WANDERLY WHAT?
Jun 15th, 2010 by Conor McCabe
I never watched Wanderly Wagon. I have no memories of it apart from the theme tune and the Safe Cross Code. And I don’t remember anybody in school ever talking about it. We didn’t stand around in the playground going ‘ahhh did you see Judge and Crow yesterday? Did you see O’Brien talking to his grandmother and then having his dinner? Wow!”
It wasn’t a conscious thing. We just had access to other shows. Not just the visceral ones like in the clip below, but other ones like Bagpuss , Camberwick Green, Mr. Benn, and Why Don’t You?.
So when I see those clip shows RTE always puts on, of people in their thirties and forties going on about Wanderly Wagon and how it was such a part of their childhood, I always go, huh?
Anyway, I this is kinda what I mean.
Enjoy.
when I see those clip shows RTE always puts on, of people in their thirties and forties going on about Wanderly Wagon
I think that was known as ‘One Channel Land’ Conor - lived in it for most of me childhood - due to me Da being at war with whatever that cable crowd were….
Ah, the Banana Splits - brings back memories
Fat Yank blokes
On Speed
In Costumes
what more could a kid want ??
Ah you missed out Seán. No Yanks here.
“due to me Da being at war with whatever that cable crowd were”
I think your Dad has some explaining to do to you Seán. We used an aerial in the seventies.
Remember the Dickies verison of the Banana Splits song?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flMS2gHFOH0
We had to travel from Cork to our ‘holidays’ - a week’s ligging in parents’ friends house - in wexford to get more than one channel. Why Don’t You was like a whole other world.
LATC - didn’t know that version but ta for the link. The video wasn’t sponsored by Ireland’s leading anti-post-colonialists, Fyffes, by any chance ?
Conor - we used to have an aerial too - but it only worked in certain atmospheric conditions. Atmospheric conditions common in the Saudi desert but not in Northside Dublin. I think ‘RTV Rentals’ (or ‘Rentboys’?) was the name of the shower..
Eoin - bleddy hell - only 1 week per year of the Welsh ‘Why Don’t You’… and you still managed to grow up to be a fully functioning adult. Well done.
Look at your passport, son.
It says ‘Republic of Ireland’, not ‘Republic of Dublin’.
Just because you went whoring after the false gods of the Saxon, doesn’t mean the rest of us can’t wax nostalgic over the wagon that wandered.
O’Brien goes to the shops and eats some chocolate. Then he plays snakes and ladders with his granny.
How did ye contain yourselves?
I grew up in one channel land too, although for the first 7 years of my life, we lived behind a mountain in East Donegal which meant I only saw the BBC - I was a gloriously British child until we moved to Galway . There, we read books written in our melodious native tongue, played manly hurling and danced the walls of Limerick with the Girls from Taylor’s Hill, ignoring the cathode God in the corner of the parlour….. Mainly because all that was on it was Wanderley Wagon and the Virginian. it wasn’t til we moved to Dublin that I heard pop music, or wore shoes everyday.
As I now see on a daily basis the ways in which Dubliners walk around affirming the divinity of man, I can only guess at the edification you must have gained from access to foreign television channels.
no worries Dr. X. Listen, how does the Angelus go again? It’s “bong” isn’t it? Followed by “bong”, then “bong” then oh I don’t know what’s next ‘cos at that stage I was too busy watching Space 1999.
“all that was on it [RTE] was Wanderley Wagon and the Virginian”
Well that’s Crystal Swing explained anyway.
I existed in a sort of opposite universe to this. In our house in the late 70s early 80s the RTE signal rarely ever worked. So I loved Bagpuss and Mr Benn and Camberwick Green, but when the RTE signal did work there were a couple of things I used to go mad for: Wanderly Wagon and this other show made by the Children’s Television Workshop which had some of the characters of Sesame Street, some of the Muppets, and even Spiderman put in an odd appearance. But for me Wanderly Wagon had an enticing mystique: a traveller from an antique land, if you will. But Bosco was pure shite. Apart from when they used to film inside his box.
Does anyone remember a show called ‘Freewheelers’?
’Brien goes to the shops and eats some chocolate. Then he plays snakes and ladders with his granny. ‘
Ah Conor, that only happened once or twice, most of the time it was serious shit with Sneaky Snake and Niall of the Nine Sausages, and some fella called Rory. And the wagon could fly, if I remember correctly. The Beverley Hillblillies, F Troop and The Sullivans made up the rest of our viewing until someone put up a huge illegal mast on some mountain in Clare around 1982.
Does anyone remember a show called ‘Freewheelers’?
No, Dr W, but I recollect a shower called the ‘FineGaelers’.
(cue drum roll)
Born late 60s so rared in a multi channel Dublin during the seventies. We had all the channels but weren’t allowed watch anything but RTE after 8 o’clock as the BBC, UTV etc would only be showing foreign British filth.
Although allowed watch only RTE after 8 pm, We were still banned from watching Dallas and Dynasty as it was American filth. ( I gathered that America at the time was “Rotten with Sex”.) Needless to say we watched Dallas every chance we got and as there were no remotes we invariably got caught.
Usually as my mother walked in what would be on the screen but a couple in the bed….. which led to the question…
“Are they married?”
Multi-channel land for me also. There was some “filth” mind you, the BBC’s “Play For Today” had some memorable ones that made an impression. Mind you that was later on as a teenager, and post 9pm watershed.
Just on ‘Play for Today’. The quote which starts off my other post on the 70s is taken from Dennis Potter’s “Blue Remembered Hills”, which had a profound affect on me as a child. It was broadcast in January 1979 as part of “The Tuesday Play” series on BBC2.
Surely this thread reveals the real reason for the depth of unionist hostility to a united Ireland from the 1950s onwards?
They were smart people. Stare long enough into Wanderly Wagon, and Wanderly Wagon stares into you.