The Railway Magazine – August 2019

Letter from Magpie producerSueTurnerto BR’s Western Regionat Reading,forwarding

Mr Dinneen’s lett er from the DartValleyRailway Associ ation .Its tatestheywerehappy

to do afilmonthe locomotivebut could not help himwith fundraisingto buythe engin

BOTH:ACURTISCOLLECTION

Aboveright: Intere st in buying No.D829 came from theDVRAnotThamesTVor th eMagpie show.

No.D829 at NorthSidings,Waterloo onAugust 9, 1964.ACURTISCOLLECTION

Lieutenant-Commander,and in September he

wasappointed in commandofthe frigate until

1952;theshipwas eventually brokenupinJuly

1959.So, thenameplate unveilingwas nothing

morethanalovelytouch by the instituteand

morewas to comeas theDuke wasthen allowed

to take thecontrolsof‘his’ locomotive.

Beforeheenteredthe cabtobeshownthe

driv ingcontrols,WesternRegion runningand

maintenanceoff icer HEAWhite offered him a

whitecoatand aBRdiesel driver’s cap. The Duke

politelyrejectedthewhite coatfor fear of looking

like amilkman,so it is said,but took thecap,

and at 12.10pm,under supervision, proceeded

to drive D829and itsloadoff ivecoachesfrom

MaryleboneNo. 2sidings toWindsor .Itwas

claimtofamenumber one,but it was alsoalleged

the Duke took controlsof thelocobetween

NewtonAbb ot and Exeter onaRoyal Train

working f romthe West CountrytoPaddingtonin

multiple with No.D826Jupiterin 1961.

Daily duties

Magpiewent back toits dailydutiesafter

its bri ef brush withroyalty andfame. D

was originally allocatedtoPlymouth’s Laira

depot when she entered service, and alternated

betweenthereand Newton Abbot depotfor the

remainderof its life.

In 1969,fame came calling once more.

It was also the year sheist hought to have

undergone her finaltrip to SwindonWorks for

overhaul, emerging in October 1969 to see

out thelast few years of her lifeasBRstarted,

somewhat earnestly,tomake severeinroads into

what were labelled, arguably,asn on-standard

diesel-hydraulics.

However,int he same year, albeit prior to

that final Swindon visit,No. D829 hadbecome

something ofaTVstar thanks toarelatively new

children’s programmecalled, of course,Magpie.

It was shown on ITV from July 30, 1968

to June 6, 1980 and wasamagazine format

show,intended to compete with theBBC’s

Blue Peter,but it attempted to attract more kids

by being more‘hip’,and focusingprimarily on

popularculture.

The show’s creators, LewisRudd and Sue

Turner,named the programme Magpie, as a

reference tothe bi rd’s habitof collecting small

items,andalso because of ‘mag’ beingevocative

of ‘magazine’ and‘pie’ being evocative of a

collection of ingredients.

It was shown weekly until 1969,after which,

until it ended in 1980, it went out twiceaweek.

It was notfully networkedtoall otherITV

companiesuntil the autumnof 1969. Around

1,000 episodes weremade, each of them being

25 minutesin duration.

Thefirstpresenterswerethe formerBBC

Radio OneDJ PeteBrady, Susan Stranks and

Tony Bastable.

Bradyleftthe show in 1971 to bereplacedby

Douglas Rae and Bastable leftthe following year,

1972, whenhewas replaced by the

long-haired Mick Robertson,while Jenny Hanley

took overfromStranks two yearslater.This

line-upremaineduntil1977, whenTommy Boyd

replacedRae.

In asimilarvein to Blue Pete r, Magpie

featured appeals for various causes and charities.

Notably,however,ita skedfor cash donations

ratherthan stampsor second-handgoods, which

was thestaplecurrency of Blue Peter.

UnliketheBBC pro gramme,Magpiewas

unscripted and the presenters werefreeto

improvise in the presentationof theshowwhich

also hadamascot,amagpie namedMurgatroyd.

Theshow’stheme tunewas played by 1960srock

combothe SpencerDavis Group, whorecorded

and performed underthe alias oftheMurgatroyd

Band. The mainlyric was cribbed from an old

children’s nursery rhyme.

Tony Bastable, who diedatthe ageof62,

was oneoft he bright and breezychildren’s TV

presenters of the era, withafringe,awinning

smile and perfecttee th. Hebecamefamous

on Magpie, andwas ther efromthe startwhen

the newl yfranchised commercial television

company Thamesscreened it onthefirst day of

its transmissions.It wasalsoBastable who was to

feature in theMarch 1969episodewhich saw the

programme highlightthe existence ofatrain with

the same name–‘Warship’Class 42 No.D829.

AlexandraHenwood,ofF reemantle Media,

which now look aftertheThamesTVfilm

archive,confirmed, from its paperrecords of the

period, that the datementioned for the ‘Magpie

dieseltrain’was March5,1969.This, she said,

wasaclose enoughmatch toapiece of archive

film (probablythe inser tonly)dated March 6,

August2019 •TheRailway Magazine•

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