Whilst transferring some old VHS tapes over to DVD, I stumbled across a recording of some mid-90s CBBC continuity hosted by the one and only Otis the Aardvark... or so I thought, for in the top left corner resides a 'BBC Nickelodeon' DOG.
Quite stumped by this, I scoured the usual places for information about the origins of this strand to no avail; I certainly had no knowledge of its existence prior to finding it on this tape.
So I open it up to the great TV Forum membership to post any details they may have on this unusual alliance (I presume it was some kind of BBC Worldwide tie-up?). In the closing link, Otis says something about 'being back in the afternoon' (unfortunately the recording cuts off before he says where) which leads me to believe it may have been a breakfast strand, if this is of any use. There are no idents or namechecks of Children's BBC or Nick during the links and apparently no ad breaks either. Programmes include Pingu, Fireman Sam and Spider! (the usual 1990s CBBC fare).
Strange how there's so little mention of it online. This Nick Wiki page claims it ran from 1996 - 1999. I remember it as "CBBC on Nick", which is what it was called during the yellow CBBC era - It shared a lot of the same idents, but I think later it may have had a puppet who wasn't Otis, and didn't appear on BBC 1 or 2.
I don't think there was any cross-promotion - presumably mentioning a commercial channel on the proper BBC would be frowned upon, and I suspect that Nickelodeon wouldn't like mentions of other channels either, so it was a sort of odd stand-alone affair. I wonder if that page is right and it really did run until 1999 - given that CBBC Choice would have launched in 1998.
I certainly remember the Children's BBC Presentation department recording these links, and there was a general feeling that it was a coup of sorts to get a BBC Namecheck on a Commercial channel! I can't remember why or even how they managed to secure this deal, but it must have been a worldwide sales deal. Presumably Nickelodeon couldn't show ads during BBC branded sequences. I don't think any of the (human) CBBC presenters did the links - just Otis. They were recorded in Pres A. I certainly remember it happening in 1996/7, not sure how long it lasted.
Similarly rare on TV websites are examples of CBBC Prime links. These were much more in the vein of CBBC on One/Two - with presenter links. CBBC Prime had two slots per weekday and an extended morning slot on Saturdays and Sundays ISTR. The links were always recorded, some generic "Now here's Playdays", some more specific to each programme. In the Yellow/Black CBBC era there were CBBC Prime idents too. Some of the things on Prime had long since disappeared on UK channels (Maid Marion was a notable example - this ran on Prime well into the 2000s, complete with the fantasticly long end credits that they used to sing over in the broomcupboard on BBC One!).
Whilst transferring some old VHS tapes over to DVD, I stumbled across a recording of some mid-90s CBBC continuity hosted by the one and only Otis the Aardvark... or so I thought, for in the top left corner resides a 'BBC Nickelodeon' DOG.
Quite stumped by this, I scoured the usual places for information about the origins of this strand to no avail; I certainly had no knowledge of its existence prior to finding it on this tape.
So I open it up to the great TV Forum membership to post any details they may have on this unusual alliance (I presume it was some kind of BBC Worldwide tie-up?). In the closing link, Otis says something about 'being back in the afternoon' (unfortunately the recording cuts off before he says where) which leads me to believe it may have been a breakfast strand, if this is of any use. There are no idents or namechecks of Children's BBC or Nick during the links and apparently no ad breaks either. Programmes include Pingu, Fireman Sam and Spider! (the usual 1990s CBBC fare).
Thanks for the responses (I should have known there'd have been a thread on here somewhere!).
It would be great to hear of the whys and wherefores of the deal, particularly how they got away with branding it so bullishly as Children's BBC/CBBC on Nick. The strand being part of a deal which saw the BBC gain Nickelodeon programming seems a worthy shout.
Yep - I remember this happening in the 90s, prior to the BBC having any digital TV platforms or launching CBBC on Choice and then the CBBC & CBeebies channels.
It always felt a bit joint-venturey. Nickelodeon got a decent raft of UK quality content, and the BBC got some credit for it. No idea how the money worked - I assume Nickelodeon bought the content and the links via BBC Worldwide?
IIRC it ran on termtime weekdays between 9 and 10am, and then from 2.30 until 3.30pm. But as mentioned Nick didn't mention it much, obviously the BBC didn't, when I first saw this on Nickelodeon (I was 10 at that time) I was quite amazed to see this, although when they managed to get a repeat run for Teletubbies I think the strand got promoted (I might have the ad on tape somwhere) as CBBC On Nick. 1999 sounds about right when it stopped, same time as Nick Jr got its own channel, and when it oddly timeshared with Sky Sports 3 on Sky Analogue.
I remember around 1997/8, although not on the same level you often saw a 'Channel 4 on Paramount' strand, which used the main Channel 4 logo.