Bill and Ben the Flower Pot Men was one of the first television shows aimed specifically at children, way back in 1952. Despite being 67 years old, the cult puppet show is still fondly remembered today, with episodes on YouTube attracting thousands of hits.

First broadcast by the BBC on 18th December 1952, the series has become legendary, not least for its invention of the strange new language spoken by its two lead characters! The show was created by design duo Westerham Arts, comprising Freda Lingstrom (head of children's programmes at the BBC) and her friend, Maria Bird.

It was part of the famous Watch with Mother series, which came long before the days of the computer-generated imagery we've come to expect today. Lingstrom and Bird had already completed the successful puppet series, Andy Pandy, before they designed the Bill and Ben show.

 

Bill and Ben inspiration

There has been a long-running disagreement on where the inspiration for Bill and Ben came from. Before Watch with Mother first came on to our TV screens in 1951, its predecessor was the radio show, Listen with Mother.

The radio show broadcast three stories, written by school headteacher Hilda Brabban, of Castleford, in 1951. They featured two characters called Bill and Ben, reportedly based on her brothers, Benjamin and William. She sold the stories to the BBC for one guinea each.

Brabban's daughter, Diana Chamberlain, described her mother as an "inspired teacher", who was an accomplished storyteller. It was generally believed the Bill and Ben TV show came about as a result of Brabban's original radio stories.

However, after her death at the age of 88, in September 2002, a public debate began in the media on the true origins of the characters, with both Brabban's family and Lingstrom's estate claiming responsibility.

 

Strange language

The puppets in the Flower Pot Men series had their own strange language. In fact, the way they spoke became a topic of hot debate in the media.

Bill and Ben were identical puppets made from flower pots, with gardening gloves for hands and hobnail boots on their feet. They spoke a largely nonsensical version of English, called Oddle Poddle. The language added extra syllables such as "ickle" or "kickle" to words, making it sound like gibberish - for example, an icicle became an "ickle-kickle". Ben's trademark saying was the nonsense word, "flobabdob".

There was also a third character in the TV show, Bill and Ben's friend, Little Weed, who resembled a giant dandelion or a sunflower, with a smiley face. All she said throughout each episode was "weeeeeed", elongating the word in a high-pitched, squeaky voice.

At the end of every episode, before returning to their flower pots, Bill and Ben said goodbye to each other and then to Little Weed by saying, "Babap Ickle Weed."

Educationalists criticised the language, as they said children were picking up on it, hindering their chances of speaking English in a grammatically correct manner!

 

Dispute

It was claimed that the Oddle Poddle language didn't exist in Brabban's original stories. However, without being able to check the original manuscripts, this may, or may not, be the case.

It was also suggested that the character of Little Weed was based on Brabban's little sister, Phyllis. Their brother, William "Bill" Wright, backed up this story, claiming she was nicknamed "Little Weed" as a child because she was so small and slender. nut the family of Freda Lingstrom has disputed this. They said it was a coincidence that the Flower Pot Men on Watch with Mother had the same name as the characters in Brabban's stories.

The families appear to have reached an impasse and agree that the exact truth of the characters' origins is never likely to be known because it all happened so long ago now. Regardless of their inspiration, the rights to the stories were sold to Ben Productions and the successful 1950s children's television series was born.

 

Main characters and plots

The episodes always took place in the garden. Bill and Ben lived in large flower pots and Little Weed grew in the ground behind them. Voice actor Peter Hawkins, who was also the voice of the animated character Captain Pugwash and the Daleks on Dr Who, provided the voices for Bill and Ben.

Hawkins had to master speaking Oddle Poddle to provide Bill and Ben's rather quirky voices. Three puppeteers worked on the show - Molly Gibson, Audrey Atterbury and Martin Grainger. There was a narrator who described the action for young viewers - Maria Bird, of Westerham Arts, had previously voiced Andy Pandy.

The early filming took place on a makeshift set in the BBC's Lime Grove studios, but when the show started becoming more popular, it received its own purpose-built puppet studio.

Each episode had its own self-contained story, with the gardener always toiling at the flower beds. Once he had gone for lunch every day, Bill and Ben would come to life, climbing out of their flower pots, once they had checked that he wasn't about.

 

Simple fun

The plots were full of simple fun, focusing on everyday occurrences. In a typical episode, Little Weed was the lookout and when the gardener had left, she would tap on Bill and Ben's flower pots. The events usually involved some misunderstanding, leading to gentle chaos. For example, in one episode, after Little Weed tapped on Bill and Ben's pots to invite them out, they spotted that the gardener had left a lot of items lying around, including quite a few packets of seeds.

"Slowly, out of the flower pots, came the Flower Pot Men," said the narrator, their faces "smiling all over" at first. Then, the Little Weed began giggling and squealing her catchphrase, "Weeeeed!"

However, due to Little Weed's limited language and the fact she also said "Weeeeed!" to warn them of the gardeners' return, Bill and Ben thought he was already on his way back. They popped straight back into their flower pots, without having had chance to get up to any mischief.

Eventually, said the narrator, they said to themselves, "Surely there’s nobody about," and popped their heads out of their flower pots again. "They went on like this for quite a long time," said the narrator, while Bill and Ben popped in and out of their pots like a jack-in-the-box in a simple visual gag.

Bill and Ben would also have lots of chats with Little Weed and they met a few other occasional characters, such as Dan the Potato Man, who was made entirely from potatoes!

At the end of every show, the gardener would return from lunch and the Flower Pot Men would rush back to their pots, after having some mishap. The narrator would say, "Was it Bill, or was it Ben?" because no-one could tell them apart.

Although the series ran for a relatively short time, ending on 10th June 1953, it was repeated for more than two decades on children's TV and is a cult show today. The original puppets reside in the Museum of London.

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