The Impatient Horse

Last week the BBC forwarded on to me a letter from the son of George Murray, author of probably the rarest Ladybird Book for collectors: The Impatient Horse. It was a lovely letter and in it he mentioned the origins of the story:

"In those days United Dairies, who had a depot at Esher, delivered milk in horse-drawn vans. Our milkman was called Old Harry and my mother, who had a kind heart, used to offer him a cup of tea which he would drink in the kitchen of our suburban house. The horse would, of course, have to wait for him and after a few minutes he would get fed up and would try to come into the gate, pulling his cart right across the pavement"

Apparently Murray wrote another book for Ladybird in the same style: "The Fairy Fair". But for some reason the IH did not sell well, the series was discontinued and The Fairy Fair, presumably, was lost to the world.

But at least The Impatient Horse's short life-span has ensured that today it is loved and prized by Ladybods.

Fickle fame

It was great fun being famous for a whole day or two! My son enjoyed being treated as a celebrity for about the same time. But I'm afraid my 15 minutes of fame seem to have worn off. On Monday lots of people wanted to talk to me. On Tuesday I was stopped in the street by a total stranger. Wednesday, nothing. By Thursday I felt like going up to people and saying - Don't you know who I AM?

Tomorrow I'm dragging long-suffering husband and son half-way across the country to buy another huge hoard of Ladybird Books. I have no idea what will be in the collection - probably nothing very special but I shall thoroughly enjoy sifting through them looking for upgrades or anything different to add to the collection. What to do with the ones I then don't want, I really don't know. It's not as if there's any storage space left in our small house which hasn't already been colonised by LBs. But that's the problem for another day.

Hooray for the Antiques Roadshow!

We got a letter today from the BBC saying that there is to be a second programme made from the footage of the Modern Collectables edition of the Antiques Roadshow, filmed in the summer and that our clip is to be featured! This might only mean a 20 second snippet or the whole of it - I don't know. But my son is delighted!

So finally, dear reader, our moment in the sun (and the wind and the rain) at Bexhill on Sea is to be shared with the nation on Sunday 17th of February.

The joy of Sussex!

Cinderella has a ball in charity shop

Once upon a time ... it was possible to walk into a secondhand bookshop and come across rows of lovely matt, 1960s Ladybird Books priced at 50p each. This was quite a few years ago, when I had just started collecting.

Now it's pretty rare to come across a shelf-full anywhere at any price. But some charity shops are more enlightened in Ladybird Lore than others and know not to throw out matt cover gems just because they aren't in perfect condition or with a wipe-clean surface.

The shop in the picture is 'Oxfam Books and Music' in West Market Place, Cirencester in the Cotswolds, a stone's throw from the parish church in the centre of town. They have a lot of very good condition early Well-loved Tales for sale as well as good clean copies from other popular series.

Not at 50p each of course, but it's a good cause.

Frank Hampson

I've just put together a new page in the 'Artists' section on the illustrator Frank Hampson. Frank was one of the small group of artists who, after war time service, worked for The Eagle comic before moving to Ladybird in the 1960s.

But before working on this page, I hadn't realised how instrumental Hampson had been in the very creation of The Eagle and how central a role it played in his life as an artist. Hampson is best known for Dan Dare - the character he created from the very birth of The Eagle. By comparison, Hampson's work for Ladybird was less all-consuming - perhaps a way to pay the bills when he felt forced to leave The Eagle. But the artistic freedom he had enjoyed producing comic-strips led him to take a very unusual approach to some of the more 'mundane' topics he illustrated for Ladybird. He often illustrated scenes from a very unexpected perspective - giving his books a rather surreal appeal.

The most creative Ladybird commission he got was to illustrate the three 1960s Nursery Rhymes books. Hampson's unconventional approach either appealled strongly to children - or rather scared them. I was in the latter camp, personally - but lots of people seem to recall these books with great affection and they are getting harder and harder to find now.

And the winner is ...

It will come as no surprise to long-standing LB book collectors to hear that this year Nicole (from Australia) was the first to crack the Christmas quiz. (Answers from two other continents followed swiftly behind hers). But Nicole wins back her tinsel crown for another year.

The answers were:

Christmas Carol: Memory
Our Land ...: Anglo-Saxon
Weather: Rainfall
Mick: Lucky
Musical Instruments: Eighteenth
Toys and Games: Yacht
Downy: Splash

Beauty & Beast: Gift
Great Inventions: Hall
Raleigh: Overseas
Numbers: Sweets
The Party: Trousers

The hidden character was therefore ... Marley's Ghost.

Happy New Year

Ladybird Christmas Quiz

This year's Ladybird Christmas Quiz is here:
If you've got a decent collection of Ladybird Books to consult (or don't mind having a few guesses) have a go.

Having completed the quiz, the first letter of every correct answer, when correctly arranged, will give the name of a Christmas character from a Ladybird Book. The first person to email me this word will join a small and select band of Christmas Quiz winners and win a Ladybird clip (worth about 10p!)

Good luck and Happy Christmas