*** English literary characters: Jim Starling








Costumes of English Literary Characters: Jim Starling

Jim Starling books
Figure 1.--This is the cover of the first Jim Starling book. It is more serious than the subsequent books of the seriues which is reflected in the cover illustration. Unlike earlier British children's literature, the storis are not set in private schools. Notice Jim's mates in the background. Also notice where the boys live--poor housing in an industrial area. The illustrator here was R. Payne. He givesJima different look than the earlier books.

E.W. Hildick (1925- ) wrote the "Jim Starling" series. Our information on this character is stll very limited. Jim Starling is an English boy who visits a technical school at Cement Street. His friends are: Terry Todd, Grimshaw and Nip Challons. The first "Jim Starling" book was published in 1958 in England, known just as Jim Starling. Several books in the series were published in the United States. We know of the following books in the series: Jim Starling, Jim Starling and the Colonel, Jim Starling Goes to Town, Jim Starling and the Spotted Dog, Jim Starling and the Agency, and Jim Starling Takes Over. A HBC reader wonders if anyone knows of any additional books in the series or any other information about the books. One interesting aspect of the series was that it was not set in exclusive private schools. Most English school stories are set in public and preparatory schools, both privae schools where only a small part of the British public could aford to send their children.

Author

Edmund Wallace Hildick (1925-2001) wrote the 'Jim Starling' series. We do not know much about him at this time. We do know that he was a orolific eriter. the starling books are a small mpart of his output. He was a former school teacher. He wrote the series because most school stores were det in the public (elite boarding>schools and grammar schools. He felt that there was a need for chool stories set in secondary moderns. A reader writes, "Speaking for myself it is a pity that Hildick wrote only seven Jim Starling-books. He produced many, many other work in his career but those are all stories for younger children. Not really interesting for someone who 'adores' Jim Starling and Co.

Characters

The Jim Starling series is about of course Jim Starling and his three mates (British for best friends). Jim himself is an English boy who attends a Secondary Modern at Cement Street. Notice that the boys do not go to an academically selective Grammar School. Secondary Modern means the secondary schools for children that were not especially academically talented. It is located in the Northern town of Smogbury--not a very imaginative dig at industry. Notice that he does not go to an academically selective grammar school or a privare school. His friends are: Terry Todd, Grimshaw, and Nip Challons. Terry Todd comes from a broken home. He is nearly 14 years old. A stocky, pale-faced lad. He often wears a flying helmet with loose ends of leather Grimshaw had Ginger hair and wears glasses which he is called 'Goggles'. He is prone to mact as what you might call 'a nutty professor'. Challons, named 'Nip'. In Jim Starling's Holiday we found out his full name is Brian Challons. The boys are 13 or 14 year old. They described themselves as the Last Apple Gang--ready for anything. There are many books about boys attending private schools or Grammar chools. Books about boys attending Secondary Moderns are much less common.

Setting

One interesting aspect of the series was that it was not set in exclusive private schools. Most English school stories are set in public and preparatory schools, both privae schools where only a small part of the British public could aford to send their children. Thus the setting was not one in which the average British child could picture himself and herself. Norice the background in the cover here (figure 1). The neigborhood is poor, industrial housing. And notice the industrial plant behind the houses. Very few grammar school boys would come from this neighborhood, let alone boys goung to private schools.

Chronology

The books have a contemprary setting, meaning the late 1950s and early 60s. The first three books are set in May, June, and July from the same year.

Plots

In some books the boys are talking about adventures in previous books, however, in some books they are discussing adventures we don't know about it for we couldn't read about in in the other books. Six books do have a short summary, printed on the dust jacked or on the back-side. One of them ("Jim Starling Goes to town") does not have it. Aeader writes, "I thought that you would like to know of a Jim Starling short story that I discovered in a book Called Boys Stories published in 1965 by the Paul Hamlyn group. The E W Hildick story called �Jim Starling and the Purple Sofa� is the first story in the book and is 15 pages long. The story is copyright E.W Hildick 1965. The synopsis of the story is as follows. The Last Apple gang are preparing for bonfire night and spending the last hours before dusk protecting the wood from their bonfire from being pilfered by rival gangs. Goggle�s mum collars them and tells them to go and help Tommy Lodge a local old age pensioner who while in hospital his sister had sold his old sofa which had Tommy�s life savings stuffed inside. The race is on to track down the sofa which it turns out has changed hands numerous times. Finally after searching high and low it surfaces smoldering on a bonfire. Needless to say the Last Apple Gang saves the sofa just in the nick of time and returns the money to a very happy Tommy Lodge." [Hamilton]

Illustrators

We do not know much about the illustrators of the Jim Starling books. The illustrator for the cover here was R. Payne (figure 1). We do not know anything about him. He did most of the covers. We note another illustrator did the cover for Jim Starling and the Colonel (1960).

The Series

Hildick was a social critic, although it does not come out that clearly in the plots. But there are little touches. The name of the city is Smogville and the school is in Concrete Street. We see it in the cover illustrations. But the whole purspose of the series is to have stories set in the secondary Moderns rather than the private schools and grammsr schoolsl The first "Jim Starling" book was published in 1958 in England, known just as Jim Starling. There were seven books in the series. We know of the following books in the series: Jim Starling (1958), Jim Starling and the Agency (1958), Jim Starling and the Colonel (1960), Jim Starling's Holiday (1960), Jim Starling Takes Over (1963), Jim Starling and the Spotted Dog (1963), Jim Starling Goes to Town (1963), and Jim Starling Goes to town (1963). A HBC reader tells us that this is the complee series. He wonders if anyone has any further information about the books. Here is the plot summaries for the various volumes."

Clothing Details

The boys here for their Summer vacation are wearing casual shirts and blue jeans. The covers show the boys wearing these same outfits. I'm not sure what their scghool uniform was.

Foreign Distribution

Several books in the series were published in the United States. A Dutch reader tells us, "In Holland only "Jim Starling" was translated in 1964 into the Dutch language. There was announced it was the first book of a series. Therefore I became very curious when I found out there were 7 Jim Starling-titles. By the way: the Dutch title of the book "Jim Starling" is "Jim als detective" (in English would it be something like: "Jim as detective" or "Jim plays detective").

Reader Comment

A reader writes, "The way the boys behave is similar to the four "Rex Milligan-stories", written by Anthony Buckerigde ("famous by his Jennings-series"). But the Jim Starling-series is also very pleasant to read." Another reader writes, "I came across your page when I was searching for some information about the Jim Starling series of books by E W Hildick. They were perhaps my favourite books when I was about eight years old and the local libraries in New Zealand had lots of books by Hildick. Now, they are quite hard to come by. I can confirm that there are seven books in the series. The one you have not listed is Jim Starling's Holiday. The boys go to stay at Nip's uncle's house in the country, which is meant to be a big estate with every comfort, only to find it's a tumbledown cottage, with no sign of the uncle. They stay anyway and the thought of you and a bunch of your friends having a house with no adults around was really appealing to me when I read it."

Sources

Beringen, John. E-mail message, April 14, 2005.

Hamilton. Phill S. E-mail message, October 30, 2006.






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Created: April 4, 2003
Last updated: 2:45 AM 11/2/2006