Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends
Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends is an animated children's television series. The series was based on The Railway Series, a series of books created by the Reverend Wilbert Vere Awdry. The books, which told of the adventures of a group of living, talking trains, were based on stories which Awdry told his son Christopher to entertain him during Christopher's recovery from measles. The TV series was created by Britt Allcroft.Ringo Starr was the first narrator of the television series, then was replaced by Michael Angelis in the British version of the series (in the American version of this series, Starr was replaced by George Carlin and then was replaced by Alec Baldwin).
Characters from the series include Henry, Duck, Trevor, Bertie (a bus), Donald & Douglas, Percy, James, Gordon, Toby, Daisy, Mavis, Harold (a helicopter), Diesel, Bill & Ben, Edward and the Fat Controller, Sir Topham Hatt.
It is produced by Gullane Entertainment which was the Britt Allcroft Company. Now Gullane's no longer a company. Hit Entertainment now owns the Thomas licenses of broadcast and merchandising because of the trade between Gullane and Hit.
Many of the charcters are based on actual British trains and vehicles from the 1940s and 1950s.
