The Cheltenham Exhibition & Fair

From June 15th to August 25th, the Cheltenham art gallery & museum hosted an exhibition of original artwork from Ladybird books. Featured artists included Harry Wingfield, John Berry and Martin Aitchison. The display was part of a touring exhibition which had already been shown at Walsall and continues on for another year.

Most of the art was for sale at prices ranging from £250 to £1000, although the real beauties were marked NFS (not for sale). Although there were several I would have dearly liked to own, these prices probably mean possession of some original artwork will sadly remain a pipe-dream.

The exhibition was held in quite small room, with framed art all round. The corner was set aside for children to read through some very dog-eared books. In the centre was a case showing a variety of books and the artists mock up for La Fontaine Fables. Some artwork from this book was on sale. It's fascinating to see these preliminary ideas for books - in this age of desk-top publishing, it's great to see things laid out by hand!

Perhaps the most interesting items were in a case devoted to the Key reading scheme, including Murray's original draft book and several rare related items. Needless to say, these items were not for sale, but on loan from the family of William Murray.

Several items were sold by the final day, although buyers have to wait until the end of the tour before they can claim their prizes. The museum also produced a neat little pamphlet of information to go with the exhibition - you can buy these from the museum at £1 each - write to Cheltenham Museum, Clarence Street, Cheltenham

I'd been in touch with the museum for some months, discussing the possibility of their hosting a collectors fair for LB books and on the final day, this did indeed take place. Through the e-list, I arranged with 7 or 8 fellow collectors to bring their spares along and we set up in a small room above the exhibition, accessed via a spiral staircase (just to loosen those wallets!). We arranged ourselves in a vaguely circular layout & admired the rarities that were on display.

Several DJ Wonks were in evidence, along with lots of other early editions. As you can see from the photo, hands were irresistibly drawn to the Wonks. One lucky enthusiast was shopping on behalf of a friend and had a wants list along with a blank cheque!

There were lots of collectors there, including Steve Rudge (busy signing copies of his excellent collectors guide), David and Lyn Ball, Craig Tanswell, Helen Day, Jim Perren, Lynn Willson, Dave Morris, Claire Jenkins (who made the Radio 4 LB special last Christmas), Jennifer Crockford, Ben Rawdon, Steve Smith - if you were there & would like your name adding, please let me know - my memory is awful!)

Prices varied from dirt-cheap to three figures (guess what for!) and it basically reinforced the belief that there's glossy covers & matt covers to be had for chicken-feed, common DJs for around a fiver & silly figure DJs for 20, 40, 60 80 plus. I picked up a Bonnie Prince Charlie, Cleopatra and a DJ Sleeping beauty for about £12 the lot & managed to refrain from raiding the more expensive items that I really wanted.

My wife was chuffed with the prospect of regaining some shelf space & helped me out, as did my son. We put him by the entrance of the museum with a box of really tatty copies, telling him he could keep the proceeds. Bu**er me, but he made over £40!

What was impressive was the sheer quantity of books available - there must have been at least 8000 Ladybirds on offer, surely the largest collection of the little treasures ever assembled in one place! There were prices to suit all and some stall-holders had even sorted all the books into series order, with proper labels and individually priced! I just bunged them into 1, 2 or 3 pound boxes, plus the DJs. Other bits I brought down were snapped up - LB jigsaws, videos, display boxes. One enterprising couple had mounted pages form the books into large frames and were selling (or trying to sell) them.

The staff were very helpful and opened up a kitchen for us to rustle up drinks & nibble biscuits. We ran from 10am until gone 3 - I left a tad early since the "punters" had all but dried up.

During the day, we all made ourselves known to each other and it was a delight to discover that LB collectors are not discontented, cocky, lazy, conceited, or even Wonkers (cough) but thoroughly nice people, intelligent enough to share a passion for W&Hs (as opposed to B&Hs). We seemed to get along famously and there wasn't a single person who I'd have put in the "don't get stuck in a lift with" category, train-spotters or not!

We swapped information, hints & tips and discussed famous LB myths (e.g.. Learnabout Farming - no-one had ever seen a copy & on that basis, we presume it never made it to print).

The amount you can pick up from talking with this type of expert is astonishing and bodes well for the proposed LB collectors convention which is being planned. We were all agreed that a follow-up book fair should be organised, although perhaps Cheltenham might lose out to Loughborough, our adopted home.

I'd like to thank Simon Richards and Wendy Malpass of the museum staff for their helpfulness during the day and willingness to host the book fair without charging for the room.

Also, thanks to all the intrepid collectors who came to sell, to buy, or just to browse - we had a great time!

Nick Robinson