Top of the Form (quiz show)

Top of the Form was a BBC radio and television quiz show for teams from secondary schools in the United Kingdom which ran for 38 years, from 1948 to 1986.

The producer, Graham Frost, was reported to have said it had been cancelled because the competitive nature of the show jarred with modern educational philosophy.

The programme was largely invented by Joan Clark;[1] she had mostly worked as a reporter on In Town Tonight.

When aged 41, she married 47 year old John Peter Wynn, at Caxton Hall Register Office on Tuesday 22 December 1953.

[5] The May 1948 radio series began as a knock-out competition for London schools only, where the winning team that of each transmission would appear in the next week's edition.

After a request from a Northern Ireland listener, girls teams were added, as an experiment.

Another similar radio quiz of Joan Clark was called Namesake Towns, on the Home Service on Saturday afternoons, from Saturday 15 November 1958, where teams from towns of the same name in Australia and Britain would compete, again made with ABC of Australia.

In order to set appropriate questions the selected contestants from each school filled in a questionnaire listing their interests, books recently read and favourite music.

Compared to many television quiz shows in recent years, Top of the Form had a resolutely grandiose outlook; nothing would ever be dumbed down.

The tune Marching Strings (composition credited to "Marshall Ross", a pseudonym of Ray Martin) was the theme for many years, though for the last few series, Emerson, Lake & Palmer's recording of Aaron Copland's Fanfare for the Common Man was used.

Earlier, Debussy's Golliwog's Cakewalk, from his Children's Corner suite, had introduced the radio series.