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The Stage and Television Today/The World's Fair

The publication The Stage and Television Today has been running for many years, with informed news items, reviews and classifieds for the whole entertainment industry. Among the semi-regular features was a column by 'Charles Trentham' on puppets. This was a pseudonym for Gerald Morice, who also had a column on puppets in the fairground trade paper The World's Fair, and had held the position of editor of The Puppet Master from 1950 to 1952.

While Space Patrol was not a massive series in the world of television, its sale overseas did attract the attention of the front page, while the puppet column had more frequent entries:


Dated January 16 1964
Puppet series for the Children
A half-page interview with Roberta Leigh - a full transcript can be found here.

Dated April 30 1964, page 9 (Front page of Television Today)
British series has best rating in America
Space Patrol, ABC's puppet programme for children, written by Roberta Leigh and produced by Roberta Leigh and Arthur Provis, has achieved in one month the highest rating of any children's show in the United States.
Thirty-nine episodes of this series have been sold to the American television station WPIX
Miss Leigh told Television Today, "Arthur and I are very thrilled. It is certainly unusual for television programmes to cross the Atlantic from Britain, and it is very flattering to know the Americans appreciate this programme so much.
"Of course the setting is in our favour. The Space Headquarters in the programme are based on New York in the year 2000 (sic).
This is the fourth television series that Roberta leigh has written and produced. The others, all children's puppet programmes, are Twizzle, Torchy, and Sara and Hoppity.

This news item was reprinted in the National Interest Pictures brochure reproduced as an extra on the Space Patrol Complete Series Box Set.




Dated April 11 1963, page 7
A new space-puppet series started on Sunday on ITV. This was 'Space Patrol', created and written by Roberta Leigh, directed by Frank Golding (sic), and produced by Roberta Leigh and Arthur Provis. Says Miss Leigh: "It is all too easy to turn a puppet into a mechanical doll with dozens of gimmicks, but my puppets aren't dolls": all their mouth movements are hand-controlled...

Dated July 11 1963, page 20
The new children's puppet space-fiction series, 'Space Patrol,' already been shown on Sunday afternoons by ABC in the Midlands, is now being transmitted by Associated-Rediffusion in its domain and in that of 'Anglia,' as from last friday. Written by Roberta Leigh, whose first space series, 'Torchy,' (also using puppets), was for very young children and began in 1958, 'Space Patrol' is scheduled to run for 26 weeks - on Fridays for the first three weeks, and thereafter every Thursday.

Dated August 22 1963, page 9
Sunday puppet show from ABC
A new puppet series, created by Roberta Leigh for the young 'Space Patrol' starts this Sunday on ABC at 4.00pm. The period is set in the year 2100 A.D.when rockets as we know them today are a thing of the past and are kept in museums.

© 1963 'Charles Trentham' (Gerald Morice)/The Stage and Television Today

Next Feature
Husky's Technical Manual
Galasphere
Freighter
Missiles
Interceptors
Confectionery
Robots
New York
UGO HQ
UGF HQ
We close on the blazing sun in space before fading to a view of ringed planet Saturn. A gyroscope-like ship, enclosed in a flickering bubble of energy, speeds past us and beyond accompanied by almost musical radiophonic tones. We see it pass the Moon before spinning away to the twilight of the Earth's curved horizon... As we hear a grinding rhythmic electronic score, we see scenes of a futuristic city under a dramatic sky. Some buildings and antennae rotate, light pours from other structures as bullet-shaped and spherical vehicles move rapidly back and forth... 'This is Earth - the year 2100. New York is the headquarters of Space Patrol and men from Earth, Mars and Venus live and work there as guardians of peace. This is the story of those men, whose courage and daring make the universe safe for us all.'
We close on the blazing sun in space before fading to a view of ringed planet Saturn. A gyroscope-like ship, enclosed in a flickering bubble of energy, speeds past us and beyond accompanied by almost musical radiophonic tones. We see it pass the Moon before spinning away to the twilight of the Earth's curved horizon... As we hear a grinding rhythmic electronic score, we see scenes of a futuristic city under a dramatic sky. Some buildings and antennae rotate, light pours from other structures as bullet-shaped and spherical vehicles move rapidly back and forth... 'This is Earth - the year 2100. New York is the headquarters of Space Patrol and men from Earth, Mars and Venus live and work there as guardians of peace. This is the story of those men, whose courage and daring make the universe safe for us all.'
We close on the blazing sun in space before fading to a view of ringed planet Saturn. A gyroscope-like ship, enclosed in a flickering bubble of energy, speeds past us and beyond accompanied by almost musical radiophonic tones. We see it pass the Moon before spinning away to the twilight of the Earth's curved horizon... As we hear a grinding rhythmic electronic score, we see scenes of a futuristic city under a dramatic sky. Some buildings and antennae rotate, light pours from other structures as bullet-shaped and spherical vehicles move rapidly back and forth... 'This is Earth - the year 2100. New York is the headquarters of Space Patrol and men from Earth, Mars and Venus live and work there as guardians of peace. This is the story of those men, whose courage and daring make the universe safe for us all.'