Trumpton
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40 free Trumpton trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Trumpton first aired on the BBC in 1967 and was repeated for decades, so several generations of British children grew up with its fire brigade, its market square and its gentle, unhurried stories. Few programmes of thirteen short episodes have left such a mark. This quiz covers the people of the town and their trades, the famous roll call, the way each episode begins and ends, and the puppeteers, animators, writer and composer who made the series. It also takes in the sister series from the same trilogy and the songs, sketches and adverts that have borrowed its look. The questions suit anyone who watched as a child, parents sharing it with a new generation, and quiz fans who enjoy classic British television. Each answer comes with a short explanation.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which officer commands Trumpton's fire brigade and calls the famous roll of his men's names?
Captain Flack
Captain Flack leads the brigade, and to his annoyance his men are sent to every kind of emergency except the one they trained for.
Q 02Why did the makers of Trumpton never let the fire brigade tackle a real blaze?
Flames were hard to animate
Flames were hard to animate, along with water and smoke, so the firemen were called out to all sorts of minor mishaps instead.
Q 03Which Play School presenter narrated Trumpton and also sang the songs of its characters?
Brian Cant
Brian Cant spent 21 years on Play School, and a 2007 poll named his the best-loved voice in UK children's television.
Q 04In Trumpton's fire brigade roll call, which surname is heard twice because two firemen are twins?
Pugh
Pugh is called twice for the brigade's twin brothers, and the series' creator was firm that neither of them was named Hugh.
Q 05What did Trumpton's creator do with nearly all of the original puppets and sets years later?
Burned them
He burned them, and the lone survivor, a soldier from Camberwick Green, later failed to reach its reserve price at Christie's.
Q 06What do Trumpton's firemen turn into for the closing scene of every single episode?
Town band
Town band duty follows every call-out, with the firemen playing the episode out at the Thursday concert as the townspeople gather round.
Q 07Which band's video for Burn the Witch was animated in the style of Trumpton and its sister series?
Radiohead
Radiohead's video crossed the cosy puppet look with the horror film The Wicker Man, and the family of Trumpton's creator said nobody had asked them.
Q 08Every episode of Trumpton opens with a shot of which feature of the Town Hall?
The clock
The clock is introduced by the narrator in the same few lines each time, before the townsfolk appear going about their daily business.
Q 09Which former BBC puppeteer created Trumpton and built its puppets and vehicles himself?
Gordon Murray
Gordon Murray had earlier been the puppeteer of Spotty Dog in The Woodentops, and he made Trumpton through his own puppet company.
Q 10Where did the family of Trumpton's creator find original film that led to a digital restoration?
In an attic
In an attic lay boxes of the original footage, and the BBC went on to clean, scan and restore all 39 episodes of the trilogy frame by frame.
Q 11Which series followed Camberwick Green and Trumpton, adding a biscuit factory and a steam railway?
Chigley
Chigley completed the trilogy, and it borrowed so many earlier puppets and theme songs partly to save the cost of making new ones.
Q 12Trumpton's creator gave up string marionettes for which technique, seen in Eastern Europe?
Stop motion
Stop motion won out because he feared string puppets would look old-fashioned, so he built the puppets himself and left the frame-by-frame filming to two specialist animators.
Q 13What does Mrs Cobbit sell from her regular pitch in Trumpton's town square in every episode?
Flowers
Flowers are her trade, and one episode reveals she has not missed a day in the square for forty years, Sundays aside.
Q 21Mr Clamp runs which kind of Trumpton shop, trading under the sign J Clamp & Son?
A greengrocer's
A greengrocer's it is, and the son on the sign is never seen, which leaves open the chance that Mr Clamp is the son himself.
Q 22Mr Munnings, who appears in Trumpton's opening titles, earns his living in which trade?
Printer
Printer was also the first career of the man who narrated the series, who worked as one before he took up acting.
Q 23What is the name of carpenter Chippy Minton's apprentice son, seen in every Trumpton episode?
Nibs
Nibs works beside his father throughout, and a remark by his mother Dora hints at a brother or sister who is never seen.
Q 14Mr Antonio appears in the crowd at the close of every Trumpton episode, and what does he sell?
Ice cream
Ice cream is Mr Antonio's trade, and although he turns up for every finale he joins the story itself in only two episodes.
Q 15What do Trumpton's firemen keep unrolling by mistake until their captain tells them to stop?
The hose
The hose often comes out by habit on a call-out, even though the crew are never sent to fight a real fire.
Q 16Which Camberwick Green character, from Trumpton's sister series, later fronted Quaker Oats adverts?
Windy Miller
Windy Miller and his windmill had to be rebuilt from scratch for the adverts, and Charlie Higson voiced them in place of the original narrator.
Q 17A spoof Trumpton account on Twitter made headlines for parodying which British political party?
UKIP
UKIP made the joke famous when one of the party's own MEPs urged his followers to report the account as a fake.
Q 18Which BBC police drama restaged the opening of Trumpton's sister series as a puppet hallucination?
Life on Mars
Life on Mars shrank its detective Sam Tyler to a puppet rising from the Camberwick Green musical box after an accidental overdose in hospital.
Q 19What breed are Mitzi, Daphne and Lulu, the three dogs of Trumpton milliner Miss Lovelace?
Pekingese
Pekingese trot beside her in most of her appearances, and her shop front uses the formal title milliner rather than plain hat maker.
Q 20Barney McGrew, the elderly driver of Trumpton's fire engine, is always shown with what odd feature?
Closed eyes
Closed eyes never keep him from the wheel, and the brigade he drives for appears in every one of the thirteen episodes.
Q 24Trumpton's animators later sold their north London studio building to which 1980s pop duo?
Eurythmics
Eurythmics finished the album Sweet Dreams upstairs in the building, now known as the Church Studios, before buying it from the animators.
Q 25What decision by Trumpton's makers let the BBC keep repeating the series well into the 1980s?
It was filmed in colour
It was filmed in colour at the animators' insistence, although BBC1 was still broadcasting in black and white when Trumpton first went out.
Q 26After the BBC's repeats of Trumpton ended, which broadcaster reran the trilogy in the late 1990s?
Channel 4
Channel 4 gave all three series a fresh run in the 1990s, years after the BBC had ended its long cycle of repeats.
Q 27Which magazine ran a Camberwick Greenbelt cartoon and later Trumpton strips mocking Donald Trump?
Private Eye
Private Eye first ran its Trumpton strip for a few issues around the start of 2016, then revived it that August as the American election neared.
Q 28Which birds does Trumpton shopkeeper Mr Platt keep as a hobby, the subject of one late episode?
Pigeons
Pigeons, kept for racing, are the centre of the twelfth of the thirteen episodes, which takes its title from them.
Q 29Which indie band's EP The Trumpton Riots imagines a violent uprising on the town's streets?
Half Man Half Biscuit
Half Man Half Biscuit filled the town with striking firemen and a military coup, and also parodied a train song from the trilogy's third series.
Q 30Nick Fisher appears in Trumpton's very first episode, doing which job around the town?
Bill poster
Bill poster Nick Fisher features in the opening episode, though episode titles were printed only in Radio Times and never shown on screen.