YouTube also has the episode about Farmer Jonathan Bell. Bell, the modern industrialised farmer – who is portrayed throughout the episode as a perfectly nice, pleasant man – discovers that the local villagers are buying fewer of his eggs. Investigations reveal that they are buying instead from Windy Miller’s free range operation, because free range eggs are nicer. Windy points out that he cannot scale up his operation to truly compete and that Bell can still sell all his eggs to the major distribution chains, so they can both happily coexist.
This discussion of free range farming and industrialised economies of scale complete, the narrator concludes the episode with this address to Bell: “Hello, Farmer Bell! Are you selling all your eggs now? I expect you’re sorry that the people in Camberwick Green think that your eggs aren’t as nice as Windy’s. Never mind! You are giving more eggs to more people more cheaply than he can. And that’s a great thing. And you are the most modern farmer in Camberwick Green. Goodbye, Farmer Bell!” I’m fairly sure it didn’t seem so passive aggressive when I was three.
Paul O’Brien takes on British kids’ TV of our youth. It’s really, really good stuff.