Mr Squiggle is Dead R.I.P.

One of the iconic shows of my childhood, that I watched religiously along with Andy Pandy and Adventure Island, was Mr Squiggle. These days it woudl be considered a very low tech show but I loved the way Mr Squiggle and Norman Hetherington, his creator, could conjure the most amazing drawings out of dots and dashes, and week in, week out, it left me enthralled. I also loved the curmudgeonly Blackboard always complaining with his cries of "Hurry up. Hurry up!" and Steamshovel, and Snail. What a wonderful cast of characters.

Thank you Norman for making my childhood such a rich and wonderful place. You will be missed.

The Obituary

The man behind popular Australian children's television character Mr Squiggle has died aged 89.



Norman Frederick Hetherington died on Monday after a long illness.


Born on May 29, 1921, at Lilyfield in Sydney's inner-west, Hetherington first became interested in puppetry at age 14 when his father gave him a magazine with instructions for making a puppet out of used bicycle inner tubes.

But Hetherington first established himself professionally as a cartoonist.

The Bulletin published one of his cartoons in 1938, but when World War II broke out a year later Hetherington enlisted, becoming a soldier in the 1st Australian Army Entertainment Unit.


After the war, Hetherington became a successful freelance cartoonist in Sydney and in 1946 was given a job at The Bulletin.

But he continued his puppetry interest and, in 1956, his TV career began after completing training at the ABC.


He created several children's shows for TV before introducing Mr Squiggle, who first appeared as part of the Children's TV Club on the ABC in 1959.


His wife Margaret, whom he married in 1958, wrote all the scripts for the moon-dwelling marionette with a pencil for a nose while Hetherington, who was awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia in 1990, provided all the voices for the show's puppets.

Mr Squiggle soon turned into its own program.


Over its 40 years on TV, the show varied from five-minute spots to a one-and-a-half hour variety show featuring other performers.


But it retained its main feature: children writing in with their "squiggles" which Mr Squiggle turned into drawings by connecting lines with his pencil nose.

The character would say "upside down, upside down" and his assistant would turn the picture the right way up to reveal the drawing.


The last episode aired on July 9, 1999.

Hetherington is survived by Margaret, daughter Rebecca and son Stephen.