Building – Page 107 – What Was Pebble Mill?

Costume Department Reunion 1999 – photo from Ruth Kiosses

Photo from Ruth Kiosses, no reproduction without permission.

This photo was taken at a reunion of the Costume Department in 1999. It was held at the Birmingham Botanical Gardens.

Included in the photo are: Muriel Hewitt (front, red hair) Anne Mills (behind Muriel), Anne-Marie Morrell (on left in red, back row), next to Russell Barnett (senior costume designer), Lesley Thomas (mustard scarf), Maria Hurley, Annie Doling, Hilary Anne Hughes, Eileen Hubble, Pat Hadley, Linda Hill, Dawn Booth Brent Fulwood, Karen Bevins, Clive Ashman, Rossie Russon, Janice Rider (senior costume designer, back row in black), Liz Fahy, Wendy Schofield, Mark Ridley (dresser), Patricia Hodge Robinson (in blue on back row), Colin Jones (dresser, back row, black top), next to Sally Pearson (designer, fuchsia cardigan), Rachel Selby (2nd row extreme right). From left next to Muriel: Joyce Hawkins (senior costume designer); Bobby Gale (former dresser, now deceased); Gill Hardie (designer). Behind Bobby Gale – Vee Layton (designer, now deceased); to the left of Rachel Selby, in turquoise – Christine Grainger (costume assistant); to the left of Mark Ridley – Alison Mitchell. To the right of Janice Rider is Terry Patterson (designer). To Ann Doling’s left is Paul Patterson (MFS); Ginnie Hardy (designer); next to Ginnie – Al Barnett (senior costume designer); next to Al – Stephanie Hazeldine (designer). Tessa Wyatt ? – behind Paul Patterson.

Please add a comment if you can identify others, or can add more information

Pre-Pebble Mill buildings – Gosta Green – Dave Kirkwood

Gosta Green

Gosta Green. This was the main TV drama studio in Aston. It was sited just behind the original Aston University building. The impressive front facade reflected its former life as a bank. Behind it the area used for the studio floor reflected its later life as a cinema. The frontage was still there when I last looked (about 10 years ago) but the studio area had been demolished to lawns.

There are pictures of Carpenter Road and Gosta Green at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_Mill_Studios in ‘Early History’ section. There were other addresses such as in George Road, Berkeley Street.

The BBC in the 60’s was a very different place to work than today. There was a ‘family’ feel to the place and a vibrant social life built around the staff club.

Dave Kirkwood

Pre-Pebble Mill buildings – Broad Street – Dave Kirkwood

BBC Broad Street. This building stood near the canal next door to Gas Street on the Mailbox side of the road. The ground floor was used by a variety of retail outlets. There was one unit on the ground floor, which was used as a BBC Club Bar. TV switching was at the back on the Ground Floor, but unseen from the road. Upstairs on floor one you found the sound control room, telecine, film editing and sound recording suites. In 1965, when I first arrived, there was also a tiny TV studio from which ‘Midlands Today’ was broadcast, but this was soon replaced by a modern studio on the first floor, which also handled other programmes such as ‘Farming’ and programmes for the immigrant community. (Not PC today I know, but that was how they were known then). Also on this floor was the film processing lab, a radio drama studio (for ‘The Archers’) and production offices for ‘Midlands Today’.

Dave Kirkwood

Gail Herbert adds the following comment: I thought the building had been knocked down and the Hyatt built in its place. There is a plaque I believe on the Hyatt Broad Street side saying this. The staff used to use the Crown as the unofficial club.

Cartoons of Pete Simpkin – Radio Birmingham

‘Good Company’ OB to the Saddlers Centre

Rolf Harris cartoon of Pete

Yoga on the Radio

Radio Birmingham producer/presenter Pete Simpkin has three cartoons of himself from when he worked at Pebble Mill. The first relates to an OB he did for the Afternoon show ‘Good Company’, from the Saddlers Centre, Walsall. The second was drawn by Rolf Harris whilst Pete interviewed him, and the third is about the famous ‘Yoga by Radio’ which was pioneered on Radio Birmingham.

Pebble Mill at One, Bob Langley – Jane Mclean

Bob Langley on location in Italy

(This memory is of an incident which occurred in the 1970s, when Jane Mclean was working on autocue on ‘Pebble Mill at One’).

The one and only time I ever saw Bob Langley lose his rag was when I had altered the autocue/loo roll so much that it was too thick to go through the machine and stuck. Too much for Bob who couldn’t speak his own name without autocue – bless!! – so when autocue stopped, so did he!!

Jane Mclean

(photo by Ian Collins)