HE first slithered his way into Evening Times headlines 30 years ago, now Monty the python is back with a guest appearance on home turf.

The six-foot snake was once part of a menagerie of small animals kept in the biology department at Cranhill Secondary by teacher David Hampton.

The reptile made the news when he disappeared after a break-in at the school in 1979: rabbits, hamsters and mice were let loose and the lid was off the empty vivarium.

It was 1983 before he was discovered behind a cupboard and staff at the school thought the snake had survived in the intervening years on a diet of mice and rats from the basement.

When the school closed in the early 1990s, David decided to take Monty home for safe keeping.

The friends were back in Cranhill to announce the opening of a photography exhibition at Cranhill Arts Project on November 5 which will feature a picture of David and Monty at the school in the 1980s.

David said: "Monty is part of the Cranhill story, thousands of people know about him. At the time when I originally got him, in 1972, Monty Python's Flying Circus was big on TV, so that's how he got his name."

David believes Monty is about 46 years old and survived for so long because he feeds well and didn't have any predators, apart from the odd school vandal.

He said: "Goodness knows how long he will live. He looks to me now exactly the same as he did all those years ago."

angela.mcmanus@eveningtimes.co.uk