Ken Dalston hangs up his gloves

The photograph above is of Ken Dalston taken outside his booth before he presented his final performance in July this year.

Ken wrote: “Major factors in taking the decision to make my finale for the local community at Laleham Village Fair were the two total knee replacements last year which made it difficult to undertake the strain of regular performances. The event was well supported and the Staines Cine & Video Society filmed my show so that we now have a permanent record for the family archive.

“I have had a good innings over the last 67 years starting my Punch and Judy shows when I was eight years old and have had some wonderful experiences fulfilling my childhood dream of performing Punch and Judy professionally over such a long period.

“The puppets still perform to a degree when I give talks about my life as a Punch and Judy Man at various meetings; I have about 40 advance bookings to speak at WI, Rotary, Probus and TWG clubs. I do not charge a fee for these but collect any donations received for ‘The Shooting Star Childrens Hospice’ to support the youngsters who cannot enjoy Mr Punch in the normal way. So far I have collected well over £5000 doing this and visit the hospice regularly which keeps me motivated and with a sense of purpose.

“My portable wooden theatre is now lying idle in my garage so if anyone is interested they could let me know. The original canvas covered booth which I made was slashed by a young hooligan with a Stanley knife at a show I was doing at a carnival several years ago. I was determined not to be beaten and built the portable one you see in the photo out of plywood on a wooden frame to ensure that the same thing could not happen again. It collapses and folds down to fit in the boot of my estate car. However, I discovered it got quite hot inside whilst performing so I installed an extractor fan to take out all the hot air!

“Shortly after this whilst performing in the shopping centre at Windsor I went off for a sandwich and left the booth unattended. Upon my return I discovered that someone had broken into it, tipped all the puppets on the floor and stamped on them. Once more I thought ‘I wont let this happen again’ so installed a lock and a burglar alarm on the back door.

“So my claim to fame is that my story featured in the ‘Swazzle’ – the Punch & Judy Fellowship’s newsletter as the only Punch and Judy Professor with a booth having the luxury of an extractor fan and a fitted burglar alarm!”