Parsley Sidings

Parsley Sidings is a BBC Radio sitcom of the early 1970s created by Jim Eldridge. It stars Arthur Lowe and Ian Lavender (who were starring in the sitcom Dad's Army at the time) and Kenneth Connor from the Carry On films.

The show is set in a sleepy out of the way railway station on the main line between London and Birmingham, in the Midlands. The main characters are the station master, Mr Horace Hepplewhite (played by Arthur Lowe); his son, Bertrand (Ian Lavender); station porter Percy Valentine (Kenneth Connor); Mr Bradshaw, the signalman (also played by Kenneth Connor, as was Clara the station hen); and station tannoy announcer Gloria Simpkins (Liz Fraser, who was also in the Carry On films, and appeared in the Dad's Army feature film). The guest cast in some episodes included Bill Pertwee (also from Dad's Army, appearing in episode 11), Roger Delgado (The Master in Doctor Who in the Jon Pertwee era) with the announcer for the programme being Keith Skues.

The scripts are by Jim Eldridge (who would later go on to write for many more series, the most successful being the BBC's King Street Junior). The series was produced by Edward Taylor, and was broadcast on BBC Radio 2. Due to the BBC's then practice of wiping tapes after the broadcast of a show, only a minority of the 21 episodes produced were still in the BBC archive; Goodbye, Parsley Sidings and The Entente Cordial are aired on BBC Radio 4 Extra occasionally and have always been in the BBC archives, while A Night Out, A Bird in the Hand and The Secret Agent were recovered between 2001 and 2003 as off-air recordings from members of the public. These episodes were aired in early 2007. All the other episodes are known to exist in private hands.

In 2008, more episodes were 'discovered', including the pilot and "The New Level Crossing".

The BBC broadcast some programmes from the series in February 2011. Starting 1 November 2012, 4 Extra began a run of the whole series using audio compiled from both the BBC's own archive and private collections, with intros and outtros re-recorded by original on-stage announcer Keith Skues.

The signature tune is "Banjo Boy" by Roger Roger, from the LP Mood Music Vol. 18 in the Chappell music library. (This music was also used for the signature tune of the 1969–71 British TV series The Mind of Mr. J.G. Reeder.)

Episodes

Series 1
Title	Recorded	First broadcast	Listen
Pilot	Unknown	28 February 1971
The Market Special	Unknown	5 December 1971
The Postal Express	Unknown	12 December 1971
The Beauty Queen Contest	Unknown	19 December 1971
The Inspector Calls	Unknown	31 December 1971
The 1890 Rocket	Unknown	2 January 1972
The Excursion	Unknown	9 January 1972
Cricket, Lovely Cricket	Unknown	16 January 1972
Who'll Be Mother?	Unknown	23 January 1972
The Concert	Unknown	30 January 1972
Goodbye, Parsley Sidings	Unknown	6 February 1972
Series 2
Title	Recorded	First broadcast
Pass The Parcel	Unknown	29 September 1973
The Flower Show	Unknown	6 October 1973
The Entente Cordiale	Unknown	13 October 1973
A Night Out	Unknown	20 October 1973
The Goods Train	Unknown	27 October 1973
A Bird In The Hand	Unknown	3 November 1973
The Purity League	Unknown	10 November 1973
The New Level Crossing	Unknown	17 November 1973
The Film Makers	Unknown	24 November 1973
The Secret Agent	Unknown	1 December 1973

External links

• Parsley Sidings at British Comedy Guide
• Parsley Sidings - more information and some episode synopses
• A more in-depth guideArchived 13 January 2015 at the Wayback Machine