Coronation Street 1978: The Barlow Twins: RETCON! Twins Lose Two Years of their Lives!

We recently had an email here asking us about our assertion that a Corrie retcon occurred over the Barlow twins' age in 1978. The writer had read in a 50th Anniversary Book that the retcon trend set in in the 'cynical 1980s'.

Ooh, aye, luvvie - the cynical 1980s!

Well, this was in the totally non-cynical (giggle) 1970s. It was 1978. 

The Barlow twins' age retconning was actually put right in the 1980s - in 1986, when they celebrated their twenty-first birthday.

From the Sunday Mirror, December 10, 1978:

WHOOPS! The great minds who think up Coronation Street story-lines for Granada TV have been caught out - by Sunday Mirror readers.

Two of them have spotted a flaw in the otherwise scrupulously worked-out plot of the top-rated serial.

The flaw came to light after we invited readers last Sunday to send in their Street questions.

Both Mrs JE Godwin, of South Ockendon, Essex, and Mrs R Rowland of Wardley, Swinton, Lancs, asked this question:

Why does Granada TV insist that the Barlow twins, Peter and Susan, are almost fifteen when they were born on April 5th, 1965?

Both ladies remember the date well because Mrs Godwin had twin boys and Mrs Rowland a daughter around the same time.

Granada TV were happy to own up to a bit of "fiddling".

Planners changed the age of the twins to suit a story-line involving Peter Barlow and his O Levels.

However, they do hope to correct the situation in future.

As we mentioned, this turned out to be 1986. When Susan Barlow visited the Street in 1981, she seemed set to apply for a temporary job in a wine bar in London. She was too young, going by the 1965 birth year, so the 'tweaking' obviously remained until the twins' 21st birthday of 1986.

We actually knew a woman back then who wrote to Granada TV on the subject. The letter was replied to by the Street's archivist, Eric Rosser, who stated very firmly that he had voted against the "fiddling" - or retconning as we call it today.

The Down-Side Of The Bill Podmore Era: The Barlow Twins Retcon, A Plastic Toy Boy And Elsie Tanner's New Grandson...

April 1965, and Coronation Street's newest arrivals, Peter and Susan Barlow, grace the cover of the TV Times. But in 1978 they were apparently born in 1964. Or perhaps even 1963.

Regular readers of my little blog (bless you both, I adore you!) know that I love the Bill Podmore era of Coronation Street. In the main. I found the show stodgy, miserable fare in the early-to-mid 1970s, but when Bill took the reins in 1976, the Street suddenly seemed to rediscover its lost youth and became so enjoyable I was glued to it.

Shake Up In The Street - there's going to be a lot more fun! proclaimed one tabloid headline. And there was. Bill Podmore's reign totally rejuvenated the Street. I have doubts the show would have lasted without him.

But even the most glittering reign has a few fake gems, and Mr Podmore's was no exception.

When was the Street's first retcon? Its first twisting of established fact to fit in with a modern storyline? I'm not talking continuity errors here - I'm talking planned, purposeful twisting of Street history to cynically shoehorn in a storyline?

1978 is the answer.

It all began when Peter Barlow came to see his father and wanted to join the Navy when he left school. Now, Peter Barlow, like me, was born in 1965, but in those episodes he was older (one stated he'd be turning fifteen in April 1979, others made him seem perhaps even older). My mother immediately noticed: 'I was pregnant with you when Val had the twins. This is a botch-up!' Matters went thoroughly public when the tabloid press got hold of the story and a friend of my mother's, another dedicated Street follower, wrote to the archivist, Eric Rosser, about it. She showed us the letter, and I remember she had ended it with the words: What would Ena say?

Mr Rosser wrote back, on a manual typewriter. Mum's friend showed us the letter and it was perhaps indicative of Mr Rosser's feelings on the subject that the middle of several o's was missing - minute holes in the paper. Was it just the quality of the paper, or had he punched the typewriter keys extra hard in his vexation, we wondered? He made it very plain that he had voted against the retcon (although we didn't call them that then).

Valerie and Ken Barlow with their twins, Peter and Susan. It all seemed so simple back in the 1960s. But in the 1970s their age would become subject to sudden inexplicable change...

This was a rare instance of the Bill Podmore era beginning trends which were unwelcome to some fans - trends which are common nowadays. The whole point of investing in a long-running saga, it seemed to me back then (and today), is that you get to know the characters and their histories. And you have contemporaries born within the span of the show as it goes on - like me and Peter and Susan Barlow, all born in 1965. If you start twisting the facts, then why bother having an archivist? The Peter Barlow storyline would have been fine a couple of years later anyway. Why spoil continuity to shoehorn it into 1978?

The age of the Barlow twins remained vague but corrupted for a few years. Susan taking Mike Baldwin up on an offer to get work in a licensed bar in 1981 is indicative of this - the plot reality should have been that she was only sixteen-years-old.

All this gave me the uneasy feeling that watching the show was a bit pointless. Would a plot I was currently enjoying be tweaked into nonsense in the future, I wondered way back in 1978?

But in 1986 sanity was restored with the Barlow twins celebrating their twenty-first birthday.

Coronation Street producer Bill Podmore with Eric Rosser, the show's archivist, in the 1980s.

In 1980, the Podmore administration did it again: showing a complete disregard for the show's history, it introduced a new grandson for Elsie Tanner called Martin Cheveski. Elsie's grandson, Paul, had been born in 1961, but we'd never heard of Martin, who was apparently a few years younger. He certainly hadn't been with his parents, Linda and Ivan, when they'd visited the Street in the late 1960s, although Paul had.

Martin didn't stay that long, and the demographic he represented, not long out of school and unemployed, was topical - although in the Street, of course, he soon found work with Len Fairclough. But it was all very strange - although not, I thought, as bad as the Barlow twins debacle.

As far as I'm aware, 1978, 1979 (Ivy Tilsley's family - but, as she was up to then a peripheral character, perhaps forgivable) and 1980 apart, the Podmore administration didn't tweak characters' ages, or create new relations for them out of thin air again.

But, in 1978, for me, the Street had committed another sin - one that was indicative of future trends, and which unashamedly went for increasing the male totty pin-up ratio, not character depth or acting skills.

This was the introduction of young Brian John Tilsley. He met Gail Potter at a party at No 11, and soon they were an 'item'. Now, of course, Ivy had once stated she hadn't been able to have children, but with the Tilsleys being introduced as Street residents in 1979, moving into No 5, this was all altered.

But doing a few retcons as a peripheral character moves to centre stage is not such a sin.

However, introducing her son as a blond-haired, unblemished body builder WAS, in my humble opinion. Back in the late 1970s, gym workouts were not the norm for working class guys. I'm sorry, but they weren't. This really came about in the 'fit for business, fit for life' mid-to-late 1980s and the narcissistic 1990s.

Vera: 'She couldn't 'ave kids yer know, well, only their Brian - and she don't like to mention 'im. I mean, can yer blame 'er?'

But actor Chris Quinten, who played Brian, was a gymnast and Brian, who didn't attend a gym and didn't even have some dumb bells at home, wasn't - and nor did he have a physically-demanding job. He was a garage mechanic. When Terry Duckworth arrived in 1983, not only was he heavier on character but his job at the abattoir would have given him the bit of muscle he had.

The Street had always had its male and female heart-throbs. Think Terry, Ray Langton and Suzie Birchall, for instance. But these characters were not OTT attractive and seemed like natural backstreet denizens.

For me, Brian did not. He seemed an obvious and rather cynical attempt to up the female/gay 'PHWOAR!' factor and I found him wholly unconvincing as a character.

Wow - fashion! Our Brian in the 1980s. He was killed off in 1989.

I don't mean to sound too 'down' on Chris Quinten, as time went on I think his acting ability improved, but he was never a Street natural.

As for the future of the Street, retcons went out of fashion in the 1980s, but returned in the 1990s. Then, a storyline I'd followed in 1983 - in which Maggie Dunlop had a son by Mike Baldwin, was retconned back a couple of years so Mike's son, Mark Redman, could attend the school Ken Barlow taught at a couple of years too early.

His own children had suffered similar age revisions, but Ken, caught up in the production team's web, was blissfully unaware of anything amiss.

Meanwhile, give or take an occasional Tyrone Dobbs, muscle hunks are all the rage when it comes to young male Street characters. But then workouts are so much more a part of everyday life now.

Oh well...

Despite my moans here, Bill Podmore's era was an absolute godsend for the Street. I hold his memory in high esteem. Nothing is ever perfect.

Shortly after Brian arrived, Steve Fisher, a lad who, as Betty Turpin said, any mother would be proud of, was dispatched to work at Mike Baldwin's London factory - and never mentioned again. A sensitive, interesting character (a bit soft though - putty in Suzie's hands), exchanging Steve for Brian seemed rather sad.

Speak Easy - July 2013

Got something to say? Well, spit it out, chuck! Here, your voice can be heard. Well, read really... 

Thanks for all communications received... here's a little round-up of recent goodies...

Firstly, thanks to Kevin, who e-mailed us about the late actor Paul Lowther, Colin Jackson in The Street in 1981. Kevin sent us a later publicity photograph of Paul, and recalls living in a shared house in Balham, "Gateway To The South", London, with him in the mid-1980s. He remembers having great fun acting jokingly about life up North with Paul. Thanks for that, Kevin! As we said before, we were very impressed with Paul's portrayal of Colin Jackson and wished the character had become a regular on the Weatherfield scene.

Pauline asks:

Why did Coronation Street employ a full-time archivist, but still messed about with the age of the Barlow twins in 1978?

It's a puzzle, Pauline! We do know that archivist Eric Rosser disagreed with the move. We can only imagine that Bill Podmore and co didn't want to wait until the character would have been old enough before launching the story-line about Peter Barlow wishing to join the Navy. As we say, the Barlow twins' age was righted in 1986, when they celebrated their twenty-first birthday and as far as we know further such tweakings of established facts (or retcons as they become known in the world of popular fiction during the 1980s) were resisted until the 1990s.

 Craig asks:

When did Annie Walker retire? I've read 1984, but I've also read that Doris Speed last appeared in 1983.

Easy one, this, Craig. Doris Speed last appeared on-screen in October 1983, when the actress disappeared from the show due to ill health. It was hoped that she would return, so Annie didn't actually retire from the Rovers until 1984.

Sara says:

I'm looking forward to your "Once Around Weatherfield" feature as I fancy trying my hand at writing a biography of a minor character. When do you think the first part will appear? Keep up the good work, by the way!

Cheers, Sara! The first "Once Around Weatherfield" challenge will appear next week, so please stay tuned.

1983: Dishing The Dirt On Elsie Tanner's Past...

Life in Coronation Street didn't begin on 9 December 1960. Eee, no, lovey - the residents had pasts stretching back to when Adam were a lad.

And some of 'em were a bit on't seamy side (sniffs disapprovingly).

Take that Elsie Tanner in't 1940s - skirts up to 'ere and 'got any gum, chum?'.

From the Sunday Mirror, August 14, 1983:

Your Coronation Street favourites have secret pasts - going back long before the start 22 years ago of Britain's most popular TV series. They are documented in Granada TV's confidential files on the Street stars. The dossiers are updated after each week's episodes so that writers can avoid factual errors in future scripts.

But it is the past "lives" of the Coronation Street regulars - built up to give them believable backgrounds - that makes the most fascinating reading. These Secret Lives have never before been made public. Now you can read all about them in this intriguing Sunday Mirror series.

It is 1942 - We'll Meet Again time - and the Yanks are overpaid, over-sexed and over at Elsie Tanner's.

Ena Sharples watches, clucking disapprovingly, as a procession of servicemen bearing everything from nylons to chocolates, comes and goes at No. 11 Coronation Street.

Flame-haired Elsie is well and truly launched on her career as the Street's scarlet woman.

Hair-netted Ena had seen it all coming. That little minx, Elsie Grimshaw as was, had never been able to resist anything in trousers.

By the time Elsie was 16, the inevitable had happened. She was pregnant by a tearaway called Arnold Tanner. He did the decent thing and married her on October 4, 1939.

The couple moved into No. 11 where, on January 8, 1940, their daughter, Linda, was born. Soon afterwards Arnold went off to join the Merchant Navy.

From then onwards, he sent Elsie money regularly but was rarely seen again. She wasn't one to sit and pine. Or to be lonely.

As often as Elsie could recruit a babysitter, she went out on the town.

In 1941, though, Elsie had to stay at home for two whole months when Arnold put in one of his rare appearances. Their son, Dennis, was born the following year.

That year, 1942, was when the Yanks "invaded". Soon word was out at the bases that there was a warm-hearted girl in Coronation Street running a one-woman "hands-across-the-sea" crusade.

Among the Yanks beating a path to Elsie's ever-open door was a handsome Master Sergeant called, coincidentally, Steve Tanner. He and Elsie made beautiful music together... and they weren't talking about Glenn Miller.

The end of the war brought little rejoicing for Elsie and Arnold. When he came home, they fought like cat and dog. And it wasn't long before Arnold found a new love and went once more a-roving.

The only time Elsie saw him again was in 1961, when he turned up to ask her for a divorce. Elsie agreed and settled joyfully into her new role as a fancy free bachelor girl.

Viewers will recall how she turned down two proposals from a besotted Len Fairclough.

Then with all the shock of a bomb going off, Master Sergeant Steve Tanner exploded back into Elsie's life and swept her into matrimony.

Elsie thought it wouldn't last. As usual, she was right. The marriage was never a going concern and it ended in tragedy when the American was murdered.

Elsie tried marriage once more - to Alan Howard. They were divorced in March 1978, and Coronation Street's scarlet woman, now 60, is alone again.

Judging by a few novels I have read recently, based on the Street in wartime, I think that some of these details have been revised since the 1980s. But these were the facts regarding Elsie's past as they stood during Pat Phoenix's reign in The Street, and the facts I was familiar with through watching the show (Elsie's past was often referred to!) and through reading the HV Kershaw Coronation Street novels.

Read about Eric Rosser, the original Corrie archivist, here.

More from this fascinating newspaper series soon.

Eric Rosser - Coronation Street's Original Archivist

From the Daily Mirror, June 18, 1983:

Two souvenir brass plates on the wall of Eric Rosser's office were used on the coffins in the TV funerals of Ernie Bishop and Cyril Turpin, late of Coronation Street.

Not that Eric needs any reminders. He knows everything about everyone in the Street. Eric, 58, is Mr Memory, the programme's official archivist.

Off the cuff, he can recite births, marriages and deaths or the name of an actress who had a two-episode part in 1963. His encyclopaedic knowledge is at his finger tips in his files, card index and bound story volumes.

Mr Rosser saw the first episode of the Street during a lengthy stay in hospital in 1960. "I was hooked," he said.

In 1970, he wrote a Coronation Street script.

Harry Kershaw, then executive producer, was amazed by Eric's knowledge. He put him under contract as a consultant.

Every week Eric sits in on the final rehearsals and the recordings of two episodes. He still watches every Monday and Wednesday night.

Once, while Eric was on holiday, the studio props man provided an egg-and-bacon breakfast for Stan Ogden.

Regular viewers knew, of course, Stan is allergic to eggs.

Eric said: "I felt myself go hot in my chair. I knew we'd get lots of letters."

He still shudders over the script in which Annie Walker complained that her grandchildren were noisy. She has none.

Now Eric helps vet scripts and regularly meets the writing team. He reminds them of anniversaries and bits of Street history.

Storyline writer Esther Rose said: "He knows more about the Street than anyone else. He's a gold mine of information. Absolutely invaluable."

Bill Podmore with Eric Rosser in the 1980s.

Personally, I always appreciated the tremendous attention to detail in the Coronation Street saga. The fact that the events we were watching would be catalogued and could influence events years into the future added tremendously to the reality of the show, as did the details Mr Rosser kept on file concerning the characters - their backgrounds, likes and dislikes, birthdays, etc.

The archivist was very much behind the scenes, the press clipping featured here is a great rarity. But Mr Rosser's contribution to the sense of reality in the show was absolutely massive.