If there ever really was a golden age of children’s TV in the UK, surely it was the 1970s. Or do I only think that because that’s when I was a child?

A new book A TV Box of Delights, subtitled A Golden Age of British Children’s TV, looks at programmes from the mid-1960s to late 1980s, a period which surely encompasses some of the best children’s TV.

Or, if not the best, perhaps the most impactful. This was a time before social media and streaming. It was the time of the shared experience, and a time when, as editor Rodney Marshall notes, “a popular programme was discussed excitedly at school the following day, the playground version of office water-cooler or coffee machine moments”.

A renowned TV historian, academic and prolific writer, Rodney has compiled a book which explores some of the great children’s drama series of the era, including Children of the Stones, Catweazle, Robin of Sherwood, and the programme which inspired the book’s title, The Box of Delights.

And because ‘drama’ doesn’t have to be restricted to live-action, it also covers animated and puppet-based series like Mr Benn, The Herbs, and one of my favourites Thunderbirds.

I was honoured to contribute a chapter myself – on a slightly more obscure children’s drama Midnight is a Place (1977-78). If you don’t remember it, this was a Dickensian tale of teenage orphans, struggling to survive in the dangerous and exploitative Britain of the mid-19th century.

This was a society where children risked their lives to earn a meagre income, amid the deadly machines of mills and manufactories, or seeking out anything of value in the disease-ridden sewers.

The series was as dark as its title sugggests, and as a teen at the time, I was gripped each week, thanks in part to the presence in the cast of Oscar-nominated Ron Moody and its charismatic teen leads, Simon Gipps-Kent and Maxine Gordon.

Last year, I was lucky to track Maxine down, and even luckier that she kindly agreed to talk to me about the series and more. You can read about the ‘more’ in a previous blog post here.

Maxine (pictured here as Anne Marie in Midnight is a Place) told me about how she got the role, the filming process, the star-studded cast, and her (totally unfounded) doubts about her performance and the strong French accent she had to adopt!

You can read my chapter ‘Exploitation, Death, and Sewage – the Teatime Treat of Midnight is a Place‘ in A TV Box of Delights, edited by Rodney Marshall, available on Amazon here.

And my previous blog post about Maxine is here.

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