More radio for the Sugar Girls

Posted By The Sugar Girls ~ 6th April 2012

Yesterday it was BBC Radio 4′s Woman’s Hour, and this morning the Sugar Girls were being beamed out around the world to the 50 million listeners of the World Service. The piece was recorded earlier this week at Tate & Lyle’s Plaistow Wharf Refinery and went out as part of the World Update programme at a quarter to 11 today.

You can listen to it by clicking the button below:

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BBC journalist Emma Wallis spoke to former Blue Room girls Gladys Hudgell and Eva Rodwell about their memories of the factory. Plaistow Wharf has changed a lot since the days when they worked there, in the 1940s and 1950s, but they managed to find their old building, and Eva recalled her husband playing Mario Lanza’s ‘Be My Love’ to her through one of the doorways we passed by.

It was a moving experience for the two former Sugar Girls, and though they were sad to see how few people work at the factory these days (fewer than fifty, compared to 1,500 in their day), they were pleased to have the chance to chat with the men and women who work there today.  We wrote a blog about the tour, which you can read here.

And if you want to hear more from Gladys and Eva, here is a bonus recording made by Graham, the producer of the Robert Elms show for BBC London, which they went on last week.