A SHOW this weekend at the Dingles Fairground Heritage Centre at Lifton will bring together several unusual and bizarre acts that have never appeared together.
Unique acts unlikely to be seen again in a fairground setting include the great Voltini and his electric chair Kondini, and the great Sebastian and Madame Electra.
The event, this Saturday and Sunday (April 25 and 26), is as a result of the centre recently being entrusted with the Tom Norman Palladium show booth. Tom Norman was one of England's foremost fairground show owners, who employed Joseph Merrick, The Elephant Man, for a while.
The trading element of travelling fairs meant that large crowds were attracted to the towns where they were held and large crowds in turn meant possible customers for entertainers.
It was soon realised by some that the way to a good profit lay with presenting the unusual and bizarre. This was the catalyst for the parading shows that became popular and profitable in the latter half of the 19th century with their presentation of so called 'magic' acts together with risque dancing girls and the unfortunates who were disfigured from birth.