page_title: Dad's Army
section_title: Tributes
hierarchical_section_title: Dad's Army / Tributes
caption_attribution_description: English: Statue of Captain George Mainwaring erected in the Norfolk town of Thetford. Deutsch: Statue Captain George Mainwarings (Figur aus der Sitcom Dad's Army) in Thetford.
context_page_description: Dad's Army is a BBC sitcom about the British militia called the Home Guard during the Second World War. It was written by Jimmy Perry and David Croft, and broadcast on the BBC from 1968 to 1977. The sitcom ran for nine series and 80 episodes in total; there was also a radio version based on the television scripts, a feature film and a stage show. The series regularly gained audiences of 18 million viewers, and is still repeated worldwide.
  The Home Guard consisted of local volunteers otherwise ineligible for military service, either because of age or by being in professions exempt from conscription. Dad's Army deals almost exclusively with men over military age, and featured older British actors, including Arthur Lowe, John Le Mesurier, Arnold Ridley and John Laurie. Younger members of the cast included Ian Lavender, Clive Dunn, and James Beck. Other regular cast members included Frank Williams as the vicar, and Bill Pertwee as the chief ARP warden.
  In 2004, Dad's Army came fourth in a BBC poll to find Britain's Best Sitcom.
context_section_description: In June 2010, a statue of Captain Mainwaring was erected in the Norfolk town of Thetford where most of the exteriors for the TV series were filmed. The statue features Captain Mainwaring sitting to attention on a simple bench in Home Guard uniform, with his swagger stick across his knees. The statue is mounted at the end of a winding brick pathway with a Union Flag patterned arrowhead to reflect the opening credits of the TV series and the sculpture has been designed so that members of the public can sit beside Captain Mainwaring and have their photograph taken. The statue was vandalised not long after the unveiling by a 10-year-old boy, who kicked it for 10 minutes and broke off the statue's glasses, throwing them into a nearby river. The statue has since been fixed.
  The British sitcom Goodnight Sweetheart paid tribute to Dad's Army in episode one of its second series in 1995, "Don't Get Around Much Any More". Here, lead character Gary Sparrow – a time-traveller from the 1990s – goes into a bank in 1941 and meets a bank manager named Mainwaring and Wilson, his chief clerk, both of whom are in the Home Guard. When he hears the names Mainwaring and Wilson, Gary begins singing the Dad's Army theme song.
  A brief visual tribute to Dad's Army is made at the start of the episode "Rag Week" from Ben Elton's 1990s sitcom The Thin Blue Line.
  In June 2018 the Royal Mail issued a set of 8 stamps, featuring the main characters and their catchphrases, to mark the comedy's 50th anniversary.
caption: Statue of Captain Mainwaring, erected in Thetford in June 2010
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