The annual Loughcaster street fair I now know is officially
opened after a civic ceremony is performed outside the town
hall in accordance with some ancient charter and in attendance
by the local Mayor and his fellow dignitaries.
I and thousands of other local school urchins only know this because the
following week the mayors, along with the smug faces of
children from some clever school would be plastered
across the front page of the Loughborough Echo and Monitor.
The picture usually depicts them getting a free ride on the
dodgems whilst the rest of us were midway through a double
period of Algebra or being force fed boiled beef and cabbage.
Unfortunately for us urchins, Terry Wogan, Pudsey bear and Children
in need was still but a mere pipedream.
Our classroom I remember was a lonely place first period after the opening
of the fair, but by the time the strays had been rounded up,
severely beaten and caned all the way back along Ashby road it
soon filled out again. By second period the corridors were
usually buzzing with a rumour going about the school that some
bloke had been seriously maimed for life after falling from
the top of the Big Wheel. Actually I know for a fact that this
did happen a few years later, because one Saturday afternoon
Lee Williams a lad I knew from playing football did in fact
fall from off the top of the Big Wheel!
I wonder whatever happened to him? |
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