THIS WEEK IN 1989: Portsmouth catches the red nose fever

Dawn Simmons, 14, from Stamshaw, dressed as a daffodil and sat in a bathtub of semolina to do her bit for the charity.

It was the charitable endeavours of hundreds of Portsmouth people like Dawn and her brother, Mark, that saw a grand total of £10,104,075 raised by the end of the BBC’s seven-hour comedy telethon.

This figure was four times higher than it was at the same point in 1988, with money raised going to homegrown charities, and those in developing countries.

Spaghetti-eating and sponsored sign language learning were just two events the Arundel Court Middle School, Portsmouth, put on to raise money.

Nationally, more than 50,000 events were held to raise cash. More than 4.5m plastic red noses were sold while 1.5m cars donned the larger versions.

Income was also boosted by the starstudded charity cover version of the Beatles’ song ‘Help!’ – which reached number three in the charts.