Teddies, dwarfs and an awful lot of cash for Children in Need in 1995

Since the launch of Children in Need in November 1980, the public has raised more than £800million '“ and the youngsters in these pictures certainly did their bit to help.
Albemarle PlaygroupAlbemarle Playgroup
Albemarle Playgroup

The photos were published in the Middy in 1995 and show some of the clever ways the area’s children raised a few pounds.At St Peter’s School, in Burgess Hill, £86 was raised via a mufti day and best-dressed teddy bear contest, while at Goodstart Nursery, in Poynings, a cake and biscuit sale brought in a bit of cash.There were pennies galore at Lindfield Infants, when the children brought in all their spare coppers and used them to cover a giant version of the school badge. At Sainsbury’s in Burgess Hill, it was all about the dwarfs – seven of them – who held a raffle and magic show to raise money, while Hurstpierpoint Junior School laid on a French cafe, offering a piping hot cup of cafe au lait for the princely sum of 30p.The children at Albemarle Playgroup found arguably the best way of raising money. They raised £41.30 by filling Smarties tubes with money – having first undertaken the rather tasty job of emptying them!The history of Children in Need goes back much further than 1980 – to Christmas Day 1927, when the BBC’s first children’s appeal came in the form of a five-minute radio broadcast. As with today’s fundraiser, the response from the public was phenomenal, raising £1,143 18 shillings and 3 pence – roughly £64,000 – which was split between four children’s charities.A Children’s Hour Christmas Appeal, presented by Sooty and Harry Corbett, was televised in 1955, and Christmas Day appeals continued on TV and radio until 1979, raising a total of £625,836.Then came Pudsey Bear and Terry Wogan – the rest is history!

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