THE HIGGINSON STORY by George Twiselton

Frederick James Higginson was the owner of a bicycle sales and repair business occupying two shops, numbers 69 and 71 Grafton Street, Northampton.  But Fred was no ordinary cycle dealer.  He had a lifelong passion for the theatre and circus, and show business seemed to be in his blood.  He not only sold and repaired bikes but the window of number 69 was full of the weird and wonderful machines he had dreamt up and built over the years, as a hobby.  Riding some of these, Fred, his son, and his nephew had regularly taken part in the town’s Hospital Cycle Parades during the nineteen-thirties, and when the annual event became a casualty of World War Two it must have come as a shattering blow.  The official view was that, given the constant threat of air raids, the encouragement of large crowds to assemble in the open would simply have been too risky.  Fred never accepted this; he felt that in wartime what people needed more than anything else was something to cheer them up, and when he was no longer able to dress up and show off in front of crowds of onlookers he must have felt bitterly frustrated.

Eventually, in 1943 when the war had been going on for over three-and-a-half years Fred decided that if the authorities were still unwilling to organise a parade then he would put one on himself.  At that time he had nine bikes ready to go, one of which was a Double-decker Tandem – hence he needed ten riders, but could muster only four.  Apart from Fred himself and his son, also Fred but always called Len, there were two family friends who shared their streak of madness, namely George Harrison and Les Jones.  By a stroke of luck Dave Battison, a young accountant who was helping Fred with his bookkeeping also happened to be Troop Leader of the 34th Scout Group based at Kingsthorpe, of which I was a member.  Dave offered to be one of the riders and at the next troop meeting he had no difficulty in recruiting the rest of the crew.  I was the first to raise a hand, the other four being John Bannister, Danny Plowman, Martin Merry and Don Butlin.  Thus, at the tender age of fourteen, still at school, I became a founder member of the Higginson Troupe of Trick Cyclists.

Next day we all went to Grafton Street to meet the Higginsons and discovered that Fred and Len ate, drank, breathed, and slept bikes and the place appeared to be full of them.  Upstairs they even kept a bedroom clear of furniture so that we could practise on wet days.  So, having chosen our “weapons” practice and more practice became the order of the day.  After all, Fred had no wish to see his precious bikes wrecked by us callow youths!  Eventually, when he was satisfied that we could handle the mounts we had chosen, Fred allowed us out into Grafton Street and we continued to practise in the side streets around St Andrew’s Church.

During the war all that remained to remind us of the annual Cycle Parade was “Hospital Week” at the end of June each year, when various events such as Children’s Fancy Dress Competitions, Jumble Sales, Whist Drives, and Dancing Displays were held to raise money for the General Hospital.  When he was ready Fred approached the Hospital Week Committee as it was known, and arranged to stage his Parade in the evening of Saturday, 3rd July 1943, the last day of Hospital Week.  The Committee supplied a batch of collecting tins and all that now remained was for the parade to be “advertised”.

By another piece of luck one of our members, Danny Plowman, was working for the Chronicle & Echo as a “cub” reporter so he arranged for an article announcing the great event to appear in Hamtune’s Town Talk and County Gossip column.  In those days, due to rationing of newsprint, the paper was severely limited in size and our piece of news was held over until the Friday evening before the event.  Fred was worried sick that given such short notice hardly anyone would turn out to see us.  In fact, quite large crowds appeared on the streets, some no doubt expecting a much larger show because the Chronicle & Echo had not made it clear that there would be only ten of us!

Our route, which had also been listed in the newspaper, took us up Grafton Street to Regent Square, across the Square to Sheep Street, thence to All Saints and Mercers’ Row, Abington Street, Abington Square, Wellingborough Road and Abington Park.  At the park we made a circuit of the Museum.  Then, finally it was back to Grafton Street.  Wherever a group of people had gathered we paused and gave them an impromptu mini-display.  At the end of the evening, to suggest that we were utterly exhausted would have been the understatement of the year, but we were deliriously happy and Fred certainly felt that he had proved his point.

On the following Monday the results of the Hospital Week events were listed in the Chronicle & Echo, including our own collection, which had raised £15-12s-9d!  Since it had all been collected in small change, most of it having been literally thrown at us by the crowds, I would have given the total as Three thousand, seven hundred and fifty-three pennies, which would have looked a lot more impressive!

Notwithstanding our noble efforts we had still not convinced the authorities enough to make them change their minds regarding a parade.  They reminded us that there was still a war on.  However, they did ask us to give a Trick Cycling Display in front of Abington Museum on the Saturday of Hospital Week 1944, and for the time being we had to be content with that.

On Saturday evening lst July 1944, just a year after our first appearance in public, we presented a show on the forecourt of Abington Museum.  A large crowd gathered to watch us and Fred’s latest creation the “Flying Bedstead” was given its first airing.  It was not a bike shaped like a bedstead, it was a bike made from a bedstead, or rather the head end of a wrought iron double bedstead that George Harrison had found at the scrap yard where he worked.  Fred had fixed pushchair sized wheels to it, brazed a “steering column” and handlebar on to one end, pedals to the bottom bar plus a very long chain, and finally a saddle on the top bar.  He then asked me to have a go at riding it.

Since it was obviously too big to get into the spare bedroom Fred suggested that I take it back and forth along the entry that ran from Grafton Street to his workshop at the back of the shop.  This was a narrow path about a yard wide between two brick walls.  As Fred helpfully put it “You won’t get hurt, the walls’ll stop you landing on the ground.”  Personally I couldn’t see a lot of difference, but several grazed elbows later I was allowed outside to make the customary circuit of Saint Andrew’s Church.

Our performance in the park was rewarded with quite a good write-up in the Chronicle & Echo.  It also resulted in an invitation to stage a similar display at the end of Hospital Week in 1945.  However, early in May of that year we were overtaken by events when the war in Europe came to an end.  Although the war in the Far East against Japan was still ongoing, the Hospital Week Committee decided, as a celebration of victory, to arrange a parade for the evening of Monday, 25th June, the first day of Hospital Week.  This was, incidentally, the first ever evening parade, and the one and only occasion when it was held on a Monday.

According to the Programme the “Victory” Parade attracted 129 entries, of which 35 were cyclists, 57 walkers (some groups and some individuals), 9 horseback riders, 5 horse drawn vehicles and 10 cars/lorries.  The Higginson Troupe now numbered eight, having lost two of our founder members.  Dave Battison had left Northampton in furtherance of his studies and John Bannister was now in the Royal Navy.  I rode the “Flying Bedstead” and Len, with Les Jones, took the Double-decker tandem on its last outing in a parade.  It was a wonderful machine, but because it needed a longish “runway” for both riders to get aboard and was really too fast for the slow pace of a parade, Fred decided from then on to keep it exclusively for our “static” shows.

Apart from the Higginsons’ mini-parade in 1943, nothing like this had been seen for six long years, and to those of us taking part it seemed that practically everyone in Northampton and the surrounding villages had turned out to see us.  And when it was all over we still had our Saturday evening show at Abington Park to look forward to. Our fame must have spread by then because a Daily Mirror photographer, no less, turned up at Grafton Street just before we left.  His idea was to take some shots before the show, as he had to be back in London in the early evening.  Unfortunately, his arrival was the signal for the heavens to open up for a torrential downpour, so he gave up in despair.  Ironically, he must hardly have got on his train when the sun came out for the rest of the evening.  Later, in the park, a sizeable crowd watched our show and we had a marvellous time, but we never did manage to get into the Daily Mirror.

Weatherwise, the 1946 Parade on 1st July also just avoided getting off to a very wet start.  It had rained for most of the day but thankfully cleared up just before the judging got underway at Becket’s Park.  The Chronicle & Echo photographer snapped the Higginsons looking somewhat bedraggled shortly before we took to the road.  That year the “Flying Bedstead” was left at home for a change, Fred having asked me to ride the Saddle Propelled contraption instead.  Can you wonder that during the next few days following the parade I did rather a lot of standing.

Following the prizegiving at Abington Park, the Higginsons gave a display of trick cycling around the Bandstand and this was advertised on the Programme. Another innovation for the 1946 parade was the small charge made for each entry, presumably to help pay for the prizes.  In later years this idea was abandoned.

The weather was much better for the 1947 event.  We had now enjoyed three post-war parades and at the time no-one could have guessed that this was to be the last one for several years.  In fact, in 1948, just when it seemed to be getting back into its old familiar pre-war stride the parade was once again snuffed out, not by threat of war this time but as a result of the starting up of the National Health Service.  Now that the Hospital was funded by the taxpayer it apparently no longer required voluntary contributions, hence the committee decided that there was no need for a parade.  So for four long years Northampton was deprived of its much-loved annual spectacle.

Then in 1952 the Rotary Club of Northampton came up with an idea that should really have been obvious all along.  If the Hospital no longer needed public support then there were plenty of other equally deserving organisations that did.  So the Rotary Club linked up with the Hospital Week Committee that was still in existence and together they re-launched the old Hospital Cycle Parade under its new name, “Carnival Parade” with the aim of raising funds for various Old People’s institutions.

Needless to say, the Higginsons were among the early entries and Fred asked me to ride the bedstead again.  When I first started riding the bedstead in 1944 I had to decide what to wear.  Fred had a wonderful assortment of costumes by then including several clown outfits, a vintage police uniform, a Russian Cossack kit, and even a Gorilla skin, (not a real one I hasten to add), but none of them seemed appropriate for a bedstead.  Then Fred made the obvious suggestion, “Why not wear pyjamas?” – problem solved!  From then on I almost always wore pyjamas with a nightcap, bedsocks and an alarm clock on a chain around my neck.  I also sported an oversized moustache, which I stuck on with a generous measure of spirit gum, as there was always the danger of it being blown off or knocked off in a pile up.  On this occasion I had good reason to wish the “tash” had not been quite so firmly fixed!

When the carnivals were underway the parade marshals always called a halt every few hundred yards along the route to allow the stragglers to catch up.  During these pauses the Higginsons put on short displays to keep the crowds entertained.  When this happened Don Butlin would hop on to the bedstead and perform a few balancing acts on the top bar. In 1952, while we were waiting for the judging before the parade took off, we had a few practice runs along the avenue of trees in Becket’s Park.  My girlfriend, Emily, took a photograph of us in action, threading our way between the inevitable onlookers and youths on ordinary bikes who had nothing to do with the parade.  A few seconds later a sparrow landed on my moustache, obviously mistaking it for its nest!  The next few seconds, which seemed more like several hours, were pretty scary.  I had to keep going ahead for fear of injuring one of the bystanders, but needed to remove the bird before it pecked my eye out.  Eventually, steering with one hand I managed to gently flick it off, whereupon it perched on the handlebar!  As soon as I put both hands back on the handlebar it returned to my moustache and I had to go through the whole process again.  When at last I got rid of the sparrow I looked round for Emily and found that she had missed the photo opportunity of the year!  Later in the evening she did, however, take the best photo that we have of the flying bedstead.

Throughout the whole of the time that the Higginsons were part of the carnival the only year when we were conspicuous by our absence was 1953.  That was the year when the committee decided to devote the cash collections to local youth organisations, a decision that Fred disapproved of so strongly that he refused to allow the Troupe to participate.  As a result, we had a unique opportunity to watch the carnival for a change.  Strange though it might seem, when you are taking part in a parade you never get to see a great deal of it.  It was an enjoyable experience, albeit extremely frustrating, as you might guess!

The following year, 1954, was a special one for the Troupe.  Fred’s grandson, six-year-old Michael (Len’s son) joined us in the carnival for the first time, so we now had three generations of the Higginsons with us.  That same year there was a National Road Safety campaign urging everyone, among other things, “not to ride a bike fit for a dustbin”.  Fred took this as a challenge, and within a short space of time had converted a council dustbin into a bike.  He cleverly designed the handlebar and saddle to be detachable, so that the lid could still be taken off.  For the first time we now had a means of carrying a few useful props such as a corset, a pair of knickers, a bra, and a suspender belt!  Whenever we gave a show during a pause Fred would rummage about in the bin and hold up the undergarments one by one, greatly to the amusement of the onlookers.

Fred proved that he had yet another masterpiece up his sleeve when in 1955 he created the “Double Bedstead”.  When Don and I first went to see it we really thought Fred had “flipped”.  After all, there can't have been many tandems on which the riders sit back-to-back!  In fact, an ingenious arrangement of gears meant that the power generated by the rear rider contributed to the forward motion of the bike so there was no danger of us tearing it in two!  The masterstroke was the tin “potty” at the back, which, worked by a foot pedal at the front, shot out about a yard on the end of a “lazy- tongs” mechanism.  Naturally, this drove the children in the crowd into hysterics.

That same year Fred and Len between them produced the famous “Stilt” Bike, and from then on Len rode it in most of the carnivals, wearing a variety of long-legged outfits.  In 1960, he had an argument with a lamppost in Derngate and fell over backwards, breaking one of the stilts.  Luckily we managed to repair the stilt, but the same couldn’t be said for his false teeth, which he carried in the back pocket of his long trousers.  He had discovered some years before that when he removed his teeth and waggled his jaw about the children loved it.  As a result of his “spill” he became the first person ever to have bitten a piece out of his own backside!!

In December 1959 my best friend and fellow founder member of the Troupe, Don Butlin, moved to Colchester and the local Constabulary must have breathed a collective sigh of relief, for it was Don who kissed all the Policemen.  Wearing his grandmother’s bathing costume, he always rode a bike we called the “Back-steerer” which was easy to dismount, so no copper was safe from his embrace and many of the men-in-blue went home after duty with a lipstick smudge to explain!  As a parting gift Don passed the costume on to me and I wore it riding the Tandem Bedstead in 1962.  Don had worn it for all our carnivals and countless other events from the beginning in 1943 and it finally gave up the struggle by splitting in a rather embarrassing place when I put it on
for the 1963 Parade.  There was no time to swap it for something else so I wrapped a piece of curtain material round my waist and this can be clearly seen in the photograph of me passing the “Bantam Cock”.  I was happy to wear Don’s costume but I drew the line at copper kissing.  I just hope I didn’t disappoint too many of them!

As might be expected with the passage of time there were several other changes to the line-up of the Troupe.  We lost another couple of our founder members, George Harrison and Les Jones and were joined by three new regulars, Alan Roberts, Clive Elliott and Reg Scaldwell.  In later years, Fred’s two other grandchildren, Len’s daughter Sandra and younger son Richard came on board, making the Troupe even more of a family affair.  On several occasions, beginning in 1952 we were also joined by Fred’s sister, Emily.

In 1971, the year our currency was decimalised, the committee were hoping to pick up a “bonus” of old coins that people had been hoarding.  They were certainly not disappointed because no less than £200 in old pennies was raked in, plus another £20 in halfpennies. Together with other participants in the carnivals, the Higginsons were thankful to see the last of the old money; after all, being hit in the face by one of the much smaller decimal coins is a lot less painful than being clobbered by an old penny!

On many occasions at Becket’s Park, while we were waiting for the carnival to start, Fred was approached by the organisers of other parades, shows and village fetes, etc., requesting our appearance at their events.  Over the years these bookings took us, among other places, to Wellingborough, Rugby, Rushden, Wolverton and Olney.   Even further away from home, we even made trips to Rotherham and Southend to take part in their carnivals.   

On a typical carnival night, from the time we left Becket’s Park at a quarter to six to our arrival at Abington at around eight forty-five we never stopped performing for a moment, even when the parade had been brought to one of its frequent halts.  We must have covered the four- mile route of the carnival many times over.  For us, the most difficult thing to do when it was all over was to wind down.  Adrenalin still in full flow, high on euphoria, sitting on the tailboard of Charlie Butt’s open lorry, we travelled the length of Clare Street sounding horns and ringing bells, calling out “Bring out your dead” and other politically incorrect slogans!  No wonder we were politely requested to leave several of the pubs we called in along the way, on the grounds that we were upsetting some of their regulars.  Fish and chips never tasted so good as they did when we got back to Grafton |Street, and pints of shandy never went down more quickly!  After a carnival it always took us several days to get back into normal, everyday life.

Unfortunately, with each year that passed the carnival seemed to be moving further and further away from its traditional concept as a Cycle Parade and was turning into what, in 1972, the Chronicle and Echo called “a cavalcade of lorries”.  From a total of ten in the first post-war parade, the number of motorised vehicles had increased to one hundred and thirty-seven by 1972 and there was a corresponding fall in the numbers of individual walkers and cyclists.  Fred, who was then in his late seventies, bitterly regretted what was happening to the parade he had supported for so many years.  He felt that it was becoming less and less like the event he had known, and loved, for most of his life.  So, in 1973, after a great deal of thought he made the decision not to take part in future.  Thus 1973 was the Troupe’s final appearance in the Northampton Carnival. 

The Troupe still had several more carnivals to attend in 1973, including our annual trip to Wellingborough in July and Wolverton in September.  The following year, 1974, was likewise a busy one for the Higginsons when we performed at Olney in Buckinghamshire and paid a return visit to Wolverton. In September we went to Hoddesdon in Hertfordshire where we were treated by the Mayor and Town Council to a three-course meal before the parade (amazingly, we managed to stay awake!)  One highlight of 1975 was a trip to London to take part in the Battersea Easter Parade, which we repeated in 1976.  That year we also went back to Olney and, nearer to home, rode in the Duston Carnival in September.

Fred’s last outing with the Troupe, at the age of eighty, was to the Battersea Easter Parade in 1976.  In February 1977 he died and his Obituary in the Chronicle and Echo paid due tribute to his many years in the Northampton Carnivals.  Just one month after his funeral, as the Troupe’s own tribute to Fred, five of us signed on as “Crazy Clown Cyclists” with Tod Cody’s Circus Productions Agency, to take part once more in the Battersea Easter Parade.

Almost thirty years later the Higginson Family decided to present a number of Fred’s wonderful bikes, including the Tandem Bedstead and the Dustbin, to the Northampton Museum and Art Gallery.  These formed the basis of the small, temporary “Carnival” exhibit, set up in the museum in the autumn of 2008.