I seem to remember that these photos were taken with a panoramic camera that was being featured on the show that day. The photos were left in the North Riser so I took them home for safe keeping.

Left to right: Alex Christison, Michael Harrison, Guy Worth, Paul Scurrell, Kathryn Shuttleworth

Copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission.

These stills are from the 2002, second series of ‘Small Town Gardens’.  The first series was produced in London, but series 2 and 3 were produced by me at Pebble Mill.  Series one was presented by Rachel de Thame, series two by Joe Swift, and series three by James Alexander Sinclair.

The top still is of presenter Joe Swift with garden designer Annie Guilfoyle, explaining the inspiration for the small front garden in Fowey, Cornwall, she was designing for the series.

The second still is of an inspiration trip for garden designer, Andy Sturgeon, with one of the programme’s contributor s and  presenter Joe Swift.  The garden Andy was designing was a small garden in East Sheen, London – right underneath the Heathrow flight path!

It was a great production team, and a lovely series to make!

Photo by Derek Price, no reproduction without permission.

The photo is of director, John G Smith (on the left). It dates from November 1984, and was at a pre plan for a Billy Joel shoot for ‘Pebble Mill at One’. It was taken on a balcony top, on Broadway, New York.

The photo is of Engineering Manager, John Allinson. He is enjoying the location catering on an outside broadcast for the hosted drama series, ‘Angels’.  Eating a cooked breakfast in a bun required great care – note the tie tucked out of the way, to avoid any dripping egg.

It probably dates from the early 1980s.

Photos by Ian Collins, no reproduction without permission.

VT editor, Ian Collins took photos of obsolete post-production kit before the 2004 auction of equipment when Pebble Mill was cleared prior to being demolished.

These photos are of a Sony Hi8 video recorder.

Hi8 was an 8mm video format, which had better resolution than the earlier Video8, but pre-dated the introduction of Digi8.  It was an analogue format, and the ‘Hi’ stands for high-band, as opposed to low-band.

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

John Duckmanton: ‘This machine is still in the bay at The Mailbox and is still used occasionally.’

Peter Poole:  ’I think it was sometimes used for ‘Midlands Today’. The reporter may have used it before the crew arrived.’

Photo from Marie Phillips, no reproduction without permission.

The photo dates from May 1993, and shows Radio WM presenter, Gordon Astley, presenting a ‘Children in Need’ cheque for the ‘Allen’s Croft Project’, right outside the front of the Pebble Mill building.

Photo from Sue Robinson, no reproduction without permission.

This photo of the Planning Office was taken in 1980.  The Planning Office used to schedule VT and other technical staff to programmes.

Included in the photo are, left to right, back row: Bev Dartnall (who went on to be a drama series producer), David Robinson?, Barbara Hynes, Margaret Barton, front row: ?, Lyn Rae (went on to be PA/PM), Janet Collins, Sue Robinson (now multi-camera director).

Please add a comment if you can remember the occasion, or identify the woman bottom left.

The following comments were added on the Pebble Mill Facebook group:

Beverley Dartnall: ‘I worked in the planning office before joining Drama in 1982, As well as allocating cameramen and soundmen to programmes, they allocated what programmes went into Studio A. Janet allocated VT and TK staff. Comms were also allocated fom that office.’

Peter Poole: ‘I remember Kath Woolstan and Mandy Peissel from the Audio Unit office. They always did an excellent job and treated audio staff as people and not machines!’

Photos by Janice Rider, no reproduction without permission.

‘Come to Mecca’ was transmitted on 2 Dec 1983.  It was produced by Peter Ansorge at Pebble Mill, and directed by John McGrath.  It was written by  the Anglo-Indian writer, Farrukh Dhondy.

The story involves Shahid, who is delighted when Betty asks him to go to a meeting at her house.  It is about the crossover and misunderstandings between different cultures.

The play stars, Sharman Macdonald (Betty), Dinesh Shukla, Nick Stringer, Moti Makan, Paul Anil, along with Zia Mohyeddin and Phil Daniels.

Janice Rider worked in the costume department, and took these polaroids for continuity reasons, so that the actors’ costumes matched from scene to scene and shoot to shoot.

Nigel Evans, Ian Dewar and myself (Derek Price) on the way to Houston, Texas in July 81 in a DC10, to meet Vic Damone, the American singer and entertainer, and bring him back for ‘Pebble Mill At One’.

Derek Price

Jane Mclean adds that John Smith and/or Jim Dumighan may also have been involved in the trip.

Pete Simpkin: ‘I was at Wood Norton in the mid 60s and our engineerng course TA16 was the first engineer group to be allowed to produce a show in the famous Gym studio.  It was relayed to the club in Evesham. I was Floor manager……we evn had to design our own captions!’

Take a look at the following 360 degree photo of Wood Norton, by Tom Poole: http://www.tompoole.co.uk/360/woodnorton2.swf

Stuart Gandy: ‘As an engineer my first 3 months in the BBC were at Wood Norton on my A course in 1979. Part of the A course for us TV engineers was to make a programme in the studio at Wood Norton trying out the different roles. In those days there were always a lot of trainees there and for our course we could not use the studio there as it was fully booked, so we had to come up to Birmingham University studio for 3 days. Whilst there we had the chance to visit ‘a proper TV studio’, that was Pebble Mill of course, one of the BBC’s most iconic buildings. It was an interesting visit especially for those of us like me that would be starting there later on. Who would have ever thought back then that 25 years later it would be gone!’

Gordon Astley: ‘Wood Norton was my rite of passage.’