pedro the clown

26/04/2024

YES, I am worried. Very worried indeed.
And, if you are wondering why, then just take a look at the First Division league table.
It's the final day of the season tomorrow, and we still don't know whether Lincoln City will get through to the play-offs yet or not.
It all comes down to tomorrow's game at 12.30 when City are at home to league champions Portsmouth.
Portsmouth and Derby County are both assured of promotion and it looks good for third place Bolton and Peterborough United (in fourth spot) to be in the play-offs.
Now, here is the big question. Two more of the high-flyers are also in with a chance. There are four teams that could. Barnsley are number five with 75 points, Lincoln are in sixth spot with 74 points, and just outside the play-offs (and only just) are Oxford United also with 74 and Blackpool with 73. And every one of them plays tomorrow and exactly at the same time!
A win for Lincoln will guarantee them a place in the play-offs. No worries.
But if we don't win, and the results go well for Oxford or Blackpool it just doesn't bear thinking about!
And apart from all that pressure, I don't want the final whistle to be delayed for any of the games at all, because I want to catch the bus into Lincoln so I can go to the April Fair!!!

29/09/2023

I've not been on to my facebook for a while now. So I was more than a little surprised to see how many additional followers have joined recently.
I am delighted to see so many new friends and followers, and my very grateful thanks.
The Pedro character was created by myself during the 1980s when I was appearing in a summer season show at the Embassy Centre in Skegness. I had started out as a juggler and rope-spinner in the late 1960s, but because there weren't very many of us in the cast at Skegness, I decided to create an extra 'face.'
But Pedro quickly took over and it wasn't long before I was doing more work as the clown than I was as a juggler.
Pedro retired at Christmas 2021, when I had done more than 2,000 performances as a circus-style entertainer. At the moment, I have no immediate plans to bring him back again - although, I suppose, we never know.
If you want to find out more, my first book "Hold the Front Page and Send in the Clowns" by me (Peter Brown) was published by Paul Mould Publishing in 2007 and there may still be copies on line somewhere.
Many thanks for your interest.

25/05/2023

Between January 1967 and December 2021, I did a total of 2,018 public appearances as a circus-style entertainer. Now, bearing in mind that I am talking about more than half-a-century of my life, you might be wondering how on earth I past my time! But, in fairness, I must point out that I did do other things as well including 57 years in newspapers!

Anyway, the reason for all this, is that today I am marking a milestone in my life. It's 25 years ago since Lynn and I first met, and it happened during one of my appearances as Pedro the Clown.
It was Spring Bank Holiday Monday May 25, 1998. and I was appearing at Elsham Hall Country Park. not far from Brigg, right through the weekend. It was one of my one-man shows and there were three performances a day, sometimes in a marquee and sometimes inside the nearby Barn Theatre.
Lynn was a Hull University student at the time, and had a part-time job in charge of the catering at the Barn Theatre.
She must have taken pity on a hard-working clown, because, a quarter-of-a-century later, we are married and still happily together.

05/04/2023

See story below.

05/04/2023

We have all got pictures at home like this - and this is mine. It was taken 70 years ago at Westgate Junior School in Lincoln, when our class gathered out on the back playground for this picture to mark the Coronation of the Queen..
Our headmaster (Mr Meldrum) is on the right and our teacher (Miss or Mrs Dixon) is on the left.
The old air raid shelter is back left; the Rectory wall on behind the group and the trees were in the old Wickham Gardens.
Most of the boys were in fancy dress. I remember my mum made me one in red, white and blue, and I was "a little boy from Holland honouring the Queen's Coronation." I was towards the end of the second row from the left, two in from the chimney sweep and next to the pirate!
I would just have turned eight years old at the time.
Oh, happy days!!!

10/02/2023

If Lincoln City Council goes ahead with its controversial plan to scrap the Christmas Market, I can't help thinking it would be a bit like Blackpool calling off its annual illuminations because they want to turn the tourists away, or the powers that be in Edinburgh abandoning their summer festival because they are frightened of attracting people in from all over the world!
I just don't get it. For the past four decades, I have never missed a Lincoln Christmas Market. And every year, I don't go merely once, I visit it on almost every one of the four days. So, yes, it has become a big part of my life.
It is something I am very proud of. And what's wrong with that.
If Lincoln wants to be a tourist city, then why on earth is it even thinking about taking away its biggest annual crowd-puller?
It was Britain's first Christmas Market and it became the blue print for all the others which now take place all over the country.
Surely the City Council won't scrap it and replace it with something which they hope will be far less successful! Where would be the sense in that???

05/10/2022