1956 Lord of the Rings: BBC For The Schools

Date: 1956.01.19
Language: English
Organisation: BBC The Home Service
Programme: For The Schools, Adventures in English
Duration: 6 x 20 minute episodes
Unabridged: No
Country: UK
Licenced: Yes

For The Schools was a long-running BBC educational show consisting of three strands, each broadcast on different days – Adventures in History, Adventures in Science and Adventures in English, of which this was a part. Adapted by Silvia Goodall who worked on a wide range of educational projects including biographies, poems, and book adaptations. Episodes were broadcast live to classrooms with the children listening and then writing, making, drawing etc something relating to the episode, guided by the teacher.

This productions and the BBC Terence Tiller adaptation were the only ones made and released during Tolkien’s lifetime. All of which are now lost as the BBC did not usually retain recordings at this time and no off-air recordings are known to exist. We don’t even have all of the episode titles – the Radio Times only published four out of the six. The story appears to have been following The Fellowship as far as Rivendell at least and then one final episode entitled The Two Towers.

Episodes: