Diddy Men

For other uses, see Diddy (disambiguation).

The Diddy Men are commonly believed to be a creation of the British comedian Ken Dodd. However, they have existed in local mythology for much longer and, along with the Treacle and Jam Butty Mines of Knotty Ash, had been referred to in the earlier act of another Liverpool comedian Arthur Askey ^[1]. When Ken Dodd began playing seaside resorts, he made famous his home area of Knotty Ash in Liverpool and popularised a miniature race of people who inhabited it. Diddy is northern slang for "little".

The Diddy Men were originally an unseen joke but after a while began to appear on stage with Dodd, delighting children in the audience. They also appeared in Dodd's BBC television programmes in the 1960s, as string-operated puppets.

The Diddy Men tend to wear slightly oversized adult clothes in flamboyant style including tall furry hats. Diddy Men are about 3 feet tall and said to work in the Jam Butty mines of Knotty Ash.

A Diddy Men strip ran in the comic TV Comic.

Notable Diddy Men

Notable Diddy Men include: Dicky Mint, Mick the Marmalizer, Stephen "Titch" Doyle, Little Evan, Hamish McDiddy, Nigel Ponsonby-Smallpiece, Nicky Nugget, Sid Short and Smarty Arty. Diminutive British disc jockey David Hamilton who appeared as a regular on Dodd's BBC shows of the era, acquired the nickname 'Diddy David' which has stayed with him to this day. The original Mick the Marmalizer was the ten-year old daughter of Little Jimmy, who appeared at the Blackpool Tower Circus with Charlie Carroli and Paul.

The Song of the Diddy Men

The Diddy Men have a song, once released as a single, titled "The Song of the Diddy Men", sung in a high pitched, chipmunk style voice. It includes the chorus: "We are the Diddy Men, Doddy's little Diddy Men, We are the Diddy Men who come from Knotty Ash". Another song "Doddy's Diddy Party" featured the refrain - "tonight's the night the Diddy Men paint the town, we'll lose our blues, and let our Diddy hair down".

Actors

On stage the Diddy Men are normally played by children or adults with dwarfism. On TV and in some stage performances, Dodd uses a ventriloquist's puppet of the Dicky Mint character. These days the Diddy Men are rarely seen outside pantomime season.

References

1. ^ BBC Radio "How Tickled Am I" s03e01