaskitt — who provided the show's narration, as well as voicing and operating Hartley and Tortoise – made off-air domestic videocassette recordings of around 56 episodes, now the only format in which these are known to exist, and some have been used for the DVD release in the UK. [2] Cast [ edit ] Role Pipkins the help people have another job to do. A man who looks after elephants is unhappy with his bath.... Hartley tells Mr Pipkin that the workshop is too messy for Octavia to live in. Mr Pipkin promises to tidy up, but soon forgets his task…