New city poetry wall celebrates the Norwich circus owner who inspired The Beatles
He was famous as a Victorian circus owner and was then immortalised in a song by The Beatles.
And Pablo Fanque now lends his name to the new student accommodation which has been completed in All Saints Green - just around the corner from where he once lived.
As a young man Fanque, born William Derby, lived in Ber Street. He joined a circus where he trained and handled horses. But he was also skilled as a tightrope walker and trapeze artist.
He struck out on his own in the early 1840s, becoming the first black circus owner in the country. His circus primarily performed in the north of England.
It was a poster for one of his shows which was the inspiration for John Lennon when he wrote Being For The Benefit of Mr Kite!The song, which features on the Fab Four’s 1967 album Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, includes the lyric: “The Hendersons will all be there/Late of Pablo Fanque’s Fair.”
Source: Dan Grimmer/edp24.co.uk
