Next to the Pelham Puppet factory in Marlborough was a coal yard and at 10:00pm on the 18th October 1961 Mr. and Mrs. Brooks who were living there at the time, looked out of the window only to see what they thought was a fireworks party going on. There seemed to be sky rockets and bangers going off one after another, yet strangely there was nobody watching.

As soon as there realized it was the Pelham factory that was on fire they called the local Fire Brigade and then immediately called Bob Pelham. Bob quickly collected Frank Lawson who lived just a few 100 yards away and they were on there way driving much faster than normal. Bob's wife Anne feared the worst as she could clearly see the glow of the fire from their upstairs bedroom window in their house over 3 miles away.

At first glance Bob's worst fears were realized as it was the paint shop that was ablaze. Each time another paint can went up the fire reached an even greater intensity.

Much of the factory was destroyed including Bobs office which contained his collection of puppets and prototypes. The fire was devastating but Bob put all his efforts into getting production running as soon as possible. With the help of his workforce very limited production was achieved within a week. Local people and businesses helped greatly and in Marlborough every workers home became a mini factory.

What started the fire was never discovered but by early 1962 the new single story factory was completed and new export orders flooded in, almost three times as many as the previous year.

As the fire destroyed most of the moulds such as the Alice in Wonderland range a whole new range came out in 1963.

It was never proved what caused the fire but the most likely cause was a lights used by a TV crew that were in the factory that morning. It is thought that their lights over loaded the factory wiring the smoldered until later and then the fire started.

Below is a photograph from the company scrap book of the headlines as they appeared in the local newspaper. Sorry about the quality of this picture but the scrap book is getting rather Flimsy.