Hickory House (TV series)

Hickory House
Genre	Children's television series
Presented by	Alan Rothwell Nicolette Chaffey Louise Hall-Taylor Amanda Barrie Julia North
Voices of	Barry Smith
Theme music composer	Derek Hilton
Country of origin	United Kingdom
Original language(s)	English
No. of seasons	5
No. of episodes	129
Production
Producer(s)	John Coop
Running time	20 minutes
Release
Original network	ITV
Picture format	4:3
Audio format	Monaural sound
Original release	12 March 1973 – 1 July 1977

Hickory House was a British television programme aimed at pre-school children. It was produced by Granada Television from 1973 to 1977 and broadcast on weekday lunchtimes.

Each programme was usually hosted by a pair of presenters, most often including Alan Rothwell. The setting was a normal house, but in Hickory House household objects were brought to life through puppetry. The puppet characters included Humphrey Cushion (a sleepy grey cushion with a fondness for bananas), Dusty Mop (a bad-tempered mop with a long red nose) and the Handle Family. The puppets were created by Barry Smith's Theatre of Puppets.

All 129 episodes survive in Granada's archive, although none has yet been released on DVD.

The animated opening title sequence of Hickory House began with Granada Television's "G" logo transforming into a house. This innovation was used again in 1978 with the game show 3-2-1, when Yorkshire Television's "Y" logo was worked into an animated title sequence. Curiously, this later programme also featured a character named "Dusty" based on a household item (in this case, a dustbin).

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