THE excellent photograph of the Blackpool Tower ballroom in Friday’s Echo by Preston Ashton reminded me of my family holidays at Blackpool in my childhood.

The places I remember most are the aquarium, the zoo and the tower circus which was most spectacular as, at the end of the show, the circus ring became a swimming pool before your eyes, with fountains and people dancing and swimming in the water.

The resident clown was Charlie Cairoli, an English-Italian impressionist and clown, who ended up in Blackpool at the start of the Second World War.

During one performance he came across and picked me up and sat me on the edge of the circus ring and sang to me. I must have been aged about five years old.

I was a bonny little lad in those days with platinum blond hair but I have definitely changed. They were happy days.

Malcolm Rolling, Durham