I fear that the story of the cancelled steam fair will be only one a series of such sorry things. I was at Fred Dibnah's funeral a while back, and the rain pouring down on the massed umbrellas of Bolton was a very moving sight, with the streets full of a procession of steam-driven vehicles. Fred's coffin was driven to the church on a trailer behind his steam traction engine, driven very bravely by his teenage son. Now , quite apart from the possible illegality of some of the event, I can't imagine something like that happening again in a town centre in England in ten years time, with the vicious spread of so-called "heaalth and safety" issues, coupled with insurance problems. "No, I'm afraid we didn't take out insurance six months ago, we didn't know which day he was going to die on".
    Definitely the end, as they say, of an era.