Early Grange Hill

[kidsick5000]

Don't remember that but I dimly recall there being a gay teacher who was taunted during an intra-school football match by the rival school team all chanting "POOF! POOF! POOF! POOF!". One of the Grange Hill kids, in an "I'm Spartacus" moment, stood up and defiantly delivered the stirring line "He may be a poof.......but he's OUR poof!"

That might not have been Grange Hill, to be honest. But it was in something.

Here's me thinking yu've got it mixed up with Only Fools And Horses or some other comedy. But no...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2k8NsLSMfsg

It also means I have "He may be a poof.......but he's OUR poof!" in my search history. Can wait to see what Google tries to sell me based on that.

[yesitsme]

On my first ever visit to London I was amazed to see that Grange Hill was actually a real place with a real stop on the real tube.  Top right, in a loop, in red.

I was desperate to go and begged my mum and dad but the miserable sods wouldn't let me.

It was a Saturday and even if the school was open it was hardly likely that Tucker and co would be Noisin About the playground.

On a recent visit to London I was intrigued to see that Grange Hill has moved it's location on the Tube map.

Bloody Tories.

[checkoutgirl]

Yeah, I think Gonch might be my favourite character from all of Grange Hill - if anyone deserved a spin-off show, it was him.

There's an episode on Youtube centering around Gonch doing a scam flogging toast and sandwiches in the school. Within minutes not one but two separate attempts to extort protection money from Gonch happen. It's like bloody South Central that school. Very entertaining though. It's from 1986 which was its heyday for me as I was 7 going on 8 that year.

[imitationleather]

On my first ever visit to London I was amazed to see that Grange Hill was actually a real place with a real stop on the real tube.  Top right, in a loop, in red.

I was desperate to go and begged my mum and dad but the miserable sods wouldn't let me.

It was a Saturday and even if the school was open it was hardly likely that Tucker and co would be Noisin About the playground.

On a recent visit to London I was intrigued to see that Grange Hill has moved it's location on the Tube map.

Bloody Tories.

Your parents are spot on. That place in Essex has owt to do with the TV programme. Grange Hill is just a generic location name that also is used by real areas, like Springfield.

[Brundle-Fly]

Christ this show could be glum. I'm in bits now. There was one sequence in this compilation that brought back a very sad memory from my schooldays. Our elderly English teacher was being given so much grief by the pupils that she suffered a heart attack in the classroom. I wasn't present but my best mate was. He said it was horrible because the troublemakers just stood over her and laughed. She recovered but immediately retired.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5QtOCS86Cc

[yesitsme]

Your parents are spot on. That place in Essex has owt to do with the TV programme. Grange Hill is just a generic location name that also is used by real areas, like Springfield.

Say it isn't so!  I expected to walk up the steps of the Tube station to see the school in all it's glory.  Perhaps Bullet Baxter carrying out some boxes in his trackie, Bridget the Midget looking from her office window and Booger Benson doing something.

Wouldn't have been great to see the 'Who do we want?/Scruffy McGuffy!' demo in full flow?

I will NEVER forgive my parents for that or you for shattering my dreams.

I remember the Scruffy McGuffy demo sparked a bit of Bolshivism at our school.  It was the era of the teacher's strikes and word had spread that pupils at Cannon Slade and Smithills schools had spent the afternoon sat in the playground shouting 'WE'RE ON STRIKE!' as hapless teachers tried to get them back to class.

We sat at the top of the 5th year playground and started chanting our defiance.

Then Mr Greenhalgh came out and we all legged it.

What a waste of a lunchtime that was!

[imitationleather]

For what it's worth (FWIW), I actually did go to the set of Grange Hill in the '90s. It was when Elstree studios still did tours, and I went to Grange Hill, Albert Square, the Top of the Pops studio and probably some other shite I don't remember. Best day ever. Seriously, it was.

[Phoenix Lazarus]

I remember the Scruffy McGuffy demo sparked a bit of Bolshivism at our school.  It was the era of the teacher's strikes and word had spread that pupils at Cannon Slade and Smithills schools had spent the afternoon sat in the playground shouting 'WE'RE ON STRIKE!' as hapless teachers tried to get them back to class.

We sat at the top of the 5th year playground and started chanting our defiance.

Then Mr Greenhalgh came out and we all legged it.

I assume the said Greenhalgh would make Mr Bronson seem a pussycat in comparison!

[Camp Tramp]

I started secondary school in'89, so Grange Hill gave me plenty of ideas about what to expect. They were mainly wrong as it happens, I never saw a PE teacher try to choke a teacher with a baseball bat or a Maths teacher run out of her class crying after a pupil was caught passing around a porn mag with her lookalike in it around the classroom.

[greencalx]

It was years before I realised that it wasn't two $ signs on that blazer badge. Never been the sharpest tool in the box.

I came in as a regular viewer around '87 I think. Just missed all the sanctimonious Just Say No crap, but got to see Mr Bronson hound Danny Kendall to his death. Those were the days!

[Mr Banlon]

They filmed exterior shots of Grange Hill at my old school in the late 80s. That school got shut down by the local authority in the mid-80s for being shit. The last episode of series 10 was filmed on the sports field/playground there. (They're having a school fate or something and Fresh 'N' Fly do a set.) The episode ends with Ziggy being chased by the bellends in American football gear. Ziggy gets away and jumps on the back of a 140 bus.

[Gulftastic]

You all joined so late. I'm so old I remember a feature on Blue Peter about the show before the first episode aired.

[yesitsme]

I assume the said Greenhalgh would make Mr Bronson seem a pussycat in comparison!

Greenhalgh or 'Bulldog' as he was known would have made a great character actor.  Former copper he was exactly what the phrase 'old school' was invented for.  Cruel but fair.

He did also provide me with one of my all time favourite memories too.  One day we were in class (careers - whatever that was) and everyone was writing away.  I saw him toying with a marble he'd picked up somewhere.  For some unknown reason he then put it between his teeth - at that moment I knew EXACTLY what was going to happen next.  Sure enough the marble slipped from his teeth and he swallowed it.

As everyone was heads down he must have thought he'd got away with it but he put his hand on his chest and then stood up very slowly and left the class.

I'd seen it though.

For other teachers the witnessed swallowing of a marble would have spelled the end - for Bulldog it just made him stronger.

[Quincey]

Do you reckon he pooed it out or did he have to go to hospital and have it removed?

[yesitsme]

Do you reckon he pooed it out or did he have to go to hospital and have it removed?

You tell me you're the forensic doctor.

I think he must have shat it out to be honest.  I bumped in to him several years later walking down to the match, we had a chat and he seemed to be ok.  I should have asked him then shouldn't I?

He commanded that much respect that even though I knew his name (Dennis - fact fans) I still called him 'Mr Greenhalgh'. 

That scene would have made a great segment in GH wouldn't it?  I can imagine Zammo being scolded for eating the drugs only to come back and say 'Aye, well at least I don't eat fackin' marbulz!' 

I used to be able to name the love interests in GH from the start up to Zammo and Jacqui and probably a bit after.  But I can't now.  Doesn't really work as a party piece any more.

Did anyone have the slight horn for Mrs McClusky?  I know I did.  A bit.  At times.

Did anyone else read any of the books?  I thought they were pretty good and what about Tucker's Luck?

*jumps on to the back of a Routemaster*

[Quincey]

How big was the marble?

[yesitsme]

How big was the marble?

Just yer normal marble, it wasn't a 'dobber' or a 'steely' or anything. 

I could see what was going to happen all the way.  From the time he started absent mindedly rolling it around his hand I knew he was going to swallow it.  Do you think I made it happen?  Do you think I projected my wish on to him in a Derren Brown/Jedi mind trick way?  I've often thought I was slightly psychic.  Nothing major, not enough to predict the lottery results but I'll often start singing a song I've not heard for years only for it to come on the radio.

Perhaps I should add 'marble ingestion predictor' to my c.v.?

[Norton Canes]

One for the 'Things you haven't done since the 90s but would quite like to give another go' thread - dragging yourself out of bed at half ten on a Sunday morning to watch the BBC2 repeats of the first few series of Grange Hill

[Phoenix Lazarus]

Just as long as it wasn't one of the Elgin Marbles!