Wombles

The Wombles are fictional pointy-nosed, furry creatures created by Elisabeth Beresford and originally appearing in a series of children's novels from 1968. They live in burrows, where they aim to help the environment by collecting and recycling rubbish in creative ways. Although Wombles supposedly live in every country in the world, Beresford's stories are concerned with the lives of the inhabitants of the burrow on Wimbledon Common in London, England. The characters gained a higher national profile in the UK in the mid-1970s as a result of a BBC-commissioned children's television show which used stop-motion animation. A number of spin-off novelty songs also became hits in the British music charts. The Wombles pop group was the idea of British singer and composer Mike Batt. The Womble motto is "Make Good Use of Bad Rubbish". This environmentally-friendly message was a reflection of the growing environmental movement of the 1970s.

Links to Peel
Peel wrote about the Wombles in an article on Sounds, published on 4th January 1975, stating that he couldn't come to terms with them:

"I can't come to terms with their stuff at all. They are, I feel, the Bobby Vinton of the 70's"

During 1975, Peel who would often tell the story on his shows, mentioned seeing at Mallory Park, the BBC sub-aqua team trying to keep away Bay City Rollers fans from approaching an island where the group were arriving. At the same time he saw on a lake, Tony Blackburn on a speedboat driven by two members of the Wombles.

Despite not playing any Wombles tunes on his own shows, Peel did play a Christmas tune from the ensemble called Wombling Merry Christmas on a Christmas radio special called Only At Christmas in 1987.

Shows Played

 * 1987
 * Only At Christmas: Wombling Merry Christmas (7”) CBS