Dixon of Dock Green

"Evening All." Dixon of Dock Green-which ran for 21 years and about 429 episodes-was a fine show about a salt of the earth copper called P.C. George Dixon who was played by Jack Warner. He looked far to old to be a police officer but that didn't matter to me.

I believe this is the longest running British police show ever (although that record may be beaten by The Bill in a few years time). It was entertaining stuff and I wish someone would release it onto DVD.

Watching the show now, you may think Dixon is an old fashioned relic but back when this show was broadcast, that is the way coppers were. The police has evolved since then but I will always have a place in my heart for P.C. Dixon.

P.C. Dixon was a good copper-he was honest, he was firm but fair when doing his job and he was a friendly local bobby. The stories were extremely interesting as was the dialogue. And the ending of the episodes were good as Dixon stood beneath the police stations lamp giving his thoughts for the day before walking off and whistling.

Eventually, Dixon was promoted to Desk Sergeant and the younger officers did the legwork but the stories were still top-notch.

This is probably the best representation of the police force in TV history and I urge anyone to try and get their hands on any of the episodes. It really was good.

This was British TV's original police series. I'm not old enough to remember the early days of this show, but I grew up with it in the sixties and seventies. At the time, Dixon of Dock Green already seemed old fashioned compared with Z-cars or US shows like Ironside. It was a cozy and faintly sentimental representation of policing. Despite this, it retained a certain authenticity that other shows lacked. The police officers that I had met had more in common with Dixon than any other TV character. Jack Warner's perennial character George Dixon oozed calm authority and respectable self-assurance. Each programme was introduced by the whistled theme tune after which George Dixon would always begin a spoken introduction direct to camera with the words "Evening all". He would make dry observations about "villains" and the frailties of human nature. The episode's drama would then be played out. By the seventies Dixon himself rarely played a huge part in the story; he was pretty old. The programme would end with Dixon again; this time proposing a moral for the story. He invariably signed off with the words "'Night all". They don't make shows like this any more. Pity.

I'm afraid we all took this TV cop series for granted when it was on – you don't know what you've got till it's gone. 432 episodes were broadcast 1955-1976, over 400 of them junked by the BBC all the way up to 1975 and not many illegally filmed by any of the TV viewers at the time either. It was PC George Dixon's, sorry, Jack Warner's show, it suited his avuncular personality down to the ground. In his case familiarity bred warmth. His weekly homily could range from you to be on your guard for scams to children to know their kerb drill, and other such laudable aims. When he started to get too old to pound the beat and others took up the stories instead it started to lose that special feeling – the real world began to creep in. Saturday evenings were never the same again. When he stopped pounding the beat I think every copper in Britain must have done so too, and hardly any have been seen since.

The Roaring Boy broadcast 18.08.56: The programme was played live as was everything then and is one of a small group from the same period that managed to avoid being binned afterwards. Dixon has to check on whether army deserter skinny Kenneth Cope has been sighted in the neighbourhood, by going to see his girlfriend. He finds him and we're in for a tense psychological 15 minutes – as psychological as Dixon was ever likely to get anyway. The story was bookended with an old lady gossipping to the station Sergeant which was reminiscent of Mrs. Lopsided in The Ladykillers which Warner had recently been in, even managing to be a Superintendent there. Peter Byrne who played Detective Andy for all those years made a brief appearance – shortly before his marriage to Dixon's daughter Mary.

Unsensational and unrealistic as it may have been, 40 years ago it was as realistic as I wanted anything to get and want to get now. I don't need to graphically see how bad the baddies are because I don't consider myself to be one. And of course, were cops ever part of their communities as depicted at Dock Green? But great to see again to check how much our lovely society has progressed since then.

I appeared in the 1973 episode "Eye Witness". Chatting inbetween takes with him Jack Warner told me that Raymond Burr (Perry Mason, Ironside) visited BBC Tv Centre at Shepherds Bush in the early 1970's and while there insisted on meeting Jack due to the fact that at the time Dixon of Dock Green was the longest running police drama in the world. Respect! Jack Warner was a real gentleman. He was also a brilliant snooker player for his age and I remember being surprised at losing to him This particular episode is of interest in that it features a speedboat chase, a car chase, a helicopter and a light aircraft all in the same story at a time when the likes of Miami Vice hadn't even been thought of!

I've watched the available episodes, and enjoyed them all, what I did enjoy, was the progression of it, the early ones seem so much more gentle, the crimes reflect the era, in the 70's episodes, time has changed, so has society, and ultimately so did the crimes, the episodes from what I saw, got a little more gritty, with Warner perhaps a little less visible. Compared to The Sweeney and The Professionals though, it was so much milder.

I must commend the acting of Jack Warner, absolutely brilliant throughout, what a talented actor, it's no wonder millions tuned in to watch him. The supporting cast each play their part, an array of well known faces appeared. I loved Dixon's addresses to the camera, I wonder if people did actually take note of the messages, the one that stood out, was a message about allowing strangers into your home.

This must be one of the earliest Police crime dramas, it's certainly one of the longest running. I wish all remaining episodes would get a DVD release. It's a shame they haven't made all on hand commercially available.

The Doctor Who fan in me is eternally sad that so many episodes (97) are missing, however when you dig into the history of this show, and realise that 400 of the 432 are missing, that is heart breaking. We can only hope one day that more are found, sadly it seems the earliest are lost to history.

I can understand why it's so loved by fans, I thoroughly enjoyed the episodes I've seen, 8/10.