Mr Piper
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mr Piper was a Canadian children's TV series made in 1963. It was originally shown by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and also became well-known in the UK, where it was repeated on ITV throughout the 1960s and 1970s and became a fixture of school summer holiday programming, in much the same way as Robinson Crusoe and Belle and Sebastian were on BBC1. Thirty-nine episodes were produced.
The show's host was a large Canadian opera tenor Alan Crofoot, dressed as a Pied Piper with a flower in his hat. He would introduce four segments in each half hour programme:
- Teletune - as a narrator of a fantasy stories illustrated with graphics;
- Port of Call - presenter of films about children and events in other lands;
- Bag of Tricks - Crofoot performs magic tricks;
- Animal Farm - many farmyard characters telling the story of the day in miniature barnyard sets, featuring Rupert the Rat, Bessie the Bunny, Kookie the Kitten, Harriet Hen, Freddie Frog, Calvin (Rac)Coon and Charlotte Cow.
The series was created by Martin Andrews and Allan Wargon, who was also the producer. Crofoot committed suicide on March 5 1979 at the age of 49.
