BLUE PETER BOOKS COVER GALLERY - PART THREE...

Copyright BBC TV

Since doing my previous two posts on the BLUE PETER BOOKS, I've acquired a few more to round off my collection so thought I'd share them with you here.  I was never what you'd call a regular viewer of the programme even if I saw enough of them for it to seem so in memory, but I have a fond affection for the show as it represents part of my childhood and teenage years.

I only caught the occasional episode after LESLEY JUDD departed in 1979, but again, it seems in retrospect that I saw more of them than I actually did, and I must confess to fancying JANET ELLIS (didn't everyone?) when she joined in 1983.  The Twentieth Book was published in the 25th Anniversary of the show, and I've had a softcover copy of the book for quite a few years now, which seemed a bit of an anomaly as the others were in hardback.  I've since discovered that it was a second edition printed by Scholastic Publications, so I assume it was printed for schools.  (I've recently obtained a first-print hardback edition as well.)

I now have Books one to twenty, which represents the first twenty-five years of the programme, and I'll soon have Book forty, which was the last one ever published in 2011.  The only other one I have is Book twenty-eight, published in 1998 to celebrate forty years of Blue Peter.  (Oh, and I've got a Blue Peter stamp album as well.)

"Why not collect them all?" you may well be wondering.  Simply because they mean nothing to me.  The only Blue Peter programmes I've watched in many a year are the Anniversary shows - and that was only to see the presenters from the past who I grew up watching.  Maybe one day I'll add the few remaining ones published in Anniversary years, but it's not at the top of my 'things to do' list.  Time will tell, I guess.