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Content Articles A Fair to Remember i-Cambria Summer 2009 A Fair to Remember
Content Articles A Fair to Remember i-Cambria Summer 2009 A Fair to Remember | A Fair to Remember |
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By Roy Noble There weren’t many ‘ rides’, but there were just enough to use up the limited money around. As you got older you graduated from the two small children’s roundabouts, with their double- decker buses, fire engines, steam locomotives and cars, up to the Noah’s Ark Carousel, where the animals went up and down as they went around. Come to think it - I don’t know why we called it Noah’s Ark, because it only had horses on it! The Stable or The Cavalry would have been better names. The sail boats, or ‘swings’ as we called them, were always down the bottom end of the field, where Gareth kept his buses and coaches. The swings were a favourite of mine, especially if the girls were watching you, because it was showing off time then, sending the swings high, towards the coal tips that rose behind the public toilets. Even the newly invented ‘pac a mac’, which was easily wind affected, was no restriction at all. The ‘Dodgems’ were always called the ‘Bumpers’ in Brynaman, and they were the last stop on the maturity trail for youngsters as they got older and braver. It was all very physical and it was always a dash to get a vacant car when they stopped. Brynaman Fair offered me the first taste of toffee apples, candy floss and butter- kissed popcorn. There was a fish and chip stall, but there was no excitement going there - we had a couple of those in the village all year round. I was never lucky at the competition stalls, roll a penny, roll a ball, poke a ticket out of a straw, but if you had three consecutive goes without success, the attendant, who was the first man I’d ever seen wearing an earring, gave you a prize anyway. There was an early bingo or tombola stall but I didn’t understand how it worked, so I kept away from it. I wonder if anyone did actually win one of those big baskets at the top of the stall - the ones with the full tea-set inside. Maturing in fairground rides evolves like a graph I suppose, you start low and simple, on the children’s merry-go-rounds, on the little fire engine and cars, then you graduate to Noah’s Ark , and then, gradually, on to the swings and bumpers. A ‘Waltzer’ turned up one year, but that was a swing too far for me, green is not my best facial colour. Finally, as you get older, you are back to the ‘manageable’ again, standing alongside the little carousels and merry-go-rounds with your grand children. As for the booths - well, you take in the boxing, the Mystic Meg Crystal Ball gazer, unusual exotic animals and, finally, the quiet stalls, those selling rugs, mats and linen. There was the one booth, though, that stays in the mind, the best ever at Brynaman Fair. It was the ‘Historical Tableau Exhibition’. I couldn’t understand why one of our neighbours said to me “Hey, you shouldn’t be going in there - you’re too young,” but it all became wonderfully clear as we entered the tent. The woman in the Tableau was nude, naked as the day she was born! She posed behind a thin gauze curtain, in various historical character guises. When the thick curtains first opened, she was ‘Cleopatra at the side of the Nile’, holding a basket of fruit. Next came ‘Boadicea in her chariot’, her helmet being her only attire! Then, ‘Queen of the Incas’ in head bandana and on to ‘Josephine - waiting for Napoleon’ - lounging on a French flag counterpane. I think it was on that night that my abiding interest in history began; Brynaman Fair was the academy that set me offRoy Noble                |
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