ULVERSTON Royal British Legion Pantomime Society celebrated its 50th anniversary in 1998.

Fifty years previously a member of Ulverston’s British Legion Concert Party offered to lend the group £65 to put on a pantomime.

The concert party was delighted and promised if it didn’t raise enough from ticket sales to pay back the loan in full, they would club together to make up the difference.

The group put on Aladdin at the Coronation Hall in January 1948, tickets were 2s 6d (12.5p) and they made a profit of £65.

It was the start of a fabulous Ulverston tradition which saw an annual panto in the town and thousands donated to charity out of the proceeds over the years.

Bridget Turner played Princess Jasmine in the first panto with Joyce Pattinson as Aladdin and an orchestra put together by Joyce’s dad.

The following year Bridget agreed to produce the show when the first producer, a Mrs Cox, left the town.

It was something she continued to do until 1980 and she was still actively involved in 1998, at the age of 81.

Bridget was full of tales of the pantomime’s early days and the many hundreds of performers and back stage crew who had been involved.

Like the year the dame Walter Howson heard halfway through the show that his wife had given birth to their first son and dashed on stage singing the old song: “It’s a boy, it’s a boy.”

The audience had no idea it wasn’t part of the show.

In the early years the group took the show on tour and went to Askam, High Carley Hospital, Haverthwaite and Grange.

Bridget used to make hundreds of costumes herself, sewing away for months for every show.

She also made many of the props with help from her husband Gran, who sadly died in 1988.

Bridget gave up producing in 1980 and experienced Ulverston performer Elaine Parkinson took over and was directing the show in 1998.