The Archers opera. Under the pseudonym "Bruno Milna", Painting also wrote around 1,200 complete episodes, which culminated in the 10,000th episode. June Spencer has played Peggy Archer/Woolley from the pilot episode onwards, though not for all of the period since. According to "Who's Who in The Archers 2008", episode 15,360 was to be broadcast on 1 January 2008. Episode 15,000 was broadcast on 7 November 2006. The Archers reached its 60th anniversary on 1 January 2011 and to mark this achievement, a special half-hour episode was broadcast on Sunday, 2 January, on BBC Radio 4 from 7pm. The episode had been advertised
The Archers subsequently on the BBC Home Service (now Radio 4). Early afternoon repeats of the previous evening's episode began on 14 December 1964. The original scriptwriters were Geoffrey Webb and Edward J. Mason, who were also working on the nightly thriller series about the special agent Dick Barton. The popularity of his adventures partly inspired "The Archers", which eventually took over Barton's evening slot. At first, however, the national launch placed the serial at the 'terrible' time of 11.45am, but it moved to Dick Barton's former slot of 6.45pm from Monday, 2 April 1951. An omnibus edition of the week's episodes