Superman Programme

Souvenir brochure, late 1978

This one’s cheating - I actually still lived in Airedale when I bought this for 50p back in 1979, so it doesn’t actually fall within the Fairburn timeframe and shouldn’t really be here - but I was with Louise Harrison (of Ward’s 7 fame) when I got it, so it’s tangentially relevant, and who cares anyway? My site, my rules to bend. It’s a 24-page souvenir brochure I bought at a screening of Superman The Movie. I say I bought it, but more likely Louise’s Mum Pam bought it, because it was her that took us to see it. Maybe at the Odeon in Leeds, which is where we usually went to see big films like this, though if Pam was in loco parentis it’s likely we went somewhere closer to home. Castleford still had a cinema on Albion Street back then, so it might have been there. It could have been 1978. The date on every single page of the programme says 1978 in tiny letters, and IMDB has the release date pegged as December 14, 1978. But I’ve always remembered it as early 1979. Usually back then, whatever time a film was released, it wouldn’t necessarily appear everywhere in the UK at the same time, and it might take several months before it came to an unwashed backwater like West Yorkshire. So I’m sticking to it. Beyond that, there isn’t much to say about it. All the info’s inside. It’s different to the American one I’ve seen online, mainly because that one’s black and this is white, but there’s also slightly more production detail in this one. Oh and I really should point out that 50p was a lot of money back then. Marvel Weeklies were usually 10p each, so it’s five weeks’ worth of comic money. I shudder to think how many sweets you could buy with it, but hopefully we each got 50p worth of those too. Thanks, Pam. Unless my Mum gave you the money, in which case, thanks Mum.

Back to Ward’s 7

Clarke Hall Old Houses Fairburn v Burton Salmon The Forgotten World String Orchestra Sheet Lightning Grezelda the Witch Bonfire Night Metropolitan Police Christmas 1979 Great Space Battles Luddenden The Hat’s Adventure Sleeping Beauty What I Do On Monday Waen Shepherd 2 Waen Shepherd in: Green Squids Ward’s 7: Move of the Galaxy Ward’s 7: Alpha Centauri Ward’s 7: Escape to Mother Ship Ward’s 7: Death Planet Blake’s 7 Ward’s 7: The Hunt The Flame in the Desert The Fugitive British Skiing Events Ward’s 7: Rescue Fiends of the Eastern Front Black Hawk Profile Apeth (from Outer Space!) Tedosaurus (from Prehistoric Time!) A Walk in Our Village The Mountain Called Tyrannosaurus Rex Florence Nightingale War of the Worlds The Micronauts in: Supersilver

TERM 2 The birth of the 1980s - Blake’s 7, Blondie and battles in space

Great Space Battles Three mighty empires take their first steps into outer space

Darth Vader An autograph from a genuine stand-in

Ward’s 7 John Ward and his band of rebels fight the evil Federation