Regular cast members Jon Pertwee, Nicholas Courtney and Katy Manning helped publicise the 1972-73 BBC TV Special E. ects Exhibition at the Science Museum… where visitors could buy a special ‘TARDIS Commander’ badge.
Late in 1972, Tom was asked by BBC Design Department head Cli€ ord Hatts to help launch the sixmonth BBC TV Special E€ ects Exhibition at the Science Museum in South Kensington. For many, the highlight was a Doctor Who display, incorporating costumes (such as an Ogron and a Draconian), props (such as the Axos model from The Claws of Axos, 1971), two Daleks and a specially constructed TARDIS console.
“Cli€ gave me a free hand to design it,” remembered Tom. “You went through the TARDIS into the display area. The police box itself was too tiny, so we had to enlarge it because of the mass of people who would be visiting.” There was no question of using the actual TARDIS console prop - which “looked good on camera but for kids having a close look, it was visually a nonsense really, so I re-designed it with Tony Oxley, a fantastic engineer and visual e€ ects guy.
“Now, I’d been to an exhibition in Canada where you actually controlled a Moon landing in a lunar module with back projection - and the kids could touch anything. It was fantastic. I wanted kids to be able to press buttons on this, but of course, there was concern they’d wreck it, so we had to put up a little barrier around it with ‘PLEASE DO NOT PRESS’ signs. The kids could come very close but couldn’t actually play. The exhibition worked well, I thought.
“Then they did another one at Blackpool, so I went up there with [BBC Enterprises exhibition organisers] Terry Sampson and Lorne Martin. I designed the whole layout, the entrance, everything. It was good fun to do.”