Memories – Page 18 – What Was Pebble Mill?

Colin Pierpoint blog 5 – Birmingham Broad Street

BBC Gosta Green Studios

BBC offices in Carpenter Rd, Edgbaston

Birmingham Broad Street

When I arrived in Birmingham I found that the regional centre was split into three, mainly for historical reasons. The main television studio was at Gosta Green, which had been so quickly installed in an old cinema at the start of Independent Television, that radiators were still fixed to the walls at varying heights where the audience seating used to be. I worked at Broad Street in the Sound Control Room, where there was also a television studio (Studio 1 later the larger Studio 4) for regional opt out; and teleciné. The drama studio was Studio 2. The managers were all at Carpenter Road, some distance from either operational centre, which was an excellent arrangement because you never saw them! The building was a blind school before the BBC took over, and some said it had never changed. The Midland Light Orchestra used Studio 6 at Carpenter Road, recording their music on tape machines a mile away at Broad Street, actually in the Control Room (Only the BBC could do it this way!)

I have mentioned my inability to get out of bed in the morning, and while working at Broad Street, I’m afraid I was late for work several times, especially on the 6-30 am shift. At my next annual interview I expected this to be on my report, so it was vital that I was not late for the interview. I decided to take no risks, start early and not use public transport so I wasn’t late due to the traffic. I therefore walked from my flat in Edgbaston to Carpenter Road where my Engineer in Charge (EiC) has his office.

As I went along the Hagley Road, and saw a madman attacking a nun, I knew that I was going to be late! He had her by the arm and was dragging her along the pavement. She even asked for my help as I went past trying not to notice. The phrase “I can’t stop now, I have got my annual interview this morning” seemed to be inadequate. So I asked the man, politely, if he would mind telling me what was going on. He said “I am arresting this woman because she is a prostitute”! Mm I see. Keep him talking I thought. As I did so I asked a passer-by to call the police from the nearby phone box on the corner of Portland Road. The man heard this, but thought it was to get the woman arrested. He said to me, “That’s right, call 99 999 99 9 99”. He’s nuts I thought. Unfortunately, the passer-by called for an ambulance, but they told me that a police car would follow. And quite quickly, a Panda car arrived. I told the officer what the man had said, and he was locked in the back of the police car, still thinking that he was to give evidence against this woman at the police station.

The officer asked other people what had happened, and at this point several brave young men now came forward to claim that they were the first to intercept and rescue the nun! She was quite distraught by now, and a woman took her to the Convent which was nearby.

So, nun back into safety, madman in police hands, I could now continue to Carpenter Road and my annual interview. There was only one problem, the interview was in five minutes, and I was still a mile away. So I went to the phone box and rang (Midland 8444 as I remember). I said that I am going to be late for my annual interview because on the way in I met a madman attacking a nun.

There was a silence from the other end. Then “ er – OK. I will tell the EiC” said with a hint of disbelief in her voice. When I arrived, something like half an hour late, my EiC just said “Congratulations on the best excuse I have ever heard”! Being late for work was never mentioned.

I must add that I received not a word of thanks from the Police, nor the Convent. It was however reassuring when I later spoke to some members of BBC staff who has seen something going on from the top of a bus in the Hagley Road. Perhaps you were one of them.

Colin Pierpoint

Pebble Mill opening delayed – tales from the archive

A letter held in the BBC Written Archives shows that Princess Anne was asked in January 1971 if she would open the new broadcasting centre in Birmingham in the autumn of that year. Her Lady in Waiting, replied that unfortunately The Princess would be on holiday in Scotland during the period specified, but that if the opening ceremony could be delayed until November, then she would find it easier to fit the engagement into her programme. It was pointed out that Her Royal Highness would understand if someone else was asked to open the building in her stead.

It was decided to move the occasion to November, rather than ask anyone else to perform the ceremony, and Princess Anne duly opened BBC Pebble Mill on 10th November 1971.

copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission

Move to the Mailbox

The article from the Birmingham Post circa 2002, explains how the move from Pebble Mill to the Mailbox was going to be a positive one, enabling technology and the studios to be improved. The move from the ‘leafy suburb’ of Edgbaston would apparently make BBC Birmingham more in touch with its audience!

Unfortunately these aims were not realised, and the move proved to be symptomatic of the decline of BBC Birmingham.

Thanks to Stuart Gandy to sharing this cutting.

The following comments were left on the Pebble Mill Facebook page:

Andy Marriott: ‘Unfortunately pretty much every move is a downsizing event, and it’s not just the BBC. I’ve been helping a friend out with a project at the old Granada site in Manchester and it’s depressing to see the facilities that existed there that they simply don’t have at their new site.’

Jean Palmer: ‘I’m sure that those who worked there could have told them it wouldn’t work. Shame we lost Pebble Mill’

Carolyn Davies: ‘All very sad….BBC Wales about to relocate….hope the same doesn’t happen…..’

Sue Farr: ‘I always suspected that London was jealous of Brimingham’s success and that was what was behind the decisions that were made. None of us believed any of it was going to benefit the Midlands, did we?’

Andrew Langstone: ‘Seems The Mailbox is the BBC’S dumping ground for things it doesn’t know where to put them.’

North 3 Outside Broadcast – press release

Photo by Steve Harris, no reproduction without permission

(Here is a press release about the reconstruction of a recording by the OB truck North 3, which was Pebble Mill’s original CM1)

“NORTH 3” TEAM TO TAKE TELEVISION BACK IN TIME

A team of television historians will travel back in time as they bring a vintage BBC outside broadcast truck back to life in North Wales.

Working with Flintshire-based broadcasting history enthusiast Steve Harris, the team from Royal Holloway University of London will reunite veteran cameramen, directors and engineers with North 3, a restored colour mobile control room.

North 3 travelled the length and breadth of the country during the 1970s, relaying live footage of Royal Ascot, The Open from St Andrews and the Royal Variety Performance from the London Palladium.

It ended its life with the BBC in the early 1980s, and spent several decades decaying at an airfield in Devon, before being rescued and restored by Hawarden-based television historian Steve Harris.

Now researchers from Royal Holloway are about to embark on a hugely ambitious “hands on” history event during which a full outside broadcast crew will be re-united with the restored vehicle to recreate a 1970s sports television production.

The experiment, which will take place next week (May 17, 18, 19) will be the first time that anyone has attempted to see the restored North 3 operational and staffed by its original crew. The vehicle, an analogue ancestor of today’s digital satellite outside broadcast trucks, is the only survivor of its type in working order.

Working with Steve Harris, the team from Royal Holloway have located a full team of former outside broadcast camera operators and engineers. For first time in several decades, they will be reunited with North 3 and re-live the experiences of their earlier careers.

Using restored 1970s television technology, the team will record a darts match and conduct interviews with former television production personnel. The exercise will help the Royal Holloway team, led by Prof John Ellis of the college’s Media Arts department, to learn more about how television was made in the 1970s and 1980s.

Prof Ellis said: “Television has seen vast technological changes since the 1960s, and some of the greatest changes have taken place in outside broadcasts. Our work with North 3 will help to document technologies and ways of working from the heroic age of television, which are now at risk of being forgotten.”

Digital producer Amanda Murphy, who is organising and directing the event, said: “When we met with Steve Harris last November and decided to take on the challenge of getting North 3 operational with as full a crew as possible, neither of us could have quite imagined quite the enormity of the task. The phone rings daily with old technicians asking: ‘Are we serious? Are we mad?’”

The complexity of the event means that it will not be open to the public, but footage and interviews from the event will be uploaded to YouTube during the week.

Prof John Ellis

Here is the link to a blog about the project, from producer Amanda Murphy: http://www.adapttvhistory.org.uk/north-3-outside-broadcast/

The following comment was left on the Pebble Mill Facebook page:

Nigel Sizer: ‘One interesting fact about OB trucks of this vintage is that many carried a steel tray about 4ft square on runners at the rear. Once parked up, the tray was slid out and put underneath the engine..to catch any oil drips! …’

Malcolm Elliott: ‘It would be nice to get my hands on a PC80 again after so many years… sadly am the other side of the world so would need a very long panning handle! Good luck with the event and would be interested to see who’s on the camera crew.’

Colin Pierpoint blog part 1- London

My BBC career. By Colin Pierpoint

London

To begin at the beginning.
My career began on 14th August 1961 when I, a timid 18 year old, left my parents’ Cheshire home, for London.
The first week was an Induction Course,which was quite comprehensive I remember. It took place in the Langham Hotel, a BBC building opposite BH. But with many on-site visits. On my second day, I arrived 20 minutes late worried that I would be in serious trouble. “Sorry I’m late” I said as I found my seat in the classroom. “Oh London traffic is terrible” was the only answer from our instructor!

So on my first days of real work I was sent to the Control Room in the sub-basement of BH London. This was the emergency wartime Control Room, installed in a hurry because the original Control Room was on the top floor of the building, rather liable to air attack. It distributed Radio, but also Television Sound; vision went through the Switching Centre in a different part of BH (only the BBC could do it that way!). The main positions in the Control Room were Simultaneous Broadcast (SB), Incomings, and Outgoings; but I and other Grade D new staff were on”The Bays” where we monitored and sometimes controlled a contribution passing through to recording channels or other destinations such as Home Traffic and Foreign Traffic. In two very small double rooms were the Continuity Suites for Home and Third programmes. Light Prog Continuity was upstairs on the basement floor.

London Control Room; Christmas 1961. Note the “Drop Flap” telephone exchanges.The metal flaps would actually drop from the energy created by someone turning the handle of a telephone to ring, often from hundreds of miles away. [for the technical readers 50 Hz at 80 volts]

On the “Bays” we were ringing all across Europe to establish contact with reporters. Our communication device was a field telephone with a handle to turn to ring. It may seem antiquated but these were great, because you could feel how long the line was, by how hard you had to turn. After getting contact, there was a speech test on the Music line, and two way circuits were established. (A Music line was high quality circuit which carried the broadcast material, whether speech or music). I was on C shift with S.K.Newling as TOM (Technical Operations Manager), Johnny Bradbury as ATOM, and Paddy Cairns, the “Grade C Engineer”. H C Miller was the Recording Supervisor in Cavendish Mansions, opposite the East side of BH, later on the 5th floor in the new recording channels. We had to look each day if we had been allocated to Control Room or Recordings. I did a lot of recording in Egton House and Cavendish Mansions and remember walking many times through the underground tunnel which connected the two buildings. Later I worked in the new recording channels on the 5th floor, often in H57. I once marked up a Radio Times with the programmes I had edited, and every day there were several Radio transmissions I had edited in some way.

H57 had the variable speed facility, called appropriately the “Savage” Bay (manufactured by the Savage Company!). It consisted of two transmitter valves which amplifier the output of a 40 to 60Hz oscillator to mains voltage, to feed the quarter horse power capstan motor of a BTR2. This was to vary the speed of the quarter inch tape! Only the BBC could do it this way. The equipment was very unpredictable, and on one occasion caught fire. The operator informed the Control Room who rang the BBC fire office, so lots of firemen were rushing around the first floor, looking for a fire which was on the 5th floor. The operator then rushed into the Recording Supervisor’s office shouting H57’s on fire. The unflappable Mr Miller said “You had better take your lunch break then”!

I have to admit to a disaster affecting a programme while I was working on recordings in London. I was to record “Music of the Masters”, a live programme broadcast on The Home Service which was repeated the following day or week, hence my recording. On the control console a monitoring key-switch allowed you to listen to either “Line In” or “Rep (Off tape)”. I began the recording on time, but when I switched to Off Tape I heard a mixture of the Home Service, the Light Programme and several other things. I rang the Control Room to query this and they told me (quite correctly) to contact the Recording Operations Office which I did. Unfortunately, when I played the recording back after the programme ended it was still a mixture of all services. So I was the cause of an announcement the following week to say that “We are unable to bring you the advertised programme for technical reasons.” I was told later that I would not be blamed. It was a complicated fault [for the technical readers, a one leg to earth due to a faulty (normally unused) key-switch on the machine I was recording on.] This experience did make me realise that when you record a live programme, it is best to have both tape machines set up and ready to record. I did that for the rest of my career, although it would not have saved me in this case because the one-legged fault on the input would have also affected the second machine also.

There was a new control room in the BH extension on the first floor (obviously another war was not expected) and they were in the process of changing over. In fact that is why my joining date was brought forward. Eventually the Old Control Room Staff had only to plug sources across to the new Control Room for transmission, and I was one of the few staff left in the old one. There should have been a supervisor present also. I remember coming on duty (alone) and finding all bookings on the sheet had finished, so I unplugged them all. “I had better check” I thought, so I read the booking sheet a second time.”What’s this Maida Vale 1 to Third Programme?” I plugged it up again, and listened to the Third Prog. The announcer said “We come now to part two of this evening’s concert…” By luck I had got away with my error in the interval while Third were on tape from continuity for the interval talk!