Fireman Sam (lost original pilot of British children's stop-motion animated TV series; existence unconfirmed; 1985)

The original series' title card.

Status: Existence Unconfirmed

Fireman Sam is a British children's stop-motion animated series that originally ran on the Welsh channel S4C (titled Sam Tân) then on BBC from 1987-1994 before being revamped into a claymation show in 2003 and then was revived as a CGI animated series thats been airing since 2008. The series about a Fireman name Sam that lives/works for the town of Pontypandy's fire department with his fellow firefighters. The series was made to help teach children about fire safety.

Original Pilot

Rumors have speculated that there was an earlier pilot that aired in 1985 on S4C.^[1] No footage of the pilot has resurfaced and although it's plot is not currently known, there's been speculations that it might have been based on one of the 4 books of the series released in 1986 by Little Owl Superstars Books. While 3 of the books (Butterfly Catching, Sam's Windy Day and Norman's Naughty Day) were adapted into episodes of the TV series. The only one that wasn't was for Sam's Forgetful Day speculating that the pilot could've been based on that story.

Status

The only potential material from the pilot were 5 early screenshots of the characters taken from various sources with some possibly taken from the Fireman Sam Annual books that were released in 1987. There are thoughts that the original pilot was actually the series first episode "The Kite" due to its development beginning that same year but this has yet to be verified by an official source.