Cunliffe had grown up listening to adults talking about a golden age that he could hardly remember – before the war, when there had been no ration books and when they had had their own car and everything had been better. The world he remembered growing up in was hard. There was this one particularly sad thing that he could never quite understand. It was all to do with his father, who had vanished about the time that he was born. He knew nothing about him, he had no idea why he was growing up without a father. No one would talk to him about it, as if it was this guilty secret, full of shame.

The thing that first worried John Cunliffe was that other writers were now turning out Pat stories and they seemed to be changing him. In these annuals and comics, for example, he was losing that wry touch of humour that Cunliffe had always given him, like at the end of Postman Pat’s Windy Day when he says “Time to blow home” by mistake. Cunliffe knew people who had adopted that as a family saying. It was only silly, he knew, but it was one of the little touches that made Pat a comfort to people. Still, he didn’t want to get into a fight, so he let it pass. And then one day, he walked into a bookshop and found a whole book about Pat that set his teeth right on edge.It was so perfect that it was a natural target for every businessman who wanted to make a profit out of children’s play. Fifteen years later, Postman Pat has become a multi-million pound marketing operation with limbs in almost every country in the world, guarded by accountants and lawyers and agents and even a private detective. And John Cunliffe has been left behind, removed to the side lines, from where he has watched in sadness as his characters have been exploited and Greendale has succumbed to the commercialisation of just about everything. VHS and Betamax releases of Series 1 were originally released by Longman Video in the early-80s, before BBC Enterprises/Worldwide secured them, and later released the four TV specials and Series 2 on VHS. For Series 1, the original opening titles which featured Pat driving in the original version of his van with a crown logo (which Pat used until Pat's Thirsty Day) was replaced with an edited version of the shot for shot remake of the original intro (which had Pat driving the Royal Mail Van) as used when the show aired in countries like France and Australia. The edits made to the intro on the DVD involved some shots being replaced by scenes from "Pat's Difficult Day", "Pat Takes A Message", and "Pat's Foggy Day". This edited intro was also used when CBeebies and BritBox reran the show.

In the spin-off series, Postman Pat: Special Delivery Service, Postman Pat has been promoted to Head of the SDS and is now called upon to deliver anything. Each episode follows Postman Pat on a Special Delivery mission, from rescuing a runaway cow to delivering a giant ice cube. In his new role, Postman Pat commutes to the nearby town of Pencaster where he collects his special deliveries from the Pencaster Mail Centre. Postman Pat now has a newer fleet of vehicles including a bigger van, gyrocopter, 4x4 Jeep and motorbike, complete with side-car for Jess. [10] He has a new boss, Ben, who tends to give him instructions (whereas he was his own master before the "promotion"). Pat also seems to make more mistakes in his work since moving to SDS, largely because the new format is always based on one delivery, which has to go wrong somehow (thus often because of Pat's errors).Pencaster is a large, bustling, modern town located within easy commuting distance for the villagers of Greendale. Situated on the waterfront, Pencaster is a hive of activity, boasting a market square in the centre surrounded by shops, houses, a large railway station, state-of-the-art buildings, and a boat jetty. It bears some resemblance to Lancaster, the county town of Lancashire, which likewise is a short commute from Longsleddale, the area used as the inspiration for Greendale. [ citation needed] Slower-paced" and "faster-paced" episodes of Postman Pat were used in a 2021 research study on the effects of fast-paced television on children's cognitive and problem solving abilities. The results of the study suggested that faster-paced television did not negatively impact children's attention spans, problem-solving, or comprehension. [20] Award nominations [ edit ] Ingledale is another large, busy village town situated in the heart of the North Yorkshire countryside, only seen once in a special in 1991, set to make a second appearance in the revival. After the sale of Woodland Animations to Entertainment Rights, the company began releasing VHS and DVDs of the revival series through their video label Right Entertainment and distributor Universal Pictures Video. Right released only one classic series volume on VHS and DVD - Postman Pat in a Muddle in April 2004, which contained three Series 2 episodes.