The Level

Billy Smart's circus in the 1950s

By Martin Nimmo

In the late 1950's, the famous Billy Smart's Circus was on the Level one Autumn. It was quite a large circus, with a menagerie of animals including elephants and the big cats. The roads between the trees and the grass were jam-packed with circus lorries and caravans, some of them old converted buses.

Tram 'feeder' box
On the "bus" theme, just outside the small building (once a police station) at the south-west corner of the Level, there was an old 'Brighton Corporation Tramways' green electric 'feeder' box. It was certainly there till the Great Storm of 1987, though a couple of days later I noted that a falling tree was resting on it and had knocked it sideways! I haven't checked since.