Wood Norton – What Was Pebble Mill?

All Memories Great & Small – part 2

Excerpt from “All Memories Great & Small” by Oliver Crocker.

Memories from Mike Duxbury (Film Editor):

‘I’d got a job as an Assistant Film Editor at the BBC in Pebble Mill in 1976 and spent most of my time assisting Henry Fowler. He was one of the senior Film Editors there and edited most of the high quality dramas. I was twenty-eight and Henry must have been in his fifties and we got on great. I had assisted him on a couple of series of Gangsters and I learned so much from him then. Henry had been editing for all of his career and by this time was becoming a little jaded. He lived in Tewkesbury which was a fifty minute drive down the motorway and he used to find the flimsiest of excuses to come in late or go home early – his favourite being “Fog on the motorway.”

60 cast and crew have shared their memories for this new book, which is available to preorder now from Miwk – http://bit.ly/2d7p5ts

Thanks to Oliver Crocker for sharing this excerpt.

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

Roy Thompson: ‘Remember Henry Fowler so well from his, and my, time at Wood Norton. He taught me so much about film production.’

Henry Fowler, film editor. Photo by Ian Collins, no reproduction without permission.

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Colin Pierpoint blog part 18 – Move From Pebble Mill

Copyright, Colin Pierpoint. My best office at Wood Norton.

Copyright Colin Pierpoint. Robin, seen from the office window.

This is the final part of Colin Pierpoint’s blog.

(After working at BBC Pebble Mill since it opened in 1971, Colin was eventually tempted away).

In June 1980 I got a permanent post as a Lecturer at the Engineering Training Department at Wood Norton, where I had had two previous attachments of a year. I was lucky. The Head of ETD had retired, and the new head was Dr Owen from the Open University, so on the Board I was able to talk about all the OU courses I was studying for my degree. In June 1980 I began my new career, but that didn’t mean that I left Pebble Mill for good. Part of my work was to bring courses of students on a regular trip to Droitwich transmitting station and Pebble Mill. Being recognised by staff I used to work with was very useful, and got us into all areas to see actual operational work going on. (Unlike the tours you get now; where, even if you are ex-staff you don’t even see inside a studio). One Christmas I sent boxes of chocolates to each department in appreciation of all the cooperation I had in the past. I expect they thought I had claimed them back on expenses, but in fact I paid for them myself. I was still well known at Pebble Mill on visits with my students because ex-colleagues who met me would often say “Have you been on leave? Kay Alexander said “What happened to my coffee?”

Colin Pierpoint

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

Stuart Gandy: ‘I remember my visit to Driotwich on my A course, but it was in autumn 1979, the year before you were there Colin. It was especially memorable because during that particular week, there had been some very bad weather and strong winds, which had actually blown down the long aerial wire that was fixed to the two masts. So you can imagine, there was a lot of activity going to to fix it. I remember they guys saying ..its not normally this busy!’

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Colin Pierpoint blog, part 11 – Re-organisation

Copyright resides in the original holder, no reproduction without permission

This was a time of change in the regions. Who remembers “Broadcasting in the 70s”? and the setting up of the Audio Units. We had a meeting about the future, led by Controller Midlands. First time I had seen him. Another manager (again, I know who it was, but I will save any embarrassment) was talking to us all and saying “Someone like Eric Sabin,” and he looked at me, “will in future be able to apply for a wider range of jobs, so Eric Sabin from the Control Room” looked at me again “could apply for a Sound Supervisor job in Television.” I had to say something, so I said “I believe every word you say, except that my name is not Eric Sabin”. Well, there was an uproar of laughter. John Grantham said to me after the meeting “What I liked was the way you let him dig himself in first!” But in fact it wasn’t deliberate on my part, and not intended. The same manager did later offer me some good career advise including a suggestion that I apply for a Tape and Grams post at Gosta Green. I never did, but only because it was not the direction I wanted to go.

What I did apply for, by default, was a post in the new audio unit. All those unsettled by the reorganisation were automatically given a board and I was the only one of these to get appointed. I was actually on attachment at Wood Norton at the time, and came back to attend the board. It was my performance on this board, and my board for attachments to ETD that I found I could bring out a personality from my usually quiet self. I enjoyed being a candidate on appointment boards, and we had a good laugh at times. I was later to develop this extension of my personality in my lecturing job; it was very useful in my relationship with students. Anyway, on this board, I remember being asked if I had done any Radio Drama. I said “No, and I wouldn’t do it that way in any case”. I went on to talk about location drama which must have gone down well. They also asked if I had any questions. I said “Yes. Why was Regional Radio being closed down when local radio has not yet taken over in all areas?” There was a long pause. Then the chairman said “You are probably as confused as we are”!

So, I got the only vacant post in the new Audio Unit. What happened to all the other applicants? They were put in the Audio Unit of course! Only the BBC could do it this way!

I mention the residual regional radio, I was often allocated to do Regional Extra, the one remaining Radio 4, Midland Opt-out programme, in Studio 5 at Pebble Mill. There were two audio assistants allocated, and we shared Tape and Grams or Panel (operating the desk). This gave me more Studio Manager experience to add to that I had had in Cardiff.

At this time I had asked to do the Grade C Engineering Course at my request. I was surprised when this was granted, and while on the course at Wood Norton, I asked about changing my career from operational work to engineering. In fact, I liked both sides of technical work and I had already spent years designing and building my own electronic equipment as a hobby. By the time the changes took place in regional broadcasting, I was qualified to work in Communications Department, and could therefore work in the Communications Centre at Pebble Mill. Comms had taken over the Control Room work which I had been doing, with two major changes; no continuity now that Local Radio had taken over from regional broadcasting (almost!), and I would now also be doing Radio Links for television.

Colin Pierpoint

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Colin Pierpoint blog 10 – Pebble Mill

Pebble Mill building circa 1970, copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission

I was one of the first people to work in Pebble Mill Studios, because all the Midland sound editing facilities were in mono at the time, and some orchestral concerts were being recorded at OBs in stereo. In fact, the Producers like Richard Butt, had to travel to London to edit their programmes. I did try to tell the management that there were stereo editing channels at Wood Norton, a lot closer, but I don’t think they understood. (These days, Wood Norton would have jumped at the chance to charge for hiring out editing facilities, but this was before Total Costing, Producer Choice, and department Business Units. Not that I am saying these were necessarily a good thing). So, when the Pebble Mill building was nearing completion, we were allowed to use the cubicle of Studio 1 for tape editing.

To be fair, I must mention another of my disasters. I was using the new Studer tape machines in Studio 1, B62 I think. I had previously used the Studer C37 at Wood Norton on attachment as an Assistant Lecturer, but I was caught out by a feature of the new machine where the wind will inch back and too, but will lock on if you have pressed the stop button beforehand. Anyway, I mangled a tape of an orchestra. The producer, Ron Gardener kindly allowed me to keep the reel while I sorted it out. In fact I had everything except one chord of music, and I built that from copying other bits of the performance and editing them together. A few days later, I played this to Ron, who said that he would have accepted that, but he had since found that Alan Ward, the Studio Manager who recorded it, had a 7 and a half ips copy recorded at the time of the performance. So we used that just for one phrase, about a bar of music. Ron Gardener then very kindly said that I had done good work for him in the past and he was prepared to overlook it. Nice of him to say that, and the only tape I ever damaged, but I did let myself down.

Colin Pierpoint

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

Carolyn Davies: “Colin, was this why future trainee Audio Assistants had to editing in a missing phrase of music as part of their 1/4″ editing training at Wood Norton?? Great story…”

Andy Freeth: “lan Ward’s OB stores equipment list was always “one and a spare!” Hardly surprising that there was another recording ferreted away Colin!”

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Colin Pierpoint blog – Part 2, New Control Room (BH London)

The New Control Room (BH London)

The New Control Room on the first floor of BH Extension had a different technical layout than the previous wartime Control Room. Gone were Incomings and Outgoings; instead they had the Multiple Switching Position MSP. The Multiple or “Mult” was the name for the uniselector switching system. The Simultaneous Broadcasting Position (SB) was still there dealing with the regions and transmitters. There was an Outside Broadcast (OB) position and a Television Sound position, (which had also been on the balcony in the Old Control Room). The “Bays“ of the old Control Room were replaced by Control and Monitor Positions (C&Ms). [Later in my career when I was a Lecturer at the Engineering Training Department, I was telling a course of male and female Studio Managers about London Control Room. As I mentioned the SB position the OB position and the MSP position some of them started to grin. When I got to the C&M position they were nearly in hysterics! Contact me for an explanation if you don’t understand!]

Most of my work in the New Control Room was on the C&Ms. Occasionally I would be chosen to operate the three channel mixers which were in a separate cubicle in the Control Room, and used for some foreign dispatches, and the Shipping Forecast on Long Wave.

It was in the New Control Room where I sent +24 decibels signal level to the Long Wave transmitter at Droitwich. This event is remembered even today by ex-Control Room Staff!
About this time in March 1962 I went on TO Course 13 at Wood Norton. Here is a photo of me in the Wood Norton Control Room, where I could do less harm.

On return to London I was move into the XP unit, which did tape editing and worked in the studios on transportable tape machines; actually TR90s on wheels, hence the name XP, transportable. I never knew if this was because of my error but I gained a lot of experience of tape editing, and working with producers. At my level I was only in the recording channels, but my colleagues worked on the Jack Jackson show actually in the studio cubicle. (For readers from a television background, in Radio, the place where the artists work in called the Studio, the place where the Studio Managers and the mixing desk is located is called the Cubicle. They are connected visually by a double glazed window, as in Television).

Some of my recording in London was on disk, and on a trip to CBC in Canada a few years ago, I came across the same model of disk cutter that I had operated.

Presto disc cutting recorder

I also found the so called “Midget” tape recorder used by reporters at this time. It used 5 inch reels of standard tape, and could record for seven and a half minutes on full track. In 1961 the midget recorder was used for interviews. The recorded tape was then taken to an editing channel. Editing standard tape at 7 and a half inches per second was no problem, the BTR2 tape machine which was used for editing could be switched to 7 and a half ips. Later these field recorders were changed, first to the Ficord and then to the Uher tape recorder. The Ficord presented a problem because it used long play tape which was thinner. When spooled back on a BTR2 the heavy machine from a German design stretched the tape! So we had to copy from the recorder first. Not convenient with an urgent news story and a deadline.

“Midget” recorder by EMI