We've been marking 50 years since the debut of the classic BBC sitcom Whatever Happened To The Likely Lads? with a series of stories.
The popular show, first broadcast in January 1973 and running through 1974, was an all-colour sequel of the original black-and-white 1960s Likely Lads. It starred James Bolam and Rodney Bewes as Terry Collier and Bob Ferris, two lifelong pals now approaching middle age and doing their best to navigate the changing world of the 1970s.
Set on Tyneside, the show retains a special appeal for TV viewers in our part of the world. We recently recalled one favourite episode,The Great Race, in which the two out-of-shape friends ill-advisedly take part in a bicycle race to Berwick. Our then-and-now location features revealed the unnamed Tyneside housing estate and Northumberland country pub which featured strongly in the episode.
READ MORE: When Newcastle's legendary La Dolce Vita nightclub was home to the stars - 10 photos
Five decades on, the show's title sequence - backed by the nostalgia-laden theme song Highly Likely - remains memorable. We see solidly working-class Terry, cigarette in hand, waiting at the bus stop and the bus driving past without stopping, while upwardly-mobile Bob is seen proudly standing outside his newly-built semi-detached house with his new car parked the driveway.
The show's title scenes depicted the region under transformation and featured scenes in Newcastle city centre, Byker, Cruddas Park, and the West End, as well as further afield in Killingworth. Fans of the series might also remember this Newcastle East End location that featured in the intro to the show. The modern scene might look relatively the same as it did 50 years ago, but much has changed here - and in the wider world - since the glory days of Terry and Bob.
This is Lime Street, in the Ouseburn Valley, in Newcastle's East End. Back in the summer of 1972 when the footage was captured, the area was still home to a cluster of crafts and industry as it had been for the previous century and more, but it was now in a state of gradual decline.
The chimney which dated from the mid-19th century once served a flax mill but had been reduced in height during World War II. The two bridges which spanned the valley in 1972 - the Ouseburn railway viaduct (1839) and Byker Bridge (1878) which carried road traffic - would later be joined by the Byker Metro Viaduct in 1982.
Today, some of the area's old buildings play host to arts, culture and leisure in a corner of Tyneside which has enjoyed substantial regeneration, thanks to the efforts of the Ouseburn Trust and local authority. The building on the right of the modern picture is Seven Stories - a former seven-storey granary building - now dedicated to children’s books and literature. Opened in 2005 at a cost of £4.5m, many of the original interiors were left intact, while more modern features were blended with the old.
READ NEXT:
- A lost world of 1970s Tyneside pubs is recalled in 10 gritty photographs from Jarrow
- Back to school on Tyneside in the 1980s - 10 classroom photographs
Then and Now: The Northumberland pub featured in a classic TV episode of the Likely Lads
A now-vanished Newcastle record store was getting ready to open its doors
Tyneside 70 years ago: 10 photographs from around our region in 1953
