Links

Archers Sites

In no particular order;

Daniel Gordon, host to the very useful map of Ambridge no longer hosts his archive of episodes, but you can still read what the BBC thought
Official pages (complete with RealAudio webcasts) at the BBC's site, with a good general introdution to Radio Four.
The Archers Anarchists - "The Archers are real - there is no cast!"
The Archers Addicts have relaunched themselves as http://www.thearchers.co.uk/. They even have daily summaries. Wherever might they have got that idea?
Alex Foster's Archer's Family Trees.
Tim Bentinck - David Archer's alter ego
The New UMRA FAQ (previously at FAQ and, before that at Gordon Woods' Archers Shrine).
Penny Mayes' page to all things UMRA related.
Peter Hesketh's various bits of Archers knowledge, now hosted by Andy Taylor.
Assorted maps of Ambridge and its environs.
The village shop - with a noticeboard to pin things up on.
UKRadio.com links database (under Information)
I'm sure the Anarchists would like this (even if the UK Usenet committee wouldn't) .... The Borsetshire Web
Borsetshire Family Trees.

Do you maintain an Archers site that I don't link to?

"Leave it to me, Dad"

Tim Bentinck has been flogging off old scripts for charity. (The graphic to the right was the compliment card he sent along with the script - very apt in the recent inheritence storyline!)

Strange Pages

I've listed some of the stranger things out there in web-land associated with the programme

People who link here

There are a growing number of wonderful people with exciting lives, healthy children (be they past, future or present), wonderful senses of humour and full heads of lustrous hair who, in no particular order, link to my Archers pages;

Articles

Doom-di-doom-di-doom-di-doom

Damn! I wish I'd thought of that one ...

"Sic transit gloria mundi" ... I can't remember exactly saying it, but I'm quoted in an article in the SIndy (25/6/00). The reporter also took up my plea to the SWs from below!

Stay!

Recently, William broke a stay while learning the noble art of campanology. What's one of them I hear you cry (as I join your merry chorus):

Basically, the stay is a wooden safety mechanism that stops a bell rotating a full circle. In the ordinary course of ringing, it will swing through 350 degrees, and then change direction. The stay is there to stop the bell continuing in one direction, and winding the rope on up. Usually, you'll break a stay by pulling too hard, so that the bell cannot stop, and smashes the stay, and continues in one direction until it eventually stops, mouth downwards. Letting go is what a beginner absolutely *must* do if he does not want to be pulled up at sixty feet a second and enmeshed into a couple of tonnes of metal! They're not cheap to replace, but they are there to be broken, so people don't tend to mind so long as you don't break too many. The reason they all had to stop is because although you can ring a bell without a stay, you cannot at any time let go of the rope; and to replace the stay on the one bell, they would have had to have secured all the others first, as it is dangerous to walk among bells that are primed and ready to ring. They're bloody heavy, and the move damned fast!

Thanks to Niles

Bob Arnold (1910-1998), RIP

The death was announced on Thursday 27th August of Bob Arnold, for 47 years the voice of Tom Forrest (BBC News' story)

Not quite an original character (he missed the first month), his distinctive voice was, for many, an integral part of the Sunday omnibus, his countryside advice and short homilies being as much a part of what The Archers was about as the storylines themselves. While, for many, Tom matured into a grumpy old man he was still able to be wise and communicative, as his relationship with Hayley last year proved. A genuine countryman, he was originally turned down for the part as his Gloucestershire voice was considered not quite right, but as Tim Bentinck (David), in an on-line chat session only the day before this said news, when asked who is most like their character, "Bob Arnold, he really is Tom Forrest."

While not as regular a player as once was, Bob (and Tom) will be sadly missed by all.

A Roll in the Hay

At the end of a surprisingly (for the Grauniad <grin>) item about the effects of fresh country air on the libido of the villagers, this site even gets a link!

John

I've written a short polemic on the degeneration, as I see it, of The Archers and the need for a responsible hand on the helm of the SS Ambridge .... There are also a collection of newspaper articles available about John's demise .... the Daily Telegraph, the Times and the Guardian, or this locally held copy of an article from the Independent (the indy only allow access to that day's news, the other papers keep the links live).

RIP, Jack May

Jack May, Nelson Gabriel for the last 46 years, passed away on the 19th September. I reproduce here without permission, the obituary that appeared in the The Times on 20th September 1997 and "Roland White's Radio Column" from the Radio Times (11-17 October 1997) - "Nelson: a Character Worthy of a Column" as (currently unavailable - file lost) posted to UMRA by Brenda Selwyn.

Naturally, my condolences and sympathies extend to his family, relatives, colleagues and all fans of the unique Nelson Gabriel, who cannot be replaced and will be sadly missed.

The Telegraph

started a series of extracts from the new book by William Smethurst, an ex-producer, from Saturday 24th to Tuesday 27th August.

Sex, death and mangel-wurzels

The Times

ran some articles on Monday July 8th, included are

Libby Purves' "Somebody had to hit Shula"
an interview with an ex-editor, from 1986-9, Liz Rigby
Some fans' stories
an interview with Hugh Dickson (the late Guy Pemberton)
and Richard Derrington (Mark Hebden) explaining why his character was too dull to live ....
and "Why Grace had to die", an interview with the Archers' founder, Geoffrey Baseley.

If you got here by some other link, don't you think that they deserve to be listed here? :-)

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