Orrom, Michael and Mary

About the authors

The Secret Pony was originally made for television in 1970 by documentary film makers Michael Orrom, and his wife, Mary Beales. The book The Secret Pony, which was published in 1977, I presume was based on this film, and is illustrated throughout with colour photographs. Ten-year-old Jane longs for a pony, but none appears, even when her family move to the country. One day Jane find a pony in the middle of the woods, and when she overhears her parents talking about the pony being shot, decides to run away with him.

Jane, who hasn’t ridden before, seems to suss out riding with quite remarkable speed, but the drama of her running away, and the real-life implications, are entirely believable.

Mary Beales (1926–2014) and Michael Orrom (1920–1997) met at Cambridge. Mary started working for British documentary maker Paul Rotha in 1942, and in 1944, became a founder member of the Documentary and Technicians Alliance (DATA), Britain’s first film co-operative. At DATA, she made several films such as Dover Spring (1947), on the redevelopment of the town following the war. She later studied sculpture at St Martins School of Art, and went on to teach sculpture, as well as working occasionally on films.

Mary was a friend of Oliver Postgate, who created Ivor the Engine, and The Clangers. Oliver asked Mary and Michael for their advice on how he should develop a cartoon series about an engine. ‘Just get on with it,’ was Mary’s advice – and take no notice of what anyone in film had done before.

Michael Orrom was a documentary film scriptwriter, producer and director. He studied physics at Cambridge, graduating during WWII. He spent the rest of the war working on radar design. When he left, he found a job with Paul Rotha as a production assistant. His first film credit was as associate director and editor of Rotha’s The World is Rich (1948), on world food problems, and he went on to script and produce films looking at major world events, such as the thousands of refugees still housed in camps in Europe in the 1950s (The Waiting People, 1954).

In 1966, he started a company, Film Drama Limited, which was reponsible for The Secret Pony, although the company’s main work was the production of industrial and educational documentaries.

Finding the book
Very hard to find.

Links and sources
Mary Orrom: Lives in Brief, The Times, Tuesday August 26, 2014
Michael Orrom’s obituary in The Independent
Interview with Mary Orrom on The History Project
Russell & Taylor [Ed]: Shadows of Progress: Documentary Film in Post-War Britain


Bibliography (horse books only)


The Secret Pony

Pelham Books, London, 1977

Jane has always wanted a pony. Her family have moved to the country, but there is still no pony. One day she finds a pony loose in the woods with just a bridle. She catches the pony, but when she gets home, thinks she overhears her parents say the pony is to be shot. Horrified, Jane runs away with the pony, whom she names Golden Boy.