''Grimbledon Down'' is a

comic strip A comic strip is a sequence of drawings, often cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions. Traditionally, throughout the 20th and into the 21st ...

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

cartoonist

Bill Tidy William Edward "Bill" Tidy, Order of the British Empire, MBE (born 9 October 1933), is a British cartoonist, writer and television personality, known chiefly for his comic strips. Tidy was appointed Member of the Most Excellent Order of the Brit ...

. It ran in ''

New Scientist ''New Scientist'' is a magazine covering all aspects of science and technology. Based in London, it publishes weekly English-language editions in the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia. An editorially separate organisation publishe ...

'' magazine from 26 March 1970 until 26 March 1994.

Description

The strip was set in a fictitious UK government research

laboratory A laboratory (; ; colloquially lab) is a facility that provides controlled conditions in which scientific or technological research, experiments, and measurement may be performed. Laboratory services are provided in a variety of settings: physicia ...

, satirising the secret

Porton Down Porton Down is a science park in Wiltshire, England, just northeast of the village of Porton, near Salisbury. It is home to two British government facilities: a site of the Ministry of Defence's Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl ...

chemical and biological warfare establishment. (''New Scientist'' wanted 'some straight talking about the scope and purpose of research on Porton Down'.) Grimbledon Down's scientists engaged in all sorts of questionable research, such as the production of ''antipornography'' – grossly disgusting

pornographic Pornography (often shortened to porn or porno) is the portrayal of Human sexual activity, sexual subject matter for the exclusive purpose of sexual arousal. Primarily intended for adults,

films which were intended to turn off the audience's

sexual drive Libido (; colloquial: sex drive) is a person's overall sexual drive or desire for sexual activity. Libido is influenced by biological, psychological, and social factors. Biologically, the sex hormones and associated neurotransmitters that act up ...

and thus save the world from catastrophic

overpopulation Overpopulation or overabundance is a phenomenon in which a species' population becomes larger than the carrying capacity of its environment. This may be caused by increased birth rates, lowered mortality rates, reduced predation or large scale m ...

. Another frequent feature was attempts to create or distribute ''Nu-Food'', an artificial foodstuff made with processed human waste. Very little of Grimbledon Down's internal organisation was ever revealed, although "BioWar" and "ChemWar" divisions were mentioned from time to time in the characters' dialogue. The man in charge was a recurring character – Director Treem (no first name given) – a moustachioed dark-haired man in a chalk pinstripe business suit. Treem was apparently not a scientist, as the scientists were drawn wearing white lab coats, but he once described himself as a former potential

Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; sv, Nobelpriset ; no, Nobelprisen ) are five separate prizes that, according to Alfred Nobel's will of 1895, are awarded to "those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind." Alfr ...

candidate, was scientifically literate, and often got into detailed technical discussions with his staff.

References

British comic strips Comic strips missing date information {{UK-comics-stub