Vintage Sooty puppet given as gift by creator up for sale
A VINTAGE Sooty puppet which was given as a gift by creator Harry Corbett to the show’s former stage manager in 1975 could fetch thousands of pounds at auction.
Robin Vyrnwy-Pierce was given the famous yellow bear as a farewell present by Bradfordborn Mr Corbett 45 years ago.
Robin quit his job as a journalist and “ran away to join The Sooty Show” during the mid-70s and went on the UK tour as an assistant stage manager.
One of his first jobs was making the devices used to create Sweep’s distinctive squeak noise before he became a sound engineer, puppeteer and Harry Corbett’s driver.
At the end of the 1974-75 tour, Robin was given the original Sooty as a thank you for his work and it has travelled with him everywhere ever since.
As well as touring the UK, the puppet has been to Australia, Oman, Wales, Norfolk, Stratfordon-Avon, Worcestershire and latterly in Farnborough, Hampshire.
Robin is now selling his tatty globe-trotting bear and it could fetch £1,000-£1,500 when it goes under the hammer at Hansons Auctioneers, in Etwall, Derbyshire, on March 16.
Robin, of Farnborough, said: “In 1974, after nine years as a news reporter, I chucked in my job at the Basildon Standard Recorder in Essex to become assistant stage manager on a UK tour of The Sooty Show – and the little yellow bear with a sooty nose has been by my side ever since.
“I wanted a break from journalism to see more of the real world.
That autumn I drove to Harry’s home at Child Okeford, Dorset, our base as we prepared for the tour.
“The stage manager and I shared a caravan which we towed behind a three-ton Luton van which carried the stage equipment.
“I met Harry and his wife Marjorie, called Toabs by her sons. Mrs Corbett was the voice of Soo.
“One of my early jobs was making swazzles, devices used to create Sweep’s distinctive squeak.”