Tearaway Trisha (1980)

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Published: Jinty 8 March 1980 – 21/28 June 1980 (no episodes 17 May to 7 June due to strike)

Episodes: 12

Artist: Andrew Wilson

Writer: Unknown

Translations/reprints: None known

Plot

Trisha is hot stuff on a bicycle. Though not a downright hooligan on wheels, she is a reckless, carefree daredevil with no sense of safety or responsibility. People say the little pest is headed for trouble, and it happens when Trisha is not paying full attention on the road because of her goofing off. She fails to notice a greasy patch on the road and goes into a skid, which causes a car to plough right into a lamp post. This puts a girl named Fran Hayward in hospital with serious facial injuries.

Everyone is blaming Fran for it and giving her a hard time, notwithstanding the oil patch, none of the passengers in the car wearing seat belts, the site of the accident having a reputation as a “black spot”, and Fran’s mother admitting it was partly her fault too. (The episode is posted above for your own judgement about the accident.)

Trisha feels guilty and responsible when she sees the state Fran is in. Mrs Hayward says money is needed for Fran to have plastic surgery but she does not have the money.

Meanwhile, Trisha wangles her way to see a stunt cycling act by helping the performers. Then, when one of the performers lets her fellow performers down, they ask Fran to take her place. This proves successful, though the manager is not impressed when he finds out. Ultimately, it is inspiration for Fran to put on three cycling shows to raise the money for Fran’s operation and the newspaper is taking up the story.

However, Trisha keeps having brushes with the law, and her latest one almost cancels the deal with the press. The editor only agrees to continue with Trisha if she will have cycling lessons and get a proficiency certificate. This is most demeaning for Trisha. It is even more so when they find her bicycle is not safe (damaged from the accident and Trish has to do self-repairs, which make for a banged-up bike). The editor has to loan her one. What’s more, she’s making mistakes with her cycling that need to be corrected. But she is forced to continue because it will keep the peace with Mrs Hayward and she’s got to convince people that she’s changed. To add to her problems, some toughs play tricks on her. As a result, she ends up in an icky river and the editor is not pleased to see the state of the bike he loaned her.

Trisha finally manages to stage her first show and it goes well. But Fran, who is having constant hysterics over the state of her face, people staring at her, and terrified of the operation, runs off. Trisha manages to find her, but the incident has Trisha so shaken up that she bungles the second show and it’s a failure.

When Fran reads about this in the paper, she snaps out of her selfishness as she realises what Trisha is going through to help her. A nurse informs Fran that she’s heard some toughs intend to come to the third show and throw rotten fruit at Trisha, and Fran alerts Trisha. Trisha turns this to her advantage by turning the whole thing into an Aunt Sally on Wheels show, with each hit raising £1 for the fund, and Trisha’s stunts ensuring some missiles miss. Everyone thinks the show’s a riot and it’s a financial success. There is now enough money for the operation, and Fran, inspired by Trisha’s courage, finds her own courage to go through with the operation.

The newspaper bike goes to raffle to raise money for Fran to go on holiday. When she comes back, she realises how silly her hysterics were – nobody is staring at her. She and Trisha become friends. Trisha is now more responsible about biking, but she is still keen on it and can’t wait for her bike to come back from the repair shop.

Thoughts

This is Jinty’s second (and last) story about cycling, the first being “Curtain of Silence”. Like Curtain of Silence, it is a redemption story about a thoughtless cyclist who needs to change her ways. But unlike Curtain of Silence, it is not about the sports side of cycling. Instead, it is the stunt and fun side of cycling.

This is definitely a strong story about responsibility, especially on the road. When you think you know it all, you find there are still some things you need to know to improve your road safety and there are road safety courses you can take a lot of things away from. Jinty readers must have emerged from this one thinking hard about how much more responsible they could be about cycling. In fact, the first episode adds this caption: “Don’t be like Trisha! Always cycle safely, with care and attention.”

Trisha is definitely one of the most ballsy, gutsy protagonists in Jinty. Although she gets depressed several times she never quits and she always bounces back. We all love her instantly because she’s no Pollyanna, and the artwork of Andrew Wilson (best remembered for “The Happy Days”) really brings off her irrepressible character.

Though not a bad person at heart, Trisha is clearly irresponsible and we know she is set for a long road to redemption about learning responsibility. However, she’s not wallowing in self-blame as many protagonists do in girls’ comics, which is refreshing. Initially she resists the idea that she is to blame, as there were other factors involved in the accident as well. It takes the shock of seeing Fran to make Trisha realise she must take some responsibility for it and she becomes more sober. It really is to Mrs Hayward’s credit that she is taking some of the blame as well and is not holding any grudges against Trisha or turning bitter towards her (unlike some parents in girls’ comics, such as Mrs Mitchell in Jinty’s “Waves of Fear”).

Trisha being an inspiration to Fran is a brilliant plot twist. At the hospital, Fran falls into the trap of self-pity, refusing to be helped, having hysterics etc, etc. We see this a lot in girls’ comics and can only wait and see what snaps the girl out of it. It is a delight to see it is the courage of the very girl who was partly to blame for her condition.

The most exciting parts of the story have to be Trisha’s bike stunts themselves. They are thrilling to watch and the highlight is definitely the Aunt Sally on Wheels. There can be little doubt Trisha will follow in the footsteps of the cycling performers and have a career in her own cycling shows. They also help to keep the story more lightweight and humorous, so the story, though a redemption and guilt complex story, is not overly dark or emotional.

Jinty and Penny 26 April 1980

Stories in this issue:

• Pam of Pond Hill (writer Jay Over, artist Bob Harvey)
• Gaye’s Gloomy Ghost (artist Hugh Thornton-Jones)
• Seulah the Seal (artist Veronica Weir)
• Alley Cat (artist Rob Lee)
• Tearaway Trisha (artist Andrew Wilson)
• Rinty N Jinty
• Lost in Time! – board game to pull out and play
• The Venetian Looking Glass (artist Phil Gascoine)
• Tansy of Jubilee Street (artist Ken Houghton)
• Blind Faith – first episode (artist Phil Townsend)
• Stories of the Stars: Evonne Goolagong
• White Water (artist Jim Baikie) – last episode

‘Start collecting our super colour 3 part game’, the cover announces. I remember thinking that the game (which involves moving between various eras such as Ancient Egypt and a time of dinosaurs) looked quite fun, but I would never have pulled the centre pages out to put a game together! I am not totally sure if the cover is done by the same artist who created the interior pages with the game – which look to me to have been done by Ken Houghton.

Everyone is teasing Pam about her friendship with Goofy Boyle, making like they are boyfriend and girlfriend. Pam denies everything but of course that is also quite hurtful to Goofy, especially when Pam intervenes to save him from being beaten up by bullies.

Seulah and his human friend Bonnie are still looking out for each other, and miss finding each other by a very close call. Instead Seulah finds a narrowboat with a feast fit for a king – or a hungry seal – in the form of a huge salmon all laid out! But when the owner returns, he is trapped…

Tearaway Trisha has Trisha and Fran reconciling their misunderstandings – Trisha goes up onto the hospital roof to talk Fran down from the edge, but in the end Fran is the one who rescues Trisha when she wobbles and nearly falls off the side. All seems like it is going well for Trisha at the end of the episode, but she is too ready to be tempted by her old, rambunctious friends.

Lucy Craven is under the spell of the Venetian Looking Glass: it has similarities to “Slave of the Mirror”, not least because they both include mirrors in the story title, but the fact that Lucy is enslaved by a set of shoes that her evil ancestor forces her to wear is a little spookier in some ways. Cousin Rosalind is in hospital because she fell from her horse, but that only happened because Lucy spooked her horse.  She vows never to hurt her cousin again but the ghost of her evil ancestor has other plans.

It’s the start of “Blind Faith”: one of the least plausible stories in girls comics, as it features a blind showjumping horse who is coached into winning events by his dedicated owner. In this first episode Cromwell is taken over the water jump by Clare, the daughter of his owner: she wants to prove she can help the horse overcome his nerves. Sadly there is an accident and Cromwell hits his head – which turns him blind. “You little fool!” says the unsympathetic father. “A few minutes ago we had a horse with a slight problem. Now we don’t have a horse” – as he leads Cromwell off to the knackers.

I don’t know much about tennis player Evonne Goolagong but her name has always stuck in my head, not though I could tell you much of what is contained in this short piece about her without re-reading it. (She won Wimbledon in 1971, I see.)

Canoeing story “White Water” comes to an end in this issue – Bridie Mason and her frenemy Jocelyn get themselves into trouble because of a challenge they talked themselves into. They are in serious danger in the water and only great paddling gets them back to safety. The experience leads to them making things up with each other and coming to terms with their own foolish actions.

Story theme: Redemption narratives

I recently wrote summary posts about two stories that I called ‘redemption narratives’: “The Girl Who Never Was” and “She Shall Have Music“. That’s a kind of story theme that we can all recognize as being fairly common in girls comics generally: in Jinty there are a number of other examples.  But how does this sort of story work?

Take those two stories as an initial guide: the protagonist is a difficult or disagreeable, probably dislikeable, girl who has some personal failing or issue that drives the story. It’s because of that failing that the story progresses; it may not have been due to something that was her fault that the story started off in the first place, but it is because of her moral or social problem that it continues and develops the way it does. Tina Williams lands in the alternate universe where magic works because of her conceited and annoying ways; Lisa Carstairs’s father doesn’t lose his money because of her, but if she wasn’t so obsessed with continuing her piano playing exactly as before, then she wouldn’t find herself in the same difficulties. It’s not just what happens to the protagonist (or how she is challenged in the story) but how she reacts to it. She has to be ‘the architect of her own misfortunes’, as Mistyfan puts it in her post about another redemption story, “Black Sheep of the Bartons“.

Does the story have to feature some sort of disagreeableness, some sort of outright nastiness or callousness on the part of the protagonist? No: I’d say that you could certainly include ‘guilt’ stories such as “Stefa’s Heart of Stone” and “I’ll Make Up For Mary”. The protagonist here  suffers huge pangs of guilt and despair because of the loss of a loved one – a best friend or a sister in the case of these two stories, but in other cases it can be a parent – a very natural feeling, but the failing here is that she lets those emotions overwhelm her and distort her common sense. The guilty feelings of the protagonist drive the story forward, but this guilt is portrayed throughout as excessive, as an indulgence that the main character should resist. It’s the lengths that their grief drives them to that causes their difficulties in their separate stories.

Also, it’s not just about having an objectionable main character who is nicer by the end of the story. “Curtain of Silence” and “Land of No Tears” are not what I would call redemption narratives, despite having protagonists who start off pretty disagreeable and end up much improved. (Likewise “Battle of the Wills” is not, nor I think “Pandora’s Box”, but sports story “Black Sheep of the Bartons” is one I would class as such: Bev Barton isn’t horrible so much as thoughtless and reckless, but her carelessness nearly brings tragedy to her family.) Why don’t “Curtain of Silence” and “Land of No Tears” count? Because when the girl main characters are swept into their initial circumstances – enslaved by a dictatorial coach, forced into third-class citizenship in a future world – their thoughts are not primarily about how they can continue to maintain their status quo ante but about how they can defeat their antagonist. Yvonne and Cassy aren’t just trying to get back to where they were at the beginning: their story is about a positive rebellion, not a futile rejection of the truth that the outside world is telling them. They end up much nicer than they started out being, but that’s not the whole reason for having the story in the first place – it’s because they have faced extraordinary circumstances which would change anyone by making them realise that some things are bigger than individual concerns.

Does the character who ends up being redeemed have to be the protagonist, or could they be the antagonist or villain? Overall I would say it has to be the protagonist, as the main character that you are supposed to sympathise with and want things to turn out well for, but maybe one counter-example is “Wanda Whiter Than White“. Wanda is not the main character of the story and she makes Susie Foster’s life a misery with her sanctimonious ways. At the end, it is revealed, as Mistyfan explains in her story post, that ‘Wanda’s own past is not as white as she would have us believe. In fact, she is on probation after being caught stealing.’ Rather than this reveal being painted as purely a victory for the main character, it ends up with Wanda being ‘truly redeemed when she tells a white lie to help Susie in return for Susie saving her life’. The reader wasn’t rooting for Wanda’s redemption all along, but it is a satisfying ending nevertheless.

What choices could the writer make that would move the story out of the category of being a redemption narrative? Let’s take Lisa Carstairs’ story as an example. As with the OuBaPo exercises, thinking about how a story could work differently will give us a view on how the stories actually do work.

• Imagine Lisa’s parents still losing everything at the beginning of the story, and Lisa still losing her piano. The story could then have taken a different turn: rather than being about Lisa’s misguided piano obsession and selfishness, it could have been another kind of story entirely, for instance a mystery story where Lisa finds out that her father’s business partner was a crook who needs to be brought to justice. Perhaps Lisa’s piano playing could help her to find the clues she needs, and her obsession with it could be turned to a good cause in that way, so that she needs no redemption.
• Or let’s say the story stays as being about Lisa’s obsession with playing piano but it’s portrayed as something not to be frowned on, rather as something acceptable or allowable. How would a story work where she can continue to be focused on playing piano to the exclusion of everything else, including her family? Perhaps her family would have to be a nasty, uncaring one, to make her disinterest acceptable.
• Or perhaps the story could proceed more or less as it does, but with an unhappy ending where Lisa gets her comeuppance. This would make her into a more of an anti-heroine than normal but would not be unheard of.

Here are the examples I would identify as fitting most neatly into the category of ‘redemption narrative’ (core examples) and as being closely related to this category without necessarily definitely being classed as such (edge cases).

Core examples

• “Dance Into Darkness” – Della just wants to live her life down at the disco with no regard for other people, but when her wish is granted she eventually discovers there is indeed more to life than her own self-interest.
• There are a number of stories that are driven by a bereavement: the main character makes poor decisions as a result of her strong emotions of grief and anger because she is afraid of being hurt again. “The Ghost Dancer” is one of these, as is “Nothing to Sing About”, but of course “Stefa’s Heart of Stone” and “I’ll Make Up For Mary” are the strongest examples.
• “The Girl Who Never Was” – discussed above
• “She Shall Have Music” – discussed above
• I said above that I thought that it needs to be the protagonist who is redeemed, not one of the other characters. In “Go On, Hate Me!” the antagonist is driven by grief into bullying the protagonist but in the end all is cleared and the antagonist is redeemed, so I would be tempted to class this alongside “Wanda Whiter Than White” as a clear example of this kind.
• “Jackie’s Two Lives” is more about the perils of wish-fulfilment, but Jackie’s snobbishness and the fact she is ashamed of her own family is definitely a character flaw that drives the story and she is cured of it at the end.
• “Left-Out Linda” develops the redemption pretty well by recognizing that you can’t usually turn around your life by yourself: you have to have some help.
• “Paula’s Puppets”: Paula has to learn to forgive her enemies rather than attacking them via the magical help she has been given.
• “Tearaway Trisha”: Trisha’s recklessness has caused a serious accident; she tries to make amends but has to change her own character in order to do so.
• “Valley of Shining Mist” has a clearly didactic message about the improving aspect of high culture: by playing the violin, Debbie will transcend the impact of her abusive family, who are low-class in their lack of culture and their morality.
• In “Who’s That In My Mirror?” the protagonist’s selfish nature is made very literally visible and becomes more and more so until finally she is driven to renouncing it.
• “Worlds Apart” is the ultimate morality tale – one by one, six girls are shown the worst outcomes possible for each of their specific character flaws, and they have a chance to repent. The psychological development is minimal but the impact of the story was very dramatic.

Edge cases

• “Fancy Free “- I know the main character is so independent that this may well be characterised as a fault, but I don’t really quite remember enough about the story to say whether it is the main thing that drives the whole plot.
• “The Four Footed Friends” – arguably another case where someone other than the protagonist ends up being redeemed, though it all feels a little sudden. “Hettie High-and-Mighty” likewise features a fairly sudden change of heart on the part of an antagonist who has mostly been about making  the protagonist’s life a misery until that point. I don’t think “The Kat And Mouse Game” quite counts, either: Kat may perhaps have realised the error of her ways at the end of the story, but will her change of heart actually stick?
• I haven’t really made my mind up about “Gwen’s Stolen Glory” – it feels like it is mostly a story about deception, though clearly once Gwen owns up to the big lie this is a kind of redemption of her former deception.
• In “Kerry In The Clouds”, Kerry is a day-dreamer imposed upon by a woman motivated by her own unfriendly concerns. Kerry’s day-dreaming nature is cured by the end of the story, but I don’t feel the main driver of the narrative was to improve her character.
• The main character in “Mark of the Witch!” is hot-tempered and angry at all around her, and she comes to seek a more peaceful set of emotions by the end of the story. However, so much of her story is about the persecution and abuse that her neighbours visit on her that I don’t see her story being primarily about her renouncing her hot-headed ways.
• I’m not sure about “Pandora’s Box” and whether it counts or not. Pandora’s witchy aunt does chide her at the beginning about being too cock-sure about her talents and says that she will need to use magic sooner or later, and this is all true: but I’m not sure what sort of morality story that adds up to – not a conventional one at any rate! The main nod in this story to more conventional morality is the fact that Pandora goes from disinterest in the pet she is stuck with (her black cat familiar, Scruffy) to loving him dearly and giving up her heart’s desire in order to save his life.

One last question struck me when thinking about this. What sort of things might the protagonist have done that means she needs to go through this process of redemption in the first place? Clearly it must be something negative: the story has a moral imperative of some sort, warning readers against some kinds of behaviour. But at the same time, some things would be beyond the pale of course, and would mean that any character doing that would be irredeemable. (There might therefore be some useful comparisons made with story villains: what does their villainy consist of?) If a character killed or seriously hurt someone on purpose then that would be beyond the pale: there are a number of villains who have gone this far, sometimes with a laugh on their cruel lips, but it would be hard to imagine that a girl protagonist could do this and still recover the moral high ground at the end of the story.

In the stories above it looks like the sort of wrong-doing that needs castigating but is still redeemable is often about emotional warmth and consideration for others – it’s not about ambition (by itself) or cleverness (by itself) for instance. An arrogant protagonist can still be the heroine, but if she is cold, selfish, or inconsiderate then that’s a good signal that this is a character marked down for improvement – by whatever means necessary. Preferably it will be a Shakespearean denouement, whereby her own moral failing brings about such a huge disaster that she has no option but to change her ways! And being too afraid to risk emotional commitment comes in for a bit of a kicking too, via the guilt / grief stories. The obvious next question: is this moral imperative specific to British girls comics? Do UK boys comics have redemption narratives too? Or those in other countries? My pal Lee Brimmicombe-Wood reckons that Japan’s flourishing manga industry has many stories about mavericks who insist on going their own ways – but in that industry’s story constraints, the mavericks are always right and never forced to realise that actually, there was a reason why everyone was telling them they were going about things the wrong way…

Jinty and Penny 14 June 1980

Stories in this issue:

• Pam of Pond Hill (artist Bob Harvey, writer Jay Over)
• Gaye’s Gloomy Ghost (artist Hugh Thornton-Jones)
• Tearaway Trisha (artist Andrew Wilson)
• Snoopa
• Seulah the Seal (artist Veronica Weir)
• The Venetian Looking Glass (artist Phil Gascoine)
• Tansy of Jubilee Street (artist Ken Houghton)
• Virginia Wade and Winning Ways 13: The Crouch Start (writer Benita Brown)
• Minnow (artist Peter Wilkes)
• Blind Faith (artist Phil Townsend)

I have just received this issue from an ebay purchase, so am making the time for a quick post. Shockingly, the seller had packaged it up in an A4 envelope when the comic is noticeably wider than that – and s/he actually rolled / folded the edge in order to get it into the packaging! Blimey, not sure what the world is coming to, though at least it was a very reasonable price.

Pam and her class are doing a school show, but Pam is busier trying to bring together her boyfriend Goofy’s fractured family… and they are both trying to manage to do sewing and woodwork respectively, and wishing they could swop over those classes!

“Tearaway Trisha” is a less well-known Jinty story, by an artist who had a very long run in girls’ comics but only this story in this title. Trisha is trying to raise money for an operation to help the girl she injured with her careless riding, but Fran has worked herself up into a right state and isn’t having any of it. They make it up in the end but everything is weighing on Trisha’s mind and her ‘Fran appeal’ show with spectacular cycling stunts doesn’t go well and raises little money as a result. We are promised a resolution in next week’s episode though.

Seulah is saved from attack by murderous yobs through the intervention of a tramp, and Seulah’s friend Bonnie is greeted with the excellent news that the coastline and seal island have been declared a sanctuary – but Seulah still has miles to go before he is back home and safe.

The Venetian Looking Glass is not my favourite of the ‘evil object’ stories printed in Jinty. We get some nice glimpses of the past in this episode, and of course Gascoine’s artwork is lovely, but it does all feel a bit ‘done before’.

The text sports pages tell us about Virginia Wade at Wimbledon, and about the Crouch Start in Sprinting.

“Minnow” is an odd story that works quite well. Minna isn’t allowed to swim by her mother; in this episode she is told that this is because her father drowned at sea when she was a baby. Nevertheless, as is always the way with these things, she starts to learn anyway, but finds that odd things happen – not magical like in “Combing Her Golden Hair“, but psychologically disturbing instead. Quite effectively done.

The last story is the rather ridiculous, but again beautifully-drawn, “Blind Faith” – the blind show jumping horse whose owner doesn’t want to give up on him. I reproduce this episode for you to see. It’s not obviously ridiculous apart from in the premise – but that’s quite enough.

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Jinty 5 April 1980

• Spirit of the Lake (artist Phil Townsend, writer Benita Brown?)
• Gaye’s Gloomy Ghost (artist Hugh Thornton-Jones)
• Bridge of Heart’s Desire – Gypsy Rose story (artist Trini Tinturé?)
• Wildflower Wonderland (feature) – last part
• The Venetian Looking Glass – (artist Phil Gascoine)
• Alley Cat
• Toni on Trial (artist Terry Aspin)
• Sports Pages – Lorna Vincent; Winning Ways 11 (writer Benita Brown)
• Rinty ‘n’ Jinty
• White Water – (artist Jim Baikie)
• Easter Bonnet Crossword
• Tearaway Trisha – (artist Andrew Wilson)

This is the issue before Penny merged with Jinty. The announcement (above) says that next week we say hello to Seulah the Seal, Tansy of Jubilee Street and Snoopa. So what ends in this issue that gives way to them?

Nothing much, really. Pam takes a break in this issue. But then her previous story finished last issue and they clearly wanted her to start with a whole new story for the merger – a wise decision. It is the last part of Wildflower Wonderland. And it sounds like it is the end of “Toni on Trial” soon, because Toni has at last found someone who could help clear her mother, and the blurb for next week tells us there will be another clue. Just as well, because the town is really rubbing Toni’s nose into her mother’s disgrace this time, with a cruel headline: “Brave Girl Saves Cup Her Mother Stole!” Poor Toni is in tears!

But all the other stories are still going strong and clearly have a way to go. “White Water” has been going as long as Toni, but there is no hint of it ending yet. Maybe there will be in the next episode or two. Trisha finally has an idea to raise the money for Fran’s operation, but Fran is not impressed with all the publicity and turning on Trisha big time. And Lucy is still haunted by the evil mirror and shoes that make her do things and go places she does not want.

The Gypsy Rose story, “Bridge of Heart’s Desire”, fills in the Pam slot this week. It is reprinted from June and will later be reprinted in Tammy. The story prompted a letter from one reader who said she turned this story into a play when her drama class was assigned a task of putting on their own play and nobody had any idea what to do. She went through her old Jintys and decided this story was just right for it. The teacher thought the end result was “very good”.

Jinty 29 March 1980

• Pam of Pond Hill (writer Jay Over, artist Bob Harvey)
• Wildflower Wonderland (feature)
• Spirit of the Lake (artist Phil Townsend, writer Benita Brown?)
• Rinty ‘n’ Jinty
• Gaye’s Gloomy Ghost (artist Hugh Thornton-Jones)
• The Venetian Looking Glass – (artist Phil Gascoine)
• Alley Cat
• Toni on Trial (artist Terry Aspin)
• Sports Pages – Suzanne Dando; Winning Ways 10 (writer Benita Brown)
• White Water – (artist Jim Baikie)
• Tearaway Trisha – (artist Andrew Wilson)
• Sandwich Crunch – feature

In Pam of Pond Hill, the school dinner dilemma has gotten worse, not better, with the departure of Mrs Harvey. Mrs Bounty refuses to return, and the temps are producing dinners that are completely inedible.

Talk about life (or death?) imitating art – Karen discovers that when she was alive, her phantom coach starred in a movie where she played a ghost who haunted a lake and taught a child to skate. Now she’s doing it for real as the “Spirit of the Lake”.

The ghost that haunts the “Venetian Looking Glass” forces Lucy to rip up her cousin Rosalind’s embroidery. And she doesn’t even remember what happened afterward.

Resident ghost Sir Roger does not think much of Gaye’s disco gear (and it does look kind of ridiculous). He thinks the Elizabethan dress in a portrait is more becoming for her. Gaye is surprised to find that Sir Roger is right – the dress does suit her once she tries it on. What’s more, it comes in dead useful when a thief tries to steal the portrait!

The grandparents won’t allow Toni to go to the celebration party for winning the trophy, because it was at such a party that the cup was found in her mother’s bag and she was branded a thief. Toni goes anyway, but it looks like the grandparents had the right idea after all – Julie is now accusing Toni of stealing the same trophy!

Bridie finds out too late that Jocelyn had tricked her; she feigned trouble to have Bridie come out and rescue her, but things looked the other way around to the campers. And things get even worse when Bridie ends up as Jocelyn’s servant and at her beck and call all the time.

Trisha goes to a cycling show, and is picking up tips from the performers themselves. But she gets more than she bargained for when the female performer nips off just before a performance to get some food (naughty, naughty!) and the other performers ask her to fill in.

Jinty 22 March 1980

• Pam of Pond Hill (writer Jay Over, artist Bob Harvey)
• Pressing Flowers – feature
• Spirit of the Lake (artist Phil Townsend, writer Benita Brown?)
• Meet the Glibbs – quiz
• Gaye’s Gloomy Ghost (artist Hugh Thornton-Jones)
• The Venetian Looking Glass (artist Phil Gascoine)
• Toni on Trial (artist Terry Aspin)
• Sports pages – Gillian Gilks; Winning Ways 9; writer Benita Brown
• White Water – (artist Jim Baikie)
• Alley Cat
• Tearaway Trisha – (artist Andrew Wilson)
• A Page for the Contrary Mary! (feature)

“Spirit of the Lake” is a story with a theme and artwork that naturally lends itself to beautiful covers, and this one is no exception. It is no wonder that this story featured on so many Jinty covers, including the covers that feature panels from the first and last episodes. The haunting gets even more mysterious when Cynthia spitefully smashes the record with the theme the ghost uses on it – but then Karen hears it out of nowhere! Could it be that she still has a ghostly coach although the lake they were using has now melted?

The other ghost in the issue, Sir Roger, is put out that there is a fancy dress banquet at Stoney Hall and he is not included. Of course there’s hijinks when he gatecrashes ghost-style.

The issue has a quiz that tests your assertiveness skills and dealing with horrible people who like to cause misery. In the quiz you have to deal with the Glibbs, who are a whole family of such people.

In the last issue, Pam was worried that they would be in trouble with Mr Gold the headmaster after their demonstration against Mrs Harvey’s health menu went too far and turned into brawling – and it’s hit the headlines too! But Pam gets a real surprise when it’s Mr Gold who ends up in trouble – with the county council for not following regulations when he appointed Mrs Harvey as dinner lady or agreed to her menu. But Pam and Tracy could be in trouble anyway, because they got trapped in Mr Gold’s office while the row was going on and are hiding in the cupboard. They need to find a way to escape before they’re caught!

Lucy finds out more about her namesake who haunts “The Venetian Looking Glass” and why. But the haunting gets worse when Lucy puts on the ghost’s shoes and becomes completely possessed with the ghost’s quest for vengeance!

Toni wins the very same cup that her mother was accused of stealing. But it’s a bittersweet victory because of the past, and Toni’s enemies just won’t stop going on at her about it. On the other hand, Toni hears something that could be another clue to the mystery.

Tearaway Trisha is humiliated when a policeman says she needs cycling lessons and her mother agrees. But there’s a more important worry when she hears that a huge sum of money is needed for plastic surgery for the injured Fran and is resolved to raise it – but how? Perhaps there is a clue in the poster of a cycling act in the last panel…

In “White Water”, things get worse for Bridie on the camping trip when she is branded a sneak and sent to Coventry. The coach advises her to sort things out with her enemy Jocelyn, and there could be a chance when Bridie sees her heading into danger.

Jinty 15 March 1980

• Pam of Pond Hill (writer Jay Over, artist Bob Harvey)
• Wildflower Wonderland (feature)
• Spirit of the Lake (artist Phil Townsend, writer Benita Brown?)
• Tearaway Trisha – (artist Andrew Wilson)
• Gaye’s Gloomy Ghost (artist Hugh Thornton-Jones)
• The Venetian Looking Glass – (artist Phil Gascoine)
• Toni on Trial (artist Terry Aspin)
• Superstar Superbrat! – feature
• White Water – (artist Jim Baikie)
• When Statues Walk… – final episode (artist Phil Gascoine)

Tearaway Trisha’s getting the blame for a girl’s accident, despite the fact that it was due to her slipping on an oil patch and the site of the crash having a reputation as a “black spot” that has already been the scene of several accidents. Guess that’s what comes of building up a reputation as a dangerous cyclist.

Meanwhile, poor Toni is back in the game, but still can’t shake off her reputation as a thief because of what her mother was accused of. And now salt really is being rubbed into the wound, because Toni is about to compete for the same trophy her mother was accused of stealing.

It’s the last episode of “When Statues Walk…”. The stone warriors track down the evil Hel, who has possessed Laura’s body, but will they be in time to switch them back? Laura’s trapped in Hel’s body, which is showing no more signs of life. If she really is dead, Hel stays in her body and wins the day. Meanwhile, in Gascoine’s new story, “The Venetian Looking Glass”, another evil form of possession is now establishing itself over Lucy Craven.

In Pam of Pond Hill, the protest over the school’s new health menu has gone too far and Pam now fears the wrath of Mr Gold, the strict headmaster. However, next week’s blurb informs us that Mr Gold is going to be eating humble pie. Things are not going well for Bridie either on the canoeing camping trip. And we are told that it’s going to get worse next week, when she becomes the camp outcast.

In “Spirit of the Lake”, Karen’s now accepted she has a ghost for a coach. Trouble is, she still has a spiteful cousin for an enemy. And “Gaye’s Gloomy Ghost”, who had taken a break last week, is back. Sir Roger has found out a banquet is being prepared at Stoney Hall, and his interference could ruin it. We have to wait until next week to find out if there will be a feast or a fast.

Jinty 8 March 1980

• Pam of Pond Hill (writer Jay Over, artist Bob Harvey)
• Wildflower Wonderland (feature)
• Spirit of the Lake (artist Phil Townsend, writer Benita Brown?)
• Tearaway Trisha – first episode (artist Andrew Wilson)
• The Venetian Looking Glass – first episode (artist Phil Gascoine)
• Toni on Trial (artist Terry Aspin)
• Girl on a Chestnut Champion – feature
• White Water – (artist Jim Baikie)
• When Statues Walk… (artist Phil Gascoine)

This issue starts the only story that Andrew Wilson, best known for “The Happy Days”, drew for Jinty – “Tearaway Trisha”. Trisha is a good-natured girl, but no sense of safety or consideration when it comes to cycling. Sounds like a recipe for disaster? Yup, and it happens when her bike slips on a greasy patch in the road, which causes a girl named Fran to end up in hospital. Trisha is blamed, which I personally think is a bit unfair. Okay, so she might have noticed the patch if she had been cycling a bit more carefully, but it was there when it shouldn’t have been.

Gascoine has a history of overlapping stories in Jinty, and this one is no exception. He starts on “The Venetian Looking Glass” (following the Jinty tradition of evil images in mirrors) while still working on the penultimate episode of “When Statues Walk…”. Steve’s discovered the body switch the evil goddess Hel pulled with his sister Laura, and is shocked to find Laura trapped in the ageing body of Hel, which could give out any minute now. If it does, Laura will die while Hel continues to wreak havoc in Laura’s body!

In “Pam of Pond Hill”, health food takes over at the school canteen after it pushes Mrs Bounty out. But the kids don’t take to it and want their chips and Mrs Bounty back. And that means protest action!

“Toni on Trial” has lost her resolve because of the shadow from her mother’s disgrace has gotten too much. Sharon Peters is taking unusual action to get Toni back in the game. In “White Water” Bridie’s on a camping canoe holiday but things are not going smoothly – not least because of jealous Jocelyn. And can the “Spirit of the Lake” meet Karen at the ice-rink now the lake has thawed? Oh yes, and now Karen realises who she is!

Jinty and Penny 19 April 1980

• Pam of Pond Hill (writer Jay Over, artist Bob Harvey)
• Gaye’s Gloomy Ghost (artist Hugh Thornton-Jones)
• Spirit of the Lake – final episode (artist Phil Townsend, writer Benita Brown?)
• Seulah the Seal (artist Veronica Weir)
• Snoopa (artist Joe Collins)
• Tearaway Trisha (artist Andrew Wilson)
• The Venetian Looking Glass (artist Phil Gascoine)
• Tansy of Jubilee Street (artist Ken Houghton)
• Toni on Trial – final episode (artist Terry Aspin)
• Sports Pages: meet Teenage Birdman Steve Collins
• White Water (artist Jim Baikie)

This is the second issue after the Jinty and Penny merger. The cover gives British readers insight into what happened to the Jintys and Tammys that were sent overseas – not all free gifts that came with an issue could be included in the issues bound for overseas readers. I think this was due to trading restrictions on edible gifts, such as the Mummies sweets that came with the issue; I do recall a Tammy issue with a free gift of confectionery that was similarly excluded from reaching overseas readers. However, there were no problems with gifts like jewellery and novelties.

The issue is now clearing out several stories from Jinty that had been running for some time. Toni on Trial ends with this issue; she just had to, because the previous episode made it obvious as to what the truth is about the trophy Toni’s mother allegedly stole. “White Water”, the story that began in the same issue as Toni, will conclude in the next issue. Jealous Jocelyn is imperilling Bridie’s life by issuing a dangerous challenge that Bridie is not ready for. “Spirit of the Lake” also ends this issue, with Karen going in for a skating scholarship that her jealous cousin tried to block her from. The last panel of the story is turned into a beautiful full-sized panel for the cover.

In the other stories, Tearaway Trisha is humiliated when she is told to take a cycling proficiency course because she is not considered a safe cyclist. In the Venetian Looking Glass, revenge-driven Lucy Craven has caused Rosalind to have a bad accident. Seulah, the serial from Penny, is still going strong. Seulah looks set to be reunited with Bonnie, the girl he has been looking for. But the blurb for next week indicates it is not the end of the story yet. Mr Hunt is dubious about Pam of Pond Hill being the lead in the school play – especially after he hears her singing. But he is soon convinced she has a talent. And Goof discovers a talent as well – for the banjo.