Photos – Page 245 – What Was Pebble Mill?

Radio Studio 2 before auction – photos Philip Morgan

Photos by Philip Morgan, no reproduction without permission. Philip took these photos in November 2004, when Pebble Mill was emptied before the auction to sell off the majority of the building’s contents. You can see the auction lot numbers on some items in the photos.

The photos feature Radio Studio 2, as well as 1/4 inch tape machines, recording rooms etc.

Studio 2 was mainly used for recording music sessions for Radio 2 – ‘BBC Big Band’, sessions for Paul Jones’ blues programme, for ‘Country Club’ which became ‘Bob Harris Country’ and many others. It was also used to record “as live” programmes with an invited audience e.g. a Cajun series. Pam Relton remembers ‘Voice of the People’ being recorded in there,with Jenny de Yong producing.

Thanks to Philip Morgan for making the photos available, and to Sue Welch for providing information about Studio 2.

Gardenwise – photo by Vanessa Jackson

‘Gardenwise’ was a BBC 1 Daytime magazine series in production in 1992. I think there were six episodes. It was produced at Pebble Mill by Clare Stride. I was a researcher and was lucky enough to do some single camera directing on the show, setting up items and directing some of the location stories.

This photo was taken as we were finishing a shoot in Madeira, which was a pretty glamorous location for a Daytime series. We recorded a couple of items about the gardens of Madeira, one about orchids, and one about the gardens of the Reid’s Hotel, where we stayed. Reid’s Hotel is famous for its beautiful setting, fantastic restaurants and illustrious guests, like George Bernard Shaw and Winston Churchill. We were extremely well looked after, and could choose which of the restaurants we chose to eat in – free of charge! I remember being happy to go along with camerman, Keith Froggatt’s choice of the a la carte restaurant. The rooms were sumptuous, and because I was the director, I had a suite (the first and last time whilst on location). We made good use of the swimming pool as well!

The photo features, from left to right; cameraman, Keith Froggatt; P.A. Sarah Reddi; presenter, Lydia Thomas; sound-man, Paul Taylor.

Costume Department – photos from Ruth Kiosses

Photos copyright of Ruth Kiosses, no reproduction without permission.

Here are a couple of photos some of the Costume Department staff at BBC Pebble Mill, from the early 1990s.

The first photo features Anne Marie Morrell, and Ruth Kiosses.

The second one features Ruth Kiosses, Russell Barnett and Andria Fletcher.

Golden Oldie Picture Show – ‘Softly As I Leave You’ – Gail Herbert

Photos by Gail Herbert, no reproduction without permission.

These photos are from a location shoot for the ‘Golden Oldie Picture Show’, an entertainment series, presented by Radio 1 D.J., Dave Lee Travis, and produced at Pebble Mill by John King’s department. Music videos were made for classic hits, recorded before the age of music videos. Guest directors would choose the hit they wanted to shoot the video for, and create the story for it. Dave Lee Travis linked the different videos together.

This shoot was for the song ‘Softly As I Leave You’ composed by Hal Shaper.

Gail Herbert was the production assistant for the series.

The first photo shows sparks Roy Carn, creating a gobo effect with a tree branch. The second photo features exec producer John King.

Merrick Simmonds, Film Editor – photo by Peter Poole

Photo by Peter Poole, no reproduction without permission.

This photo shows Merrick editing in one of the film editing rooms. Before PSC (portable single camera) most location programmes were shot on film. Pebble Mill had several film editing rooms. Editors often worked late into the night to meet transmission times.

News was shot on reversal film and processed in Pebble Mill’s film processing unit. I think it took about an hour to process the film. Then it was edited and sometimes a voice over added. This made getting a story to air very slow.

Merrick latter became a director for Midlands Today. After that he directed ‘Pebble Mill At One’ and many other network programmes, including ‘Good Morning with Anne and Nick’.

Peter Poole