Touch

The fair offers plenty of opportunities to stimulate the sense of touch. There are lots of stands where the visitor is challenged to demonstrate strength or skills. Take the cakewalk, for example, or the coconut shy, or the shooting gallery.

The sense of touch is stimulated at stands where you are challenged to show strength or skills. These attractions are very popular. Just look around at a fair and notice how many people gather round the coconut shy, the cranes, the dodgems and the fishing- and shooting galleries. Until recently, prize fighting was very popular and even today the try-your-strength machines are sought-after. The sense of touch is stimulated as well by the swinging and turning of attractions like the bumper cars, the bungee-jump, the cakewalk, the caterpillar, the ghost-house, the giant wheel, the merry-go-round, the roller-coaster, the swing and the wild-water chute. Modern electronics and computer technology are a blessing for showmen. Thanks to those new inventions they can create lots of new variants of traditional fairground attractions.

This is where you step in a bumper car for.

“Shall we go in or not?” Some new attractions, including the Super Bowl, at Hull Fair in 1997.

A cock-shy at Milan Fair in the 1950s.

“More to the right!”

A spinning caterpillar.

The Original Old Tyme Brooklyn Cake Walk at the Hull Pleasure Fair, 1978.

One of J. W. de Voer’s caterpillars (‘rupsbaan’ in Dutch) circa 1960.

At the fair children have always loved an opportunity to put their skill to the test.

At the fair "The Wall of Death" was seen as one of the greatest tests of courage. The audience, often as nervous as the driver, looked on in anticipation as the heroic figure zoomed around below them defying the laws of gravity.

Fencing obviously was a popular pastime in 19th century France: the Salle d’Estime (Fencing Hall) is almost overrun. The lad on the right probably believes in space travel, wearing a ready to start rocket on his back. The fair was in Ménilmontant, now a Paris suburb.

Youngsters enjoying a ride on The Plains.

Harry Holland’s Cakewalk at the Melton Mowbray Steam Fair in 1968.

Bowman’s Jersey Bounce Cakewalk with front lettering the Jolly Cakewalk at Tooting Bec London, 1960.

The Cyclotron is an attraction in which you are being pushed against the wall because of the speed. Poster from the 1950s.

H. Richards’ Cakewalk at the Birmingham Onion Fair in 1951.

The Giostra Aerei, a product of Bergantino, in 1951. This Flying Ride was designed and built by Albino Protti.

A father and his daughter in a dodgem at the fair in Carpi (Modena, Italy) in 1948

Autoscontro, the first bumper cars made in Bergantino. They were built by Umberto Bacchiega. The photo’s from the 1920s.

The Autopista on an unidentified Italian fair in 1928.

A carousel with aeroplanes in 1939. The attraction was built in Bergantino. Albino Protti designed and built it.