Simon in the Land of Chalk Drawings was produced in the early 1970s (thanks to Gasper Bongiovani) by FilmFair London Productions. It involved the adventures of a small boy who had a magic blackboard in his bedroom. The blackboard was magical for one reason only - whatever Simon drew on his blackboard would appear in the Land of Chalk Drawings. Only Simon knew of this special place and only he could create the drawings for it.
The Land of Chalk Drawings was found just over the fence which Simon normally entered by climbing a ladder. Occasionally, the characters of Chalk Drawing Land would wait to meet Simon on the fence itself. Once on top of the fence, Simon was transported to the fantasy world in which everything was a chalk drawing except Simon.
Each Simon adventure normally lasted about five or so minutes.
Click
on the image below for the introductory music.
The town where Simon lives
Simon heading off to the Fence for another
adventure in the Land of Chalk Drawings
Characters
Episode guide to twelve Enchanting Adventures
1. Simon and the Early Morning
Simon gets up early in the morning and is walking along the street. Here he meets the school teacher from the Land of Chalk Drawings (LOCD). The school teacher tells Simon that there is a problem in LOCD. This concerns his pupils all of whom are all asleep and will not get up in the morning. So, Simon agrees to come and help. Simon climbs up the ladder and over the fence and into LOCD. There he finds all the chalk people, chalk animals and even the chalk Sun fast asleep. He instantly has an idea on how to wake everyone up and goes home to his special blackboard (where whatever he draws comes to life). The next morning a chalk drawing cockrel wakes everyone up on time for school. However this is short lived as the very next day the cockrel has lost its voice so everyone is asleep again. Simon finally solves the problem by drawing a huge alarm clock to ring at exactly 07:30 which it does and so everyone is able to get up on time.
2. Simon and the Chalk Drawing Cars
Simon is back in Chalk Drawing Land and is talking to the Chalk Land children about cars but they have never seen what a car look like so he goes home and with his magic blackboard he draws some cars. This is a big mistake because when the next morning he returns to Chalk Land he finds things in a terrible mess. All the children are driving cars around the land very badly. The school teacher tries to reason with the children but they do not want to go back to using the slow train and are more happy with their cars. Simon eventually solves the problem by filling Chalk Land with so many cars that no one can move and it is one huge traffic jam. Now the children realize that they are perfectly happy to live without the cars and travel by train instead.
3. Simon and the Dinosaur
Simon visits a natural history museum and is fascinated by all the dinosaurs. Afterwards, he goes home and draws a giant dinosaur on his blackboard. The next morning, one of the Chalk Land birds rushes to Simon to tell him of a big problem. He climbs over the fence and is met by a deserted Chalk Land, the railway line is all twisted, trees have been felled and no one can be found. He soon finds some very large scary footprints though, made by something big... very big. He then finds out to whom the footprints belong and is chased by a large, dangerous dinosaur which catches Simon and swallows him whole. Inside the dinosaur's stomach, Simon finds out where all the other Chalk Land poeple have gone. Simon gets them all to blow very hard so the dinosaur which catch a chill and then sneeze them out. As usual, Simon's idea works and everything turns out okay for the people of Chalk Land. Even the dinosaur ends up living happily ever after.
4. Simon and the Knight
Simon is at home reading about Knights in the days of old. He then decides to draw one on his blackboard. The next day he meets Henry (his best friend from Chalk Land) who tells him that there are funny goings on in the LOCD. There he finds that a Knight has appeared and telling all the Chalk Land folk that he is there to rescue them from the dragon. The Knight thinks that the Chalk Land train is a dragon and sets out to defeat it and rescue any damsel in distress he encounters.
5. Simon and the Rainbow
Simon is asked to go to Chalk Land to settle an argument between the Sun and the Cloud as to who should be in the sky. The Cloud wants to rain but the Sun will not go away as Chalk Land will get dark. All the local people are terrified at the thunder and lightning and of the terrible noise that the argument is creating. With each shout the buildings shake. "Why don't you shine together?" Simon asks. But they do not listen. Eventually the problem is resolved when Simon decides to go up in a rocket in order to paint a rainbow.
6. Simon and the Pied Piper
Simon's homework is about the exploits of the Pied Piper of Hamlyn. He reads about him and decides to draw him on the blackboard. The very next day Henry is waiting on the fence for Simon. He has come to get him as the Pied Piper has appeared in Chalk Land and all the adults, children and animals are following his pipe. Even the band playing very loudly does not prevent the piper from leading the people away. Simon thus asks the Sun to blow the Cloud over the crowd of people and to rain on them. Whilst it is raining Simon is able to get hold of the pipe and exchange it for bagpipes. He thus breaks the spell and it all ends happily for the people of Chalk Land and the piper.
7. Simon and the Robot
Whilst in the LOCD, Simon is approached by the train driver who wants Simon to extend the railway track. Simon agrees, however he does not want to do all the extra drawing which will be required. He walks home thinking of a way round the problem and then goes and does a drawing on his blackboard. The next day in Chalk Land, he finds that there are rail tracks everywhere. Simon had drawn a robot to do the drawing for him and it had gone mad drawing rail tracks everywhere. Simon soon has to clean up the mess thus creating more work for himself that drawing the rail tracks in the first place would have done.
8. Simon and the Measles
Simon had been in bed with measles and was still not very well at all. He decides on his first day up to do a drawing on the blackboard. The boy next door to Simon arrives and asks him what it is like having measles. Simon does not feel like talking and so draws them on the blackboard. The next time he visits Chalk Land, however, all the chalk people, animals, birds and flowers have spots. Even the train and building has spots. Simon does his best to help by rubbing them off but needs to find the source of the problem. The spots are finally located hidden in a fruit tree and before Simon can catch them they rush off and start to re-infect all the people of Chalk Land. Simon eventually captures them on the outside of a rocket and sends them to the moon. There they become stars around the crescent shaped moon.
9. Simon and the Flags
Whilst in the LOCD Simon meets the school teacher who is very excited. All the school children want a flag day so Simon is asked to draw them some flags. Simon thus goes home to his blackboard and make a start. Whilst at home he decides to draw lots of of flags with different designs for each type of person in Chalk Land. Problems ensue the next day when each person in Chalk Land wants their flag ahead of other people's flags and no one wants to be at the back. Simon and Henry thus wait until everyone is asleep that night and then he and Henry take all the small flags and make a large one out of them. This sorts the problem and everyone is happy.
10. Simon and the Chalk Drawing Sports Day
Simon watches the Chalk Land folk as they prepare for their sports day. He decides to enter the race event and goes home to train hard. The very next day he gets up early and goes out for a run. Whilst out, he passes the fence and meets the dog which is surprised Simon is entering the race but runs along with him. Simon has a very hard time keeping up. He soon loses sight of the dog but meets the cat who does the same. The Chalk Land children do the same until Simon is totally exhausted. After very hard training he is too tired to run the course.
11. Simon and the Pop Singer
Simon has visitors. His two girl cousins have come to stay with him for a while and he is not too happy about it. All they seem to want to do is listen to pop music and dance. They pester Simon to draw a pop singer. He reluctantly does this just to stop them from bothering him. Next morning, he meets the Chalk Land Band Sergeant who is very unhappy because the Band are no longer being listened to by the Chalk Land people. Simon's pop singer is making music which all the Chalk Land children are dancing to. Not everyone is dancing though. The Sun and the Cloud are very upset and the Sun hides behind the cloud. This makes the cloud very angry as he cannot hide behind anyone. The cloud eventually loses his temper and sends a thunder bolt down to destroy the speaker and so silences the loud musical din.
12. Simon and the Detective
Whilst passing the fence Henry asks if Simon has been drawing any stars and planets because something has appeared in the sky in the Chalk Land. Both Simon and Henry decide to investigate this twinkling planet and set off in the Chalk Land rocket. On landing on the unknown planet they meet an odd looking figure with a large magnifying glass. Simon realizes that it is the detective that he recently drew. He then meets a load of finger prints who are annoyed because they want to be on things and be examined by someone who is interesting. Simon helps them by drawing lots of trees and flowers and things for them to be on. That way the detective can investigate and examine the finger prints. Everyone is happy in the end as Henry and Simon decide to go home after their little adventure.
And so ends an enchanting little series beautifully scripted, drawn and adapted for television. Below are a few more images from this wonderful animated series.
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