They spoke in whistles, ate green gunge supplied by the Soup Dragon and were loved by millions of children.

Now the pink-nosed Clangers are being enjoyed by a new generation of children, after CBeebies released a new version of the show.

The children’s BBC show was originally created in a converted pigsty in Blean, near Canterbury, back in the 1960s by Peter Firmin and Oliver Postgate.

Other creations by the pair include Ivor the Engine, Pogles’ Wood, Bagpuss and Noggin the Nog.

The mouse-like Clangers lived on small blue planet which had a surface peppered with holes topped with metal dustbin lids. The lids flipped open with a clang to reveal steps down to their home beneath the surface.

Whichever generation you belong to, you’ll enjoy a celebration of the Peter and Oliver’s huge output of Smallfilms before CGI animation at the Beaney in Canterbury.

Speaking in 2014 when he received a special award at the Baftas, Peter said: “Television has changed and developed beyond anything we could have dreamt of in the years before colour and digital and computer chips with everything.”

Oliver Postgate died in 2008, but his son Dan, who lives in Whitstable, has been involved in the new TV series as has Peter Firmin, who is now in his 80s.

“We didn’t want to update it in such a way that the Clangers were using iPads or things like that,” said Dan.

“It still exists in this strangely non-specific period of time.”

EXHIBITION DETAILS

Firmin & Postgate: The Making of Smallfilms runs in the Drawing Room Gallery of the Beaney in Canterbury until Sunday, February 28. Admission is free but the museum operates a “pay what you can” system, with donations going back into putting on exhibitions.

or details go to www.canterbury.co.uk/Beaney