Churches join in to help make festival ‘best yet’
THIS year’s Littleborough Rushbearing Festival has been hailed as one of the ‘best yet.’
And for the first time in more than 20 years Littleborough’s churches joined in the event - with both St Barnabas’ and Holy Trinity hosting services over the weekend.
The annual festival featured two days of music, dancing and the traditional rushcart parade - as revellers celebrated a tradition dating back many centuries.
Organised by voluntary group Littleborough Events and Associations Forum (LEAF) the festival included morris dancing and live music from groups including Littleborough Band and That’s All Folks.
The busy programme attracted hundreds of people, with Saturday’s fun at Hare Hill Park and Sunday in and around Littleborough square.
There were also dog trick displays and children’s activities, including face painting, an assault course and a Punch and Judy show.
Steve Lister, from LEAF, said: “It was one of the best festivals we’ve had. The weather was good, we had lots of new things happening and we had lots of vol- unteers helping out from across the community.
“For the first time in 21 years the parade stopped at St Barnabas’ Church for a service to bless the rushes and on Sunday another service was held at Holy Trinity which was great to see.
“The festival is a celebration of English folk traditions, so we had morris dancing. clog dancing and folk singers.
“We’d like to thank the council traffic management department, councillors and everyone else who helped out.”
IN a statement on its Facebook page the Benefice of Littleborough said: “It’s been a great weekend and over the course of the two day Rushbearing Festi- val it has been wonderful to welcome lots of people into the churches, make many new friends and have lots of conversations.
“Thank you to everyone who had joined us and thank you to LEAF for allowing us to renew the churches’ involvement with this wonderful community event.”
●●Pictures by Sean Hansford