It’s a pity that such a well-loved and influential TV series has gone un-heralded; unlike many others which the BBC does seem to champion. As I feel it’s my duty to raise awareness of all the ‘Victorian Kitchen Garden’ series, I see now as the time to start campaigning to get the 30th Anniversary of VK celebrated on/by the BBC in 2 years time.
I’m not holding my breath but I am going to give it my best shot. If anyone wants to join me by writing/texting/emailing/tweeting/faxing/pigeon-posting the BBC (and anyone else who might hold some sway) to get them to see the light and mark the anniversary of the introduction into our lives of ‘Auntie’ Ruth Mott, and a second swathe of excellent programmes from the ‘Victorian Kitchen Garden’ stable.
What the BBC got absolutely right in 1989 was the schedule timing. In the 13 weeks prior to ‘The Victorian Kitchen’ starting, they re-ran the first series in the same Thursday slot. This meant on 12th October, 1989, we watched Harry close the big green doors at Chilton Foliat on one series and, a week later, we were treated to seeing Harry open them up again for a second marvellous season.
FYI, there’s a BBC project that’s been running for a while which is called ‘Genome’. It’s basically the text content of ‘Radio Times’ listings from 1923 until 2009 (when they sold the title off) in a searchable web-site. Recently I’d noticed that they’ve been promoting a new ‘archive’ aspect and, e.g., ‘Tweeting’ about (radio/TV) things that had happened in previous years ‘on this day’. Lately, for instance, they highlighted that Michael Palin’s ‘Around the World in 80 Days’ had its first broadcast on 11th October, 1989. Hoping it would lead me to the equivalent for ‘The Victorian Kitchen’, I followed the links for October Anniversaries but I was sorely disappointed: nothing about ‘Victorian Kitchen’ under October, and nothing about ‘The Victorian Kitchen Garden’ under September, either. Something definitely isn’t right in the State of Genome . . .
#OTD #ThrowbackThursday #VictorianKitchenGarden #RuthMott #HarryDodson