Following the closure of “The Black Bison” which had reverted to “The Cricketers” after Christmas, it has been decided to try a new venue for the mid summer lunch on June 22nd.
Annie & I have just returned from lunch at “The Anchor” at Pyrford near Ripley, Surrey. It wasn’t too busy – we had a minimal wait for a hot lunch – and there’s plenty of car-parking. Very handy for the A3 and M25. I asked about a ‘large number’ (25) of attendees and it seemed to present no problem. As you will see there is plenty of outside eating space – the website claims 400(!) I will update after the weekend when I have emailed them and made a booking – their online booking system will only cope up to 20, it certainly coped for the two of us!
In <Links> we have <A History of London’s Television Studios>. Ian Howlett has just sent me the following direct link to the TV Centre pages, which are well worth a look – I think they have been expanded since I first saw them. A nostalgic read!
The funeral and committal for John Wilson has been arranged for 11:30 on
Thursday 9 February at:-
St Mary’s Church,
Haddenham,
Bucks.
HP17 8AH.
This will be followed by a reception at:-
Thame Barns Centre,
Church Road,
Thame.
OX9 3AJ.
This is about ten minute’s drive from Haddenham, and there is plenty of parking at both places.
John’s wife Rosemarie says, ”I will be very pleased to welcome John’s BBC friends, I might even meet a few people who have just been names in the past”.
No flowers please, but if anybody would like to donate to a charity it can be done through the Funeral Directors (FJ Wilson, Greenway, Haddenham, Aylesbury, Bucks, HP17 8BJ) to one of the following:-
Florence Nightingale Hospice
Stoke Mandeville Hospital
Medecins Sans Frontieres
RNLI
Or send it directly, or leave a donation at the church.
I trust that 2017 will be a good year for you all.
I’ve just made some additions to Obituaries – names many of you will remember working with in the past.
Jeremy Summers (thanks to Ian Williams for pointing me to the Guardian page), Rodney Bennett (whose obit I found on a Dr Who Fan page) and Claude Whatham (I was prompted to look him up having just watched the new “Swallows & Amazons” – he directed the 1974 version – and in the process I discovered he had died in 2008).
These are all people we “older” Oldboys worked with – it’s nice to discover what else they did in the past.
CB
Many of you will know or have worked with Philip Saville who died on December 22nd. While I wait for a full obituary, here is an excerpt from his Wikipedia entry.
Saville began his working life as an actor. During the 1960s he directed television plays, such as Harold Pinter’s A Night Out (1960) for ABC’s Armchair Theatre anthology series. He directed over 40 plays for Armchair Theatre and helped pioneer the innovative visual style it became known for, including rapid and intricate camera movements during the often live productions.[1] He also directed Madhouse on Castle Street (1963) for the BBC. The (now lost) production was the first acting appearance of the folk singer Bob Dylan, whom Saville had flown over specifically to take part in the play. Saville’s production of Hamlet at Elsinore (1964) for the BBC pioneered the use of videotape for location recording.[1]
Other significant programmes on which Saville worked include Out of the Unknown (1965) and the Boys from the Blackstuff (1982) for which Saville received a BAFTA to add to his earlier BAFTA for Hamlet at Elsinore, and The Life and Loves of a She-Devil (1986).
I’ve just heard of the passing of John Jarvie – many of you will remember him.
A long career in the BBC started with a spell at Norwich and took him on to become Head of Studio Capital Projects – involving him in the creation of a number of new local radio station buildings – and later engineering general manager at TV Centre.
Thanks to Robin Hall for pointing me to this at the Forum for former BBC Staff
I’ve just discovered this 3D model of the East Tower – many happy memories of Sundays spent lift-racing all those years ago!
Many of you may have found this already, but, in the search for ETD course photos I stumbled across this page with a couple of interesting links to articles by Pat Leggatt and “LG” Smith about the BBC at Wood Norton during the war.
I’ve added this link to the ETD main page as well.
Keith Graham has just commented:-
This year marks the 60th anniversary of the launch of the Ampex VR1000. The Santa Clara (California) chapter of the IEEE, in conjunction with the San Francisco section of SMPTE unveiled a Historical Milestone plaque at Stanford University, where there is one of the first VR1000s on display.
Here is the link to a 30 minute documentary I made with footage of the event and reminiscences from people, including Fred Pfost, the last surviving member of the original development team.
Please forgive my “stealing” John Naull’s animation from the Christmas tape so many years ago.
You can find the video on YouTube here
(Keith is the originator of our photograph of the Ampex Sign)
Many of you may well remember this from 32 years ago! There had been a similar event in 1978 in TC1, where an exhibition of the latest video technology was assembled so that staff could see it for themselves and assess its potential.
You can download the entire pdf here thanks to Phil Ashby who found it ‘in the back of his garage’!
