Upside down! Upside down!

June 30, 2009 8:28 PM

Mr Squiggle, the Man from 93 Crater Crescent, the Moon, turns 50 today. Created by cartoonist and puppeteer Norman Hetherington, who would take children's scribbles and then craft it into a drawing, Mr Squiggle, along with friends Gus the Snail, Bill the Steam Shovel and the ever grumpy Blackboard (whom Mr Squiggle would use as an easel, being told to "Hu-rry u-p, hu-rry u-p" as he did) has been something of an institution for generations of Australian kids. Relive some of the magic...
posted by Effigy2000 (18 comments total)

Bill the Steam Shovel was my favourite. I'm a bit sad my kids don't get to watch him and Miss Jane.
posted by bystander at 8:33 PM on June 30

Blackboard was definitely my favourite, although he did scare me a bit. I'm sad my kids have missed out on ol' Mr Squiggle as well. Ah well, at least they've got YouTube. Thanks for the post!
posted by h00py at 8:39 PM on June 30 [1 favorite has favorites]

Yay, happy birthday Mr Squiggle!!

In honour of him, I shall reboot the server at home bearing his name. Also Blackboard, while I'm there...
posted by pompomtom at 9:17 PM on June 30

I'm struck by how similar the endings to 'Mr Squiggle the man from the moon' and 'Skippy the bush kangaroo' sound.
posted by tellurian at 9:24 PM on June 30 [2 favorites has favorites]

Aaaargh tellurian: that's an earworm for the rest of the day. grrrr and boo to you.
posted by pompomtom at 9:51 PM on June 30

I used to love Mr Squiggle, but I thought Gus was a creepy little freak.

My friends and I still say "Upside down, Miss Jane!" and "Hurrr-ry up, hurrr-ry up" whenever the occasion arises.
posted by harriet vane at 10:24 PM on June 30 [2 favorites has favorites]

And hey! Miss Pat appeared in an episode of Skippy.
posted by tellurian at 10:31 PM on June 30

I also came here to say "HURRY UUPPP!" in honour of Blackboard, as I also still use that today where appropriate. God that show ruled when I was wee.

50 years old, wow. Happy birthday Mr Squiggle!
posted by nudar at 10:38 PM on June 30

I also came here to say "HURRY UUPPP!" in honour of Blackboard

People just look at me funny when I say that now.

Of course, sometimes people just look at me funny for no reason at all, so I'm pretty relaxed about it all...
posted by pompomtom at 11:05 PM on June 30

For folks living around Chicago (initially), the equivalent was Gigglesnort Hotel, courtesy of Bill Jackson. I worked at the Museum of Broadcast Communications when they did an event honoring him, and you never saw such a gleeful room full of adults adore a slightly stooped, friendly old guy like I did that night. He brought out his puppets and did some live drawings on an easel, and then four (I think) lucky people in the audience who had lemons taped under their chairs got to take the drawings home. For all the excitement, you'd think they'd won a car on Oprah.

So thanks for inadvertently bringing back those memories, even though I've never heard of this particular show before.
posted by davejay at 11:06 PM on June 30 [1 favorite has favorites]

My friends and I still say "Upside down, Miss Jane!" and "Hurrr-ry up, hurrr-ry up" whenever the occasion arises.

Glad it is not just our household. Though our five year old, who has never seen the Squiggly goodness, just looks at us rather confused when we do.
posted by Megami at 12:16 AM on July 1

I've forgotten which Australian comedian it was that riffed on Mr Squiggle and asked "What were they thinking of when they created him?"

"OK, there's this man from the moon. With a giant pencil for a nose."

"And he travels from the moon in a rocket. With his pencil-nose protruding."

"His best friends are a sentient steam shovel and a blackboard with anger-management problems."

"Man, I am so baked right now ..."
posted by outlier at 1:02 AM on July 1 [1 favorite has favorites]

Great! HB Mr Squiggle!
posted by wgl1 at 4:29 AM on July 1

Great post! Except Wikipedia totally ruined my trip down memory lane with some real-life tragedy relating to Miss Jane.
posted by No-sword at 6:22 AM on July 1

(Also, I guess Mr Squiggle's first name was "Jolly"?)
posted by No-sword at 6:23 AM on July 1

No-sword: "Great post! Except Wikipedia totally ruined my trip down memory lane with some real-life tragedy relating to Miss Jane."

Wow, fuck. Fate just took her life and fucked it over something bad, huh?
posted by Effigy2000 at 2:15 PM on July 1

I'm fairly certain that I've seen a Mr. Squiggle knitting pattern somewhere in my collection...
posted by web-goddess at 5:54 PM on July 1

Oh, neat, I loved Mr Squiggle! I'll totally have to remember to have some fun Mr Squiggle challenges with my young one once he's old enough to enjoy it. "Hurrrry Uuuup" is brilliant, but my favourite quote, which seems just perfect sometimes is "Everything's upside down these days, Miss Jane!".

Man, Bill's jokes were always sooo bad though.

Happy birthday, Mr Squiggle! I hope that some day you'll return to Earth.
posted by bunyip at 8:34 PM on July 1