Why I Still Miss the Golden Age of Lunchtime Children’s Television
Lunchtime memories I’ll never lose
It’s 1986. It’s 12pm. I’m fresh home from playgroup. A ham sandwich is in my hand. Could life get any better? Well, yes, of course it could. Puddle Lane is about to start. And a little later it’ll be time for Mop and Smiff. The lunchtime children’s television slot in Britain felt, at the time, like its own small kind of magic.
Today, when children can watch whatever they want, at anytime, the idea of children’s television being restricted to a few hours a day feels ludicrous. But, for a long time, until satellite television and the internet, that was simply how things were. It was non-negotiable. Children had a few brief slots of television aimed at them, and that was that.
The BBC’s Watch with Mother was first out of the blocks in 1952. A spin-off from BBC Radio’s Listen with Mother, the schedule had expanded to five programmes by 1955: Picture Book, Andy Pandy, Flower Pot Men, Rag, Tag and Bobtail and The Woodentops.
ITV kickstarted their lunchtime children’s slot in 1955. But the regional nature of the broadcaster meant it was a more fractured affair. By 1972, however, the schedule had expanded and was more established. Rainbow, Pipkins and Hickory’s House all launched within the first year, a lineup not to be sniffed at.
Watch with Mother evolved into See-Saw in 1980, reflecting the growing number of mums now going out to work. And this is when I started watching television. I may be biased, but the early to mid-1980s was an unbelievable time for the lunchtime children’s slot. Both See-Saw and Children’s ITV delivered classic after classic.
They generally fell into three categories. First up was education dressed up as fun. Bric-a-Brac featured Brian Cant delving through his dusty bric-a-brac shop to explore phonetics. The Giddy Game Show, meanwhile, got the old grey matter going with a series of fiendish puzzles.
Next, there was good old fashioned storytelling. The Little Green Man, narrated by Jon Pertwee, followed the curious friendship between schoolboy Skeets and a visitor from beyond the stars. There was also Tickle on the Tum, featuring not only the songs of Ralph McTell, but also a series of stories featuring a star-studded cast - Billy Connolly, Burt Kwouk and Penelope Keith all took part.
Finally, there was everything else. From the imagination sparking Let’s Pretend through to the dance inspired Hokey Cokey and the wilfully bizarre antics of The Buttercup Buskers (this one really needs to be seen as words cannot do it justice). There was truly something for everyone, even Stop-Go for any ardent fans of transport documentaries.
A welcome diversion for children, for sure, but why do the memories persist so strongly? Why, forty years on, does the Thames theme tune leave me eager with anticipation that Zippy, George and Bungle are about to appear? Why will I never forget the episode of Mop and Smiff where they meet the Queen? And why do I still resent having to sit through Pebble Mill at One to get to the See-Saw slot?
It felt special. By the time I started watching, home recording existed, but blank tapes were still expensive. Lunchtime programmes were rarely repeated - miss an episode of Chock-a-Block and it was likely gone forever. Even now, many of these programmes are difficult to rewatch, with some wiped into oblivion by the broadcasters.
I toddled off to primary school in 1987, so you’d think that’s where my memories of the lunchtime slot ended. But they didn’t. For many years afterwards, I was lucky enough to pop home for my lunch, and remember watching countless episodes of The Riddlers and Allsorts before dashing back to school. They weren’t aimed at me by this point, but the charm I remembered from my even younger years still hooked me in.
Of course, like so much of the television landscape from the past, the children’s lunchtime slot is now consigned to history. ITV ended their slot in 1993, allowing This Morning to run later - thankfully, the lost time was absorbed into the afternoon Children’s ITV slot. The BBC, however, carried on for a decade longer, with the final lunchtime slot coming towards the end of 2002.
By now, digital television was kicking off, and children’s schedules far eclipsed anything available in the past. A few years on and linear watching would seem as archaic as black and white programming and getting up to change the channel. Everything had changed.
For as long as I live, I’ll cherish the lunchtime children’s slot. It was more than just television - it was a small, perfectly contained pocket of magic in the middle of the day. That ham sandwich at 12pm, the glow of the television and the knowledge that the rest of the world could wait. It all combined to turn an ordinary lunchtime into something worth remembering forty years later.
What are your memories of watching the lunchtime children’s schedules?
It’s interesting. The notion of going home for lunch during school didn’t really exist in Australia, at least in government schools, private schools usually have different rules for some things, so it may have been allowed with them. Leaving the school grounds at any time (between roughly 9 and 3) was strictly forbidden, at least at the (state) schools I went to, plus the fact that many kids lived a fair distance from home, and often you’d travel by bus. You couldn’t just nip home when it was a 90-minute return walk. Some were fortunate to live only a few minutes away, although the riotous bus trips to and from school are some of my best memories of school. I don’t know how the bus drivers put up with us.
Children’s watching periods were usually between 6am and 9am in the morning and then 3.30pm to 5pm in the afternoon, often with repeats of old classics, like Sgt Bilko, not that it’s a kids show, but it was G-rated. There was never anything on around lunchtime for kids, except educational programmes on the ABC that you would watch at school. Even during school holidays there wasn’t a great deal on for kids during the day*, but it was nice to watch the grown-up stuff (serials, dramas, talk shows and midday movies) during the day that you couldn’t watch whilst at school.
(* There may have been the odd child-friendly movie matinee during school holidays, it’s hard to recall, I’d have to consult old TV listings. Plus, a lot of the time you were out playing with friends during the day, if they were available.)
I used to love running home from school at lunch time (because I didn’t like school and the 55 minutes at home was a much-needed break from it) and watching Rainbow. But what sticks in my mind is this: I recall what I think was a review show (for grown-ups), and my lasting memory was seeing a clip from American Werewolf (the tube chase). I’m certain it was shown at lunchtime/12.30, because even as a nipper I knew I shouldn’t have been seeing anything scary at that time of day!