But say, for a real scream, you had to take a sight-seeing trip in the auto! It was worth twice the toll. Dottie Earle had charge of it, and she made one of the funniest guides you ever heard. "This way, ladies and gentlemen," she would shout through her megaphone; "get your tickets for a tour of the city in the most magnificently equipped sight-seeing autos that ever ran on three wheels and one cylinder! Only twenty-five cents, two bits a ride! See the birthplace of Ashton's mayor, the history of Ashton's past, its chief industries," and so on.
When her tourists assembled in front of her machine, which was a real car, at least the front half of one, an old relic which the garage had just about decided to scrap, its latter half hidden behind a dark curtain, Dottie led them back of the curtain where the sights of Ashton were hidden. In another black curtain were a series of holes not any larger than a quarter, and behind each was one of the sights, a cradle, a picture of the town dump, a scrubbing brush and a large pen-knife for the sights already mentioned. For the Home Team she had a snapshot of the Warren twins, for the competitor of the Herald, a telephone, and so on with eight other "hits" on town topics and characters. So many guffaws and squeals of laughter came from behind the curtain that they had to call in a "traffic cop" to keep the crowd outside quiet.
The "traffic cops," by the way, were boy scouts. They had dark blue costumes of cheap drill, trimmed with white braid, and wore white cotton gloves and shiny badges. They really did have power invested in them by the committee to preserve order and keep the crowds moving. At one point they were allowed to stand with a semaphore and hold up the crowd, not allowing anyone to pass who could not show a certain number of tags from the various booths. This tag system was to insure that all would play fair, for there was so much fun just watching other folks spend money that the tightwads might never have taken their hands out of their pockets or opened their purses.
A Racket Around the Candy Booth
Mrs. Peterson, who sells the best bread in town, had charge of the cake archery. You bought arrows for this, three for ten cents, but you could not shoot until a dollar's worth of arrows had been sold. Then you took your turn at the bow and arrow. The arrow which hit nearest the bull's-eye got the cake, of course, and it was some cake, if it happened to be one of Abbie Southerland's angel foods.
The Girls' Club had drawn the candy table for their share of the fair, and a pretty booth they made of it, using all the tennis nets they could beg, borrow or steal to drape it with and putting up all the candy in ten-cent packages wrapped in white waxed paper to look like tennis balls. Someone got funny and asked why there was such a racket around the candy booth!
The fair lasted three days. What with changing the attractions, keeping fresh food on the refreshment tables, making special attractions for children in the afternoons after school by offering prizes for sports events like sack races, obstacle races, and so on, getting up interest in golf tournaments and baseball series, the place was kept packed from three in the afternoon until midnight.
In The Ladies' Home Journal, Jan., 1921. Published with the permission of the author, Claire Wallis, and The Ladies' Home Journal.