Photos – Page 241 – What Was Pebble Mill?

Golden Oldie Picture Show, Minehead – photos from Gail Herbert

Photos by Gail Herbert, no reproduction without permission.

These photos were taken in 1986 on a location shot of the ‘Golden Oldie Picture Show’ in Minehead, Somerset. The camera, on a track and dolly can be seen on the first photo towards the right of shot.

The ‘Golden Oldie Picture Show’, was presented by Radio 1 D.J., Dave Lee Travis. The show was made up of specially shot videos for hit singles which pre-dated the era of music videos. Individual directors would submit ideas for films for individual tracks. It was produced at BBC Pebble Mill; the executive producer was John King.

Gail Herbert was the production assistant on the series.

Please add a comment if you know what hit this video was made for.

Mike Johnston – photo by Laura McNeill

Photo by Laura McNeill, no reproduction without permission.

This photo is of Mike Johnston, a floor manager at BBC Pebble Mill.

Radio WM – photo of Maggy Whitehouse

This photo is of Maggy Whitehouse, who was a BBC Radio WM breakfast presenter back in 1983. She presented the Breakfast show for a year and then a lunchtime interview show for two years.

Marconi Mark One Camera – Pete Simpkin

I remember the Marconi Mk ONE……we trained on them at Evesham (Wood Norton) and this picture is of three of us carrying out some ‘impact’ maintenance on one of them! On the left is Phil Upton showing where to hit the camera and wielding the panning handle is Keith Tucker. We were from all the regional studios and I cannot recall the members from Birmingham on TA Course 16 in the Spring of 1963.

Pete Simpkin

Marconi Mark 3 Camera – photo from Dave Kirkwood

This is a very young ‘me’ with a Marconi Mark 3 camera. This was one of the iconic cameras of the era (1960s) used in studios and outside broadcasts. It was the one featured on the original opening shots for ‘Grandstand’.

(Incidentally it was the Grandstand titles that inspired me to go for a career in broadcasting). The camera was obsolescent by the time this was taken but still in daily use at Gosta Green (pre BBC Pebble Mill).

Dave Kirkwood

Former Radio WM presenter, Gordon Astley, remembers working at Gosta Green: ‘I was there as my first posting after Wood Norton. My biggest thrill was being allowed to play on the new colour cameras …I seem to remember a scanner outside. Then I went to be a boom operator on all sorts of shows such as “The Doctors”. Looking back I should have stayed on staff, and now would be living on an island on a hefty pension!!!’