Last of the Summer Wine at 50: Super fans head to Holmfirth

It is 50 years since the world's longest-running sitcom, Last of the Summer Wine, first aired on TV screens in Britain. With a few bars of lilting harmonica playing out, millions of viewers would sit down on a Sunday night to watch the antics of Compo, Clegg and Foggy meddling mischief in the Yorkshire countryside.

As a special weekend of events to mark the anniversary unfolds, the BBC visits its home to uncover the show's enduring appeal.

With its distinctive white front, red sign and green gingham curtains, Sid's Cafe in Holmfirth is instantly recognisable as the place where plenty of slapstick and melodrama happened.

Among the locals and tourists savouring the afternoon sunshine sits self-confessed super fan Bobby Loney. Sat next to his wife Debbie, the pair have travelled from Kentucky in America for the celebrations.

The 65-year-old watches Last of the Summer Wine episodes every day. If it's not playing on his television, it's on his phone.

"I watch it all the time - I just love it. It looks like they had so much fun making it."

For the last seven years, he has made the 11-hour journey to Yorkshire in homage to the show. In his thick American drawl, he describes returning to Holmfirth as "coming home".

"We have a lot of friends over here now and I've got to know so many people."

Busy tending to her throng of customers, cafe owner Laura Booth snakes through the gingham-topped tables and cardboard cut-out of Nora Batty. She bought Sid's 17 years ago along with her sister who used to work in the cafe as a teenager.

Ms Booth, who has helped organise the 50th anniversary events, says the best part of her job is witnessing the "genuine joy" of tourists as they walk into the cafe made famous from the sitcom.

"People are absolutely thrilled to be here," she says. "They've seen it in their living room on the telly for years and for some of them, it's been a life-long ambition to visit."

She adds: "We get people coming from all over the world - America, Australia, Corsica, Sweden, it just has this huge appeal everywhere."

Growing up in Holmfirth, the 53-year-old recalls the cast and crew mingling around the town on shoot days and having to sneak down streets that had been closed off for filming.

"My best story is that the BBC hired my dad's battered old pick-up off him for Compo to hang-glide off. My dad was quite chuffed really because they paid him more than it was actually worth."

Outside Sid's, Joan, from Whitley Bay, has a huge smile as she clocks an instantly recognisable face. Sat among the customers is Jonathan Linsley, the actor who played dim-witted "Crusher" Milburn between 1984 and 1987.

Linsley has returned to Holmfirth to host a stage show at the Civic Hall as part of the Summer Wine 50 weekend events.

Greeted warmly by the actor, who has since starred in Hollywood films, Joan beams: "I saw you on the telly not long ago with Jane McDonald. Would you sign this for me?"

The 86-year-old says she watches episodes of Last of the Summer Wine "over and over".

"My daughter says, 'mam you've seen them', but I just love them. It is something that you can sit and watch and enjoy instead of all that violence and sex that's on."

Linsley has played numerous roles in his career including a part in Pirates of the Caribbean, but Last of the Summer Wine, along with its fans who he describes as "incredibly loyal", has his heart.

"The number of times fans have said to me, 'I watched you Sunday night, it'd be Songs of Praise, Antiques Roadshow and then I was allowed to stay up and watch Last of the Summer Wine.'"

"I meet people now in their 40s and 50s who watched it as children with their mum, dad and grandparents. That's part of the love of the series because people reminisce about watching it with family.

"It was gentle and safe. It was just a really simple story about ordinary folk."

The iconic show ran for an impressive 37 years with 295 episodes before airing for the final time in 2010. Many of the original actors have since died including Bill Owen and Peter Sallis who are buried next to each other in nearby Upperthong.

But for many fans, the show's legacy continues to be remembered and celebrated.

Another pair of self-confessed "nerds", Andrew Smith and Bob Fischer, say for them the appeal lies mainly in the fact it's "just very funny".

Smith and Fischer have forged something of a career from their love of the show, having formed a podcast duo, Summer Winos, whose ultimate aim is to review all 295 episodes. Based on their mutual love of the show, they have performed a stint at Edinburgh Fringe Festival and written a book.

Fischer says: "It's funny, it's real, it's very northern. It's that kind of northern, surreal, sarcastic humour but just brilliantly funny. And of course it's wonderfully acted."

Alongside the three irascible pensioners determined to grow old disgracefully, Holmfirth and its countryside is undoubtedly the Last of the Summer Wine's fourth character. The show is woven into the town's history.

Greengrocer Andrew Bray met Bill Owen as a boy when he was 11 and they were filming in Holmfirth. The pair struck up an enduring friendship that lasted up until the actor's death in 1999.

Mr Bray reflects: "Last of the Summer Wine brought us so many characters and they had a real love for Holmfirth.

"Bill loved the people, he loved the friendliness of the area, he loved the dry stone walls. He always said he wanted to do his best for Holmfirth."

Follow BBC Yorkshire on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Send your story ideas to [email protected] or send video here.