Watch with Mother
Watch with Mother was a cycle of children's programmes created by Freda Lingstrom and Maria Bird. Broadcast by BBC Television from 1952 until 1975, it was the first BBC television series aimed specifically at pre-school children, a development of BBC radio's equivalent "Listen with Mother", which had begun two years earlier. In accordance with its intended target audience of pre-school children viewing with their mothers, "Watch with Mother" was initially broadcast between 3:45 pm and 4:00 pm, post-afternoon nap and before the older children came home from school. 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. Show cycles. Although "Andy Pandy" had been regularly broadcast every week since mid-1950 (normally on Tuesdays), and was joined by "Flower Pot Men" in December 1952 (normally on Wednesdays), the name "Watch with Mother" was not adopted until January 1953, shortly before the programming was expanded to three afternoons a week with the addition of "Rag, Tag and Bobtail" that September. The "classic" cycle of shows was in place by September 1955, with the first  showing of "The Woodentops". Broadcast at 1:30 pm each day, it comprised: Each of the five classic shows actually consisted of only a very small number of episodes, all made on film – and all in black-and-white. Typically, not more than 26 programmes were filmed for each show, this being sufficient for a run of six months as there was only one broadcast per week. The aim was to provide children's programming on the cheap: the BBC Children's department had an extremely tiny budget, and needed a collection of films which could be endlessly repeated, typically in  six-monthly cycles, for its undemanding pre-school age audience. 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 slot in December 1963. The original programmes had a loyal following, and there was concern when it was learned that they would be replaced by new programmes, as in 1965 when it was (wrongly) rumoured that the new show, "Camberwick Green", would replace "Andy Pandy" and "Flower Pot Men". "Camberwick Green" eventually was slotted in the Monday slot in January 1966 and  saw an end to "Picture Book". Eventually, new programmes were added, including "Tales of the Riverbank", "Pogles' Wood", "The Herbs", "Joe", the Trumptonshire trilogy, "Barnaby", "Mary, Mungo and Midge", "Fingerbobs", "Bod", and "Bizzy Lizzy". After 1975 - Name change and later developments. In 1975, the "Watch with Mother" title was dropped, as it was considered to be dated, and the strand was known as "See-Saw" from 1980 to 1990. A "Watch with Mother" video became a best-seller in 1987, and was followed by a second and a third in 1989 and a fourth in 1993. A 45rpm promotional single  was available to radio disc jockeys, for promo only, entitled "Flob-A-Dob-A-Ben", in 1987. The single was not released on general release and was played often as a novelty record by Radio Trent on the "Andy Marriott Television Show". As the shows were a great success – and fondly remembered by many – modern incarnations of "Andy Pandy" and "Flower Pot Men" have been produced. Under British law, copyright in TV programmes lasts for 50 years from the date of first broadcast. As such, surviving episodes first transmitted between 1950 and are slowly appearing on the Internet Archive. In  the early 2000s, the shows "Andy Pandy" and "Bill and Ben" were remade as stop motion animations, which aired on CBeebies. References. Notes Bibliography