Witham: Carnival still in danger of folding (From Braintree and Witham Times)

it happens everywhere when an areas is nice and rural we can keep all our nice things as soonas the area become urbanised we lose all th enice thins and gain all horrible things why is that?

The picture certainly supports your hypothesis.

Not many 'thins' to be seen there - although I'm sure they're all very nice!

Ha ha!

Carnivals as I remember from my youth consisted of loads of floats from schools, youth groups, adult organisations, and local companies - interspersed with bands from the lcoal cadets etc. Admittedly, this was in Surrey and I am only assuming that Essex ones were the same; and our carnival (Farnham) had a three mile circular route and the front had to wait for the back to leave the car park before they could start to get back in, it was so long. Now carnivals seem to consist of the same 20 spoilt kids sat in trailers looking bored, and a couple of troops of batton wavers dancing to very badly amplified distorted music. If the carnival was more interesting, then more people would be willing to help.

Those times are gone forever Keith, along with so many of our other traditional quintessential English way of doing things. Red tape alone these days puts a massive damper on ‘public liability’ events such as carnivals

Circa 1961 I think I was seventeen or maybe just eighteen when given – without any familiarisation training whatsoever - a Co-op coal lorry to drive through the crowded streets of Halstead Carnival. People were precariously balanced on the back and all sorts of revellers were running closely alongside.

Fortunately no one fell off the back or went under the wheels!

Can you imagine trying to get that scenario cleared through a Health & Safety Risk Assessment today? Probably a good thing that you couldn’t, but maybe the pendulum has swung so far the other way that the joy of being involved in the planning and execution of small town carnival events has been killed off by all the embracing controlling legislation.

No wonder that those who actually do actually make it look so darned miserable!