The new Lord Mayor, Alderman Andrew Parmley
was duly installed at the traditional “Silent Ceremony” in the Guildhall on
Friday 11th November. As you know, Andrew is an Honorary Member of
our Company and in support of him we entered a float in his Lord Mayors Show
(see photograph of brochure).
The day of the Show, Saturday 12th
November, started very wet and overcast. Some 50 of us arrived at our float in
Aldersgate, in the City, at 10.00am – some were sponsors who travelled on the
front end of the float, the Wardens, Clerk and me (together with spouses)
travelled at the back end of the float (in gowns and badges), whilst members
and their families walked alongside the float attired in Water Conservator
sweatshirts and baseball caps – all had matching blue and white umbrellas.
Despite the wet conditions (which quickly
improved to a light drizzle), spirits were high and after boarding the float we
set off in the direction of Mansion House (via London Wall and Princes Street) just
before 11.00am. At 11.35am (exactly on-time) I was interviewed live by the BBC in
Princes Street (see photograph) and that gave me a great opportunity to
describe the work of our Company. We were given substantial air-time and much
praise and support for our float (see photograph of our tap passing the Bank of
England with our Clerk and Walbrook Warden also featured). If you missed the
parade, BBC1 iplayer has recorded the whole event and we appear at about minute
50.
After waving at the new Lord Mayor in his
grandstand outside the Mansion House we headed off towards St Pauls and the
Royal Courts of Justice smiling and waving our union jacks all the way.
Pavements were several bodies deep for most of the route and that gave me the
opportunity to make some cheering children even wetter with aid of “super
soaker” water pistols (see photograph)! Wherever we went our “magic tap” was
seen with much awe and interest, accompanied by an awful lot of cheering. Fiona
and I felt very proud to take part in the show, having been supported by so
many people to produce the magnificent float (see photograph of us on board).
We stopped for a packed lunch at the
halfway stage and set off again for the return trip at about 1.30pm. At Mansion
House, Fiona and I had to leave the vehicle as all the Masters of the new Lord
Mayors livery companies greeted him on his return with a guard of honour. A
lunch in the Mansion House followed and then we set off to find a good vantage
point (with red wine glass in hand) on the banks of the Thames to view the
impressive firework display which started at 5.15pm.
A wonderful day in the history of our
Company. Many, many thanks to all who helped organize it under the ever
watchful eye of our Clerk, Ralph Riley.
I will post more photographs in coming days
as they become available.
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