A fair old get-together!
“!’m so glad you’re keeping this going”. This one of many similar comments at the Nottingham Postcard Fair (plus cigarette cards, ephemera, militaria!) on Saturday. It was apparent that just about everyone there was having a good time, immersed in the fascination and thrill, of collecting. Missing dealers Rod Jewell and Mark Routh were asked after by numerous people (they’re both ok!). But having said that, we could have done with another hundred people! There’s no escaping the fact that putting on fairs is becoming a challenge for organisers, squeezed at one end by increasing costs (particularly of venues – though Nottingham University have been very good to us) and at the other by reduced attendances of both dealers and the public. So we heard that the next casualty in the postcard stratosphere will be the once-renowned Stockport Town Hall event, which will stage its final event next Saturday. What’s the answer to all this? Only to keep plugging away at enthusing more to come along. Might start a bring-a-mate deal next time? Anyway, Nottingham’s postcard event is very much alive, with next dates at King’s Meadow Campus Saturdays 13th May and 4th November. In the meantime here are a few pics from last Saturday.
1. Mick Liversidge from Easingwold, equally at home at a fair or treading the theatre boards (his Christmas romp was on a train) presides over his classy stock.
2. Paul Newman was making his debut at the Nottingham fair. He comes all the way from Yeovil! That’s 203 miles away – but he’s beaten on distance by Mark Bown from Wooler, Northumberland, 206 miles! But Mark has been coming to the Nottingham fair for ever and dislikes missing one!
3. A nice old couple who just love being at the postcard fair – and what a presentation!
4. This is probably aviation postcard chat between Alan Bower (left) from Huddersfield (that’s near Happy Valley) and Carl McQuaide, the country’s leading expert on this genre of the postcard world.
5. Barbara Irwin is from Basingstoke, and she and husband Ted always put on a great shop display of postcards and ephemera.
