The Middy, October 21 1999

Beer, beards and pole squatting

In the 13th century, the Plantagenet King Henry III granted a Royal Charter to a Mr John de Warrene to hold two fairs for the sale of stock and pedlary near Muster Green in Haywards Heath each April and November.

It is believed Mr de Warrene, a notable Mid Sussex landowner, had been granted this charter because of family connections, via marriage, to William the Conqueror.

The charter was renewed by Charles II and a fair was held for 700 years before Victorian rowdyism forced it to close in 1860.

It took the dynamism of the Round Tablers, and particularly an ex-chairman, Geoffrey Cohen, to spur the town into reviving the occasion for the benefit of local charities in 1956.

He said: "Frank Finch, a Haywards Heath builder, told me about the old Chartered Fair on Muster Green, and I knew that was just what the Round Table wanted because we were concerned Haywards Heath was just a dormitory town with no real community spirit.”

The intention was to get people together for one day in the year to let their hair down and gather support for charities and voluntary organisations.

The all England Beard Growing competition raised enormous interest and achieved notoriety in the national press.

Geoff said: "We organised the beard competition and an ale quaffing contest. People had six months to see what sort of growth they could reach.

"In those days there was hardly anybody wearing beards, so the ex Middy editor, Robin Anderson and I, along with six or seven of his staff all stopped shaving.

"A Lindfield dairy owner, Dudley Partridge, won the £10 prize after growing an absolutely astonishing beard, it really was a sight to be hold. It was a bit of fun and Robin actually got us in the Daily Mirror."

And it became a truly international affair following a challenge from Mr James Robertson, the Mayor of Sault Sainte Marie, a city in Michigan USA, who had their own competition.

The competition to see who could drink three pints of ale faster than anyone else was won by a teetotal local government employee! Donald Humphrey, and non-drinker who worked for the council, downed his ale in 28 seconds.

Geoff remembers he used to practice with water, and recalls the occasion with fondness: "it was a really bright sunny day and the police estimated there must have been about 15,000 people there. We really filled Victoria Park and achieved what we set out to do – we gave the town a pretty remarkable day. "

The fair ran annually until the mid-1980s, when a lack of support forced it to stop.

In 1344, King Edward III granted the dean of Lindfield a weekly market every Thursday and two yearly fairs thereafter.

The August fare began life as the feast of St James the Great and was held on the common each July 25, but from 1871, with the introduction of bank holidays, it moved to August 8.

Helena Hall’s 1960 book Lindfield, Past and Present, states this fair was the largest in the county. Around 40 - 50,000 sheep were penned as traders from miles around came to view them.

The contrast between the early years in the face of the 1950s is marked.

At the fairs of yesteryear, the noise, according to Helena's book, was terrific – the shouting, the neighing in the baaing of the thousands of sheep behind the wattles, barking of the sheep dogs, the raucous cries of many gypsies, the howling of lost children, made true pandemonium.

A Mrs Terence Martin noted in the 1960s: "the character of the fare has changed, none of the men now wear earrings and gay coloured handkerchiefs tied round their heads."

Also missing was the heavily laden stall of ginger bread made by Mr Humphrey of the High Street bakery, and brandy snaps and humbugs of all colours.

The outbreak of the Second World War caused the fair to close down, as Helena's book says "for with complete darkness in the evenings there was no fun, no kind of enjoyment, and moreover, nearly everyone was engaged in some kind of war work ".

But horses were still being sold at the fair as late as 1939, with the government occasionally buying stock. And the shooting galleries rewarded keen marksmanship with nuts, a reminder of the slang phrase "he couldn't do it for nuts “.

A possibly apocryphal story says the Brighton born theatre impresario said Charles Cocherane attributed his early interest in the stage and showmanship to the fairs he saw as a boy on Lindfield Common.

The pleasure fair continued until 1992, but 1980s saw a year of drama. Stevenson’s Fair’s visit to the Haywards Heath carnival was postponed because of heavy rain in late July, and the new date clashed with the Lindfield fair.

Both events went ahead as planned with Bensons, the Lindfield entertainers, and Stevensons in hot competition with the number of big posters displayed.

Burgess Hill's first Goose fair was held at the Sydney West boxing Hall, Leylands Road in 1956 and attracted 8000 people to witness the procession and crowning of the first Goose Girl, Annabel Jefferies.

It was organised by Dr De Lacy and some colleagues, as a charitable cause to raise money for care homes for the elderly.

Fred Avery, a Burgess Hill historian, remembers it well. He said: "Buster Bartlett organised a pram race from pub to pub where half a pint of beer had to be consumed at each one. It was one of the funniest things I have ever seen, all these grown men dressed as babies tearing around the town in their prams.

"By the time they got back to the hall, they were falling about all over the place."

He remembers it as "brilliant fun as it seemed all Burgess Hill turned up.

It was a novelty, and after the austerity of the war years, it was a chance for people to get out and let their hair down ".

It was borne out by the success of the cinemas and amateur dramatic society to all agree the golden years of entertainment in the mid Sussex were the 50s and 60s.

In 1957, a one-off pole squatting event was held in Folders Lane field. The contestants – Rob Roger Dible a 17-year-old bookkeeper, John Parker an 18-year-old bricklayer from Scaynes Hill, Roger Ticehurst, a 33-year-old foreman, 18-year-old Oliver Oliveros and a dummy – compete to see who could sit the longest on a one square platform at the top of a 20 foot Telegraph pole.

Peter retired in the afternoon, but the other three lasted until 8:30 pm when it was declared a draw and they were given £5 each.

The fate of the dummy lies unrecorded.

In 1962, acclaimed film star Julie Christie, who used to live in Cuckfield and went out with a lucky Burgess Hill lad in the 1950s, returned to the town to crown the Goose Girl.

And in 1967 bunny girls from London's Playboy club dropped in for a visit while three years later the Penthouse pet graced the fair with their presence.

Other functions have included the Duck Fair, first held in 1959 at World's End recreation ground for at least 10 years, and the town day with a donkey derby.

Town day is now a well established event in the Burgess Hill Summer Festival which was first held in 1986.

With thanks to: Geoffrey Cohen, Fred Avery and Glyn Mansfield.

Acknowledgements: Lindfield, past and present: Helena Hall: 1960.