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Beside the Louth Canal Riverhead basin is a handy pub, called The Woolpack, named for the former export of wool from the town. Just across the pub garden is the old drill hall, which was turned into a theatre about 20 years ago, with much local effort and fund-raising. The theatre has a dedicated team of supporters, both audience and all kinds of front-of-house and back-stage crew. Amongst the stage crew are talented scene painters, who were prevented from painting scenes on flats for the stage during the interminable lock-down of the last couple of years. So attention turned to the rather uninteresting blank brick wall at the back of the theatre. This forms the boundary to part of the back of the stage used by actors for going from side to side during performances.

Local research in the library and museum found many useful details of the Riverhead canal trade during the prosperous period before the railways gradually took over from the canal, and a creative imagination turned the dull back wall into a dramatic scene of a busy Riverhead, albeit not exactly as it is now or was then. Even the mortar rows in the wall serve as ripples on the water. Many thanks are due to Rob Hall, of the Riverhead Theatre, for the work, and for permission to reproduce it here. PH