Grade ‘C’ Course – Wood Norton 1964

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

The photo is of the ‘Grade C’ No. 46 trainees at Wood Norton, from June 1964! Pebble Mill’s telecine engineer: Jim Gregory is on the front row, fourth from the left, and Pete Simpkin (who became a Radio Birmingham producer/presenter, after a stint in Southampton), is third from the left in the middle row.

Pete remembers that the trainees had a use a mix of different cameras, including two Marconi Mk 1′s, an EMI vidicon and an Marconi Mk 3 3″ IO.

Thanks to Pete Simpkin for making the photo available.

Paul Grice added the following information about the Grade ‘C’ course, on the Pebble Mill Facebook group:

‘The ‘C’ course was the final course in gaining ETSIs (engineering training standing instructions) for people recruited as school leavers or graduates. School leavers had to do part one (electronics) and part two ( TV, radio or transmitters) while graduates only did part two. It took part in the 2nd or 3rd years of careers and was recognised all over the world as the bet qualification for broadcast engineers. I taught at Wood Norton from 1977 to 1988 when I moved to Pebble Mill.’