The first Saturday morning show in the modern sense was Tiswas in 1974. The presenters were DJ Chris Tarrant, and Sally James, previously of LWT's pop music show Saturday Scene. Also on board were John Gorman (ex of Scaffold), comedian Bob Carolgees and New Faces alumnus Lenny Henry, getting his grounding in 'alternative' comedy.

However, for the first four years Tiswas was only shown on ATV. For most of the country, Saturday morning shows began with the BBC's Swap Shop in 1976. This grew out of the earlier Noel Edmonds' effort Z-Shed. Initially the show was just a series of links but it grew during its run to incorporate other presenters such as John Craven, and eventually Keith Chegwin on location around the country.

By 1978 more ITV regions were starting to show Tiswas. This year also saw the first of ITV's attempts at a networked summer show, in the shape of Southern TV's Saturday Banana. This starred Bill Oddie and Metal Mickey and featured a version of Runaround. The following year saw the more ambitious Mersey Pirate from Granada, and in 1980 Fun Factory with Jeremy Beadle.

The BBC's first attempt to fill the summer recess came with Get Set for Summer in 1981. Until then the long summer months were filled with the sort of dry fare that previously passed for entertainment all year round - Champion the Wonder Horse, Zorro and Children's Film Foundation arse. Get Set featured DJ Peter Powell and comic relief from Mark Curry, echoing the Swap Shop set up with Noel and Cheggers. It was made by BBC North West, as would all the BBC's summer shows for the rest of the decade.

Chris Tarrant's decision to leave Tiswas in 1981 fatally scuppered that show. Other presenters such as Fogwell Flax and Den Hegarty were promoted and Gordon Astley was introduced to helm the show, but the new team failed to inspire.

1982 was arguably the most eventful year in the history of Satkids, with several big changes. The year started with the portent of one of them: TVS, the new replacement for Southern, replaced Tiswas for six weeks with a show of its own, No. 73. This first series made little impact other than angering 'Was fans. More importantly, though, the new series of Tiswas had not been viewed as a success and it was decided it would be the last. At the same time, Noel Edmonds had chosen to leave Swap Shop. Come the autumn the two giants of Satkids tv were to be replaced or relaunched. Before that happened, TVS screened a second series of No. 73 over the summer; the rest of the ITV network failed to come up with anything, for the first time since 1978. They did, however, heavily promote their forthcoming new series, The Saturday Show. Originally this was to be Big Daddy's Saturday Show, presented by the kiddies' favourite fat wrestler. Shortly before transmission, however, Crabtree had to pull out on health grounds. Eventually it was presented by Tommy Boyd and Isla St. Clair.

In the autumn the new line-up debuted. Central's Saturday Show bore little resemblance to the anarchic Tiswas. Boyd did his best to insert an element of surprise, but it was a long way from the Tarrant days. Saturday Superstore, meanwhile, went to unnecessary lengths to try to modernise Swap Shop, introducing a raft of gimmicks on the theme of shopping. Essentially, however, it was the same show - of the presenting team, only Noel departed, to be replaced by fellow DJ Mike Read. Blue Peter's Sarah Greene was introduced and later promoted to the front desk.

In 1983, following the previous summer's debacle, No. 73 was fully networked. A few minor changes were made, such as moving from Southampton to the larger Maidstone studios. At the same time, the BBC tweaked Get Set for Summer slightly by renaming it The Get Set Picture Show (commonly abbreviated to the more vigourous Get Set). The following year this was firther refined into The Saturday Picture Show. Mark Curry was joined by Cheryl Baker, and a larger part of the show was taken up with extraneous material (hence the title).

In autumn 1984 The Saturday Show was looking increasingly staid, so an attempt to energise it was made by renaming it The Saturday Starship and bringing Bonnie Langford on board. This cannot have been judged a success as it turned out to be the last series. Summer 1985 saw the debut of Get Fresh, again spaceship-themed but more in the out-and-about tradition of the BBC's summer shows. Gaz Top and Charlotte Hindle were overshadowed by the awesome Gilbert the Alien, a truly bizarre creation voiced by impressionist Phil Cornwell.

The following year a new approach was tried with the modernistic TX, presented by Sue Robbie and Tony Slattery. The most remembered aspect of the show was the game Knock Your Block Off, which later returned as a separate programme. The series was presumably another failure as its run ended prematurely in December. The summer series of No. 73 was brought forward to run from January to April, in readiness for switching to autumn transmisson. Sadly the seventh series of No. 73 was without Sandi Toksvig, and a large part of the show's charm left with her. New characters were drafted in to fill the gap, but to little avail.

1987 saw ITV sticking with Get Fresh and No. 73, while the BBC underwent only its second change of winter show - the resolutely non-shopping themed Going Live. Mike Read elected to piss off back to the obscurity of Pop Quiz, or something, and was replaced by the first of the new breed: young, good looking, a telly person rather than radio, Philip Schofield set the mould for the next generation. Sarah Greene stayed on as co-host, enjoying a much closer relationship, while a regular comedy element was introduced in the shape of Trevor and Simon. Cheggers and Craven were dispensed with and a generally more modern feel was established, without changing the essence of the programme at all.

The BBC's 1987 summer show was, by marked contrast, bollocks. It's Wicked was a flagrant attempt to hip it up, which failed miserably. Jake Abrahams and Carolyn Marshall presented this over-complicated postmodernist toss-off which stood no chance of getting a second series.

TVS had already decided to make radical changes to No. 73, but were unsure what. Needing to free up studio space so that many thousands of extra editions of Catch Phrase could be made, 73 was thus moved outdoors. Unfortunately the original idea of recreating the street on the Maidstone studio's backlot was abandoned in favour of an ill-conceived affair involving a Wild West theme park. The show was renamed 7T3 from January 1988, and proved to be the final series.

The production team decided to abandon whimsy and instead devise an up-to-the-minute replacement. Their answer, Motormouth, borrowed a visual style from yoof programmes such as Def 2 and Network 7, but the content was essentially the same as before, with perhaps a greater emphasis on pop music. Another factor preventing the show from establishing a cohesive style was the overarching framework of 'Spin Off', a comedy-drama supposedly set in the studios which produced Motormouth. This element was quickly downplayed and eventually abandoned. Andrea Arnold and Neil Buchanan stayed on from 73, joined by Tony Gregory and Julian Ballantyne.

Summer 1989 saw Get Fresh replaced by Ghost Train, which, against the prevailing fashion, contained a hefty narrative element, though it was so absurd and convoluted it made the No. 73 look like The Forsyte Saga. In essence it was not too dissimilar, although Nobby the Sheep was no match for Gilbert. The presenters were Sabra Williams, Paul J Medford and Angelo Abela as the alien Gerard. 73's Sandi Toksvig appeared in a game show segment.

To Be Continued...