PREPARATIONS for Holsworthy Carnival this November are well underway.

The event is now organised by Holsworthy Lions Club members who took on the responsibility last year. This year the Lions are trying to find the oldest living carnival queen to be guest of honour at the event on November 21.

The Lions Club held its first carnival committee meeting last week when Ted England was elected as the committee’s chairman for the coming year.

Last year the committee had difficulty filling the royalty roles.

Lions member Robin Mitchell said: “One of the major headaches for last year’s carnival was the fact that nobody applied to be the Holsworthy Carnival Queen.

“There are only two requisites for the position; firstly that the applicant must live in the catchment area for Holsworthy Community College, and secondly she must be 12 years old or older. But as nobody applied, and as there were two applicants for fairy queen, the Lions decided to break with tradition and invite 10-year-old Paige Davies to be the carnival queen, leaving 7-year-old Zara Kepple to fill the role of fairy queen.”

Applications for the positions of carnival queen and fairy queen for this year’s carnival will be invited in the upcoming weeks. With Paige being the youngest carnival queen, the Lions have been seeking the oldest living queen, which it turns out, could be closer to home than they thought.

Mr Mitchell added: “Lions’ treasurer John Cottle’s mother was the carnival queen in 1948. There were two carnivals that year, a summer carnival and the regular winter carnival in November. She was the ‘November Queen’ — the Summer Queen was her friend Stephanie Petherick, who to the best of the Lions’ knowledge is still alive, but not living locally.

For the full report, and a round-up of the area news and sport, see this week’s edition of the Post.