( Joe Weston-Webb)

Early days – Joe was born into a wealthy upper class family of respected yarn merchants who can trace their family tree back to the 17th century, with family crests and royal warrants. He was educated privately at Bilton Grange and the famous Harrow Public School, rejected the chance to run the family hosiery business and opted to make his own way, promoting unusual events whilst building up a very successful rental company, funded by selling ice cream and hot dogs from a van and manning a goldfish stall at fairs.

Rejecting a career in the army – having represented the Royal Engineers, at National competition level in pole vaulting, he was discharged with a slipped disc and a pension, and a burning enthusiasm for off beat entertainment. He started renting sound equipment to shows, extending this into a wide ranging general entertainment rental company with sound, lighting, power distribution, furniture and dance floors, ultimately employing 40 men with a 24,000sq ft premises, and a fleet of vehicles creating stunning themed society parties and corporate hospitality events all over the U.K.

Entertainment always played a major part – from the first outdoor family extravaganza – inaptly named “The Greatest Show on Earth” where he first tried to get a crocodile to wrestle a man underwater, the exploding human coffin, the car and bike stunts, the car jumping through the roof of a furniture lorry, and the flea circus. This was when the first human cannon actually blew itself to pieces into a lake on press day. To his father’s dismay, he didn’t go bust or to prison, although he did get fined (and a lot of publicity) for being cruel to the crocodile. (8ft long and the biggest in captivity in Europe at the time). The croc wouldn’t fight and when rescued from the tank, escaped across the showground. Joe could see his investment disappearing and, whilst everyone else ran away, he rugger tackled it, tying its jaws closed with his dressing gown cord.

 

Having created a publicity stir with the crocodile, the prototype Human Cannon and blowing a bolt through the stuntman’s foot having doubled the explosives trying to make the human coffin actually blow the person into the air, Joe started to actually earn money with Features International press agency from a percentage of the photographs taken of some of his crazy stunts and inventions. Such news items as the flying car – driven over a 100ft high cliff into a quarry, the first windscreen washers using a toilet cistern on the car roof with the chain by the driver’s window, a car jumping over a boat full of fisherman on a river, the car mounted in reverse on another chassis so it would drive down the highway at 70mph, seemingly in reverse.

Then there was the Stunt School for girls, the car turned into a boat motoring down the River Thames, the steam roller that ran away and flattened all the cars in a car park and ended in a stream, the man who lived in the telephone kiosk, the stuffed crocodile floating down the stream as the kids came out of school (Mum, Mum, look at that crocodile – SMACK – don’t be stupid and look where you’re going), and many, many more ‘silly season’ end of the news staged stories. Joe also provided the ideas, stunt performers and equipment for many TV and film adverts and shows, including Clunk Click seatbelts – demonstrated by shooting a girl through a sheet of (sugar) glass from the cannon, Skol lager versus the snow bank – which is more refreshing, a girl shot from the cannon into snow or a drink of lager, Game for a Laugh, the Noel Edmonds Show, David Frost and Paradine Promotions, most of the Breakfast TV shows, cigarette adverts, Vodka adverts, film stunt doubles, target shooting girls into lakes, Bulmers cider promotions, Long Life beer promotions – all zany, spectacular and unusual, but planned and professionally executed.

As someone who could not help but invent something new every week, in between earning a living from his rental company, he was promoting outdoor family fun days every Bank Holiday and touring the country with a stunt team every weekend. First the Destruction Squad, a team of four stunt men who smashed a furniture van, a coach and ten cars in their display. They were featured regularly on TV programmes such as Magpie and Blue Peter, and had a fan club, souvenirs and regular news letter. Following this success, Joe formed the first all girl car and motorcycle stunt team, the Motobirds. They toured for four years, appearing at all the major outdoor shows as well as TV appearances and replaced Evel Knievel when he was injured on the first date of his English tour. Girls from the team appeared on the Japanese Channel 9 show ‘Pink Shock’ as well as performing the motorcycle stunts in many TV and film commercials, and were invited to join the White Helmets, the army motorcycle stunt team for a training day and a try over their horrendous selection endurance course.

One of the girls, Theresa, achieved the World Record for riding a motorcycle through the longest tunnel of fire – shortly before setting fire to Joe’s sales kiosk by pouring petrol instead of fat into the donut machine. Theresa also managed to set fire to the Motobirds trailer on the way back from a show – and Joe’s rental shop burnt to the ground uninsured at about the same time . Joe’s not had much luck with fires – when his cannon caught fire whilst parked outside a hotel in Hull after a big show, no-one told him or called the fire brigade – even the policeman watching said he “thought it was a cannon and probably supposed to smoke like that.”.

During this period (late seventies and early eighties), Joe’s zany publicity stunts guaranteed his unusual shows would be a sell out – always covered by both the UK and world press and TV crews, he devised and staged a human cannon shot over the River Avon, then the world’s first Human Catapult, an enormous replica of a Roman boulder thrower which catapulted a girl over the River. The next year it was four cars attempting the river jump, then a motorcycle, the next year a mini bus, followed by a single deck 52 seater coach and ultimately a London double decker bus (all speed and ramp angles carefully and scientifically worked out by TVs Don’t Ask Me, Magnus Pike.) Much to the public’s and the press’ delight, the vehicles always landed in the river. The rest of Joe’s entertainment consisted of the usual Motobirds car and bike stunt show, Mud Wrestling matches (one year thrown open to the public, both sexes, for publicly sorting out disputes) car jumping contests (where members of the public bought their own cars and tried to get the farthest off a 10ft high ramp over a line of parked cars), car rolling contests (again bring your own car), egg kicking contests, (specially for kids), custard pie contests (a speciality devised by Chris Tarrant and Tis Was TV show), the first BMX bike stunt show performed by eight boys all under eleven years old, the first National dog swimming championships (over the River Soar and the River Avon), the birdman contests (who could go furthest down river in unpowered flight from a 100ft high platform) the World’s first Mixed Domestic Pet Race, handicapped by scientific computerized programme based on girth to inside leg ratio (Joe was prosecuted by the RSPCA again), the first ever gorilla to parachute into a showground (yes, he was prosecuted again – the gorilla wasn’t pushed, he leaned out too far reaching for the banana on the end of the stick, your honour), the first man (Mr X) to jump out of a plane without a parachute into the cannon safety net (it’s a long story and he did nearly get locked up for that one), the car and stunt driver hoisted to 150ft high and then dropped onto a stack of parked cars, as well as the usual fairground and celebrity appearances – its hardly surprising that his shows have been known to sell out to capacity crowds, bringing the whole town to a standstill, all shops having sold out of goods and the police having to close the motorway exits to move the 10 mile traffic jams trying to get into the show when its already full. The annual reputation was such that, when Joe gave up doing them, the press and TV stations were ringing and asking him to please carry on.

The BBC made a 50 minute film in the Man Alive series on Joe and one of his Family Fun Days which won Best Documentary awards – and repeats on TV, and Joe also did a 30 minute show for Channel 9 Japanese TV with two of the motobirds – where he was arrested as a suspected terrorist for walking near a railway line – he also honestly did not know that stunt shows were illegal in Japan, but wondered why the filming had to take place on a remote island and not in Tokyo, - another unbelievably funny story – luckily rescued by the man from the British Embassy who spoke no Japanese, had only been in Japan for two days, and knew less than Joe about the situation.

In between these exciting episodes, Joe designed a clever clip together portable dance floor, and a level tent flooring system, which was immediately copied and took years and thousands of pounds to protect. He designed and built the first double decker clear span tented structures for hospitality events, which allowed him to build tents supported by the floor system without stakes, meaning he could hold events on rooftops, the decks of ships and many other bizarre locations. He sold and built tented structures in Saudi Arabia on several occasions (yes, there were dramas – on an impossibly tight deadline, the trailer back axle caught fire in the middle of nowhere, the driver didn’t keep in touch and Joe was having to reassure the Royal Commission on the truck’s progress with only a child’s atlas to help him guess where the tent had got to each day.] It arrived just in time – and he escaped the life sentence we were assured he’d get if he’d failed to deliver. He is still officially on call to the Saudi Arabian Royal family, should they want the tent built again.

He toured all the major UK sporting events with this equipment for two years; being Joe, of course nothing ran smoothly – and although the show always DID go on, there were many close calls and hilarious behind the scenes dramas – tents held up in customs whilst 100 waiters and waitresses in uniform tried to lay up tables for 1000 VIP guests in an empty Scottish field, two days before the Open Golf – with everyone laying bets Joe wouldn’t get out of trouble on this one – but he always pulled it off in the end. Or the stoned employee at the same Golf Championships who turned the pump to BLOW instead of SUCK whilst emptying the mobile toilets and caused a 30ft mushroom jet of sewage just as the guests were arriving for champagne cocktails, or the staff going on strike just before the Queen arrived to open the new Wedgewood factory, and the tent men had drunk the bar dry and were sleeping it off in the flower bed where she would be walking by, or laying the red carpet over the oil spill on the podium where the queen was to open Brighton Marina, and then trying to avert disaster as she followed the carpet to the edge of the stage where there were no steps for her to go down – she teetered on the edge for what seemed like ages and then very professionally side stepped over to the steps. We were not amused, but Joe escaped by the skin of his teeth again.

He did appeal to our Royal family – enlisting Prince Philip’s help when British Waterways tried to stop him shooting a girl over the River Avon from the cannon – he assured Prince Phillip that he wouldn’t dream of polluting the river, and would personally ensure that the girl showered every day before the river crossing attempt. This annual show relied on unique ways of crossing the river – British Waterways got even more upset when one year, having run out of things to jump the river, Joe bought ten scrap cars at Evesham car auctions, removed their engines, wrapped them in cling film and towed them down the river to the Showground at Tewkesbury, which took three weeks and generated lots of publicity. Every car and the floating jumping ramp were licenced as boats, so no laws were broken, but when licencing a boat in that area, you will probably be asked now if it’s a boat or a car. With the press and public watching from the main town bridge, having narrowly missed being washed over the weir, the current took the last two cars at the end of the rope faster than the tow boat, and wrapped themselves around the bridge parapet. (The name of the Show and the dates were of course written in big letters across the rooves of the cars, so they had to be got back in the right order, and no-one could cover the drama without advertising the show). They continued down river with a motobird on each car roof to try to control the progress. After several rows with fishermen, (who were not amused when one of the cars sank in the middle of their fishing match, and the crane driver pulling it out of the river, placed a loaf of bread on his crane hook and claimed first prize as he pulled out a car full of fish] it was decided to enlist the help of boaters in towing the cars – there is now a local byelaw and a paragraph on rental agreements that holidaymakers may not tow cars down the river. Despite Waterways attempts to stop the stunt, (the fair rides chained themselves to the cars and we had 24 hour security to stop the Navy who were sent to try to tow them away) – the speed boat with the enormous engine, having somersaulted in the river on press day, successfully jumped the floating cars in front of sell out crowds at the Show. British Waterways, having been bombarded by letters from fans, MPs etc, and having seen that all the stunts were carried out safely and professionally, with divers, cranes and rescue boats in attendance, decided to give Joe permission and help to do whatever stunts he wanted over the river the next year, but as this meant no publicity, Joe has not been back.

Having decided that renting tents was boring and having exhausted his ideas on outdoor shows and built and presented the cannon, catapult, Motobirds, and exploding human coffin, and enjoyed touring through Europe, Scandinavia, Denmark, Iceland, Finland, (except for the court case where he had to demonstrate the coffin was safe, demonstrated with his six week old baby son, and accidentally let it off in court – another good story) he switched to promoting Pantomimes – an eccentric and traditional family theatre show – having protested with scantily clad show girls in the Town Hall at Leicester to bring back the tradition. These Christmas shows (40 performances, top celebrity stars, 2000 seats per show) had a touch of the Joe Weston-Webb unusual promotions- a talking donkey called Daisy and six children in Smurf costumes were taken around the villages and shopping centers on fun promotional and ticket selling outings in a replica Model T Ford. If anyone going to the shows was celebrating a birthday, Daisy was told, and as if by magic, remembered and announced them during the show (helped by a microphone covered in toffee and a mimic off stage). Then we had the flock of sheep and two sheepdogs in the stalls for a bet to see if they were related to smurfs, and as if by magic (and not by clever sheep dogs), as the smurfs came on stage, every sheep turned to watch. Joe wasn’t prosecuted by the RSPCA this time, but nearly got in trouble for overworking the smurfs – several fainted inside their costumes from the heat. For three years, Leicester had unforgettable Panto – party poppers, kids crèche, party room, meet the stars, sponsor a child seats (a chance for people to sponsor a child from an orphanage to see the show – so successful, Joe ran out of underpriviledged kids and had to ship them in by coach from other towns), all down to Joe’s determination. He produced and directed the shows, built the proscenium and fly towers, built the tiered seating in the auditorium, employed all the Equity cast, dancers, child dancers and Smurfs, the backstage crew, the front of house staff, arranged the photographers and the on-site photo developing, the catering, programmes and souvenir sales, ice creams, party room, plus the booking office staff and ticket selling programme – (only one mistake in the programme allowed us to sell the front row of the balcony twice, so we were the only theatre show with a full time person (Joe’s daughter)- on complaints, double bookings and giving away boxes of chocolates). As the show was so successful, the council agreed Leicester should have a panto, and took the show over – it’s never been the same since.

Joe then settled down, invented and manufactured a world famous portable floor system, FLORLOK, and over twenty years built up a business turning over three million pounds a year, selling dance floors to every major hotel group worldwide. (Supplied a version of the floor for our tented hospitals for the war in Iraq, supplied 400 tons of portable floors for the Atlanta Olympics as well as the black and white floor for Posh and Beck’s wedding and Sir Elton John’s birthday party, and the all white floor for Calvin Klein’s party, etc. etc)

Getting bored with flooring, Joe then moved on to entertaining up to 70 people a night on his very own trip boat – complete with remote controlled leaks in the floor, bangs and flashes from the engine room and at least one crew member overboard on every trip. Advertised as the ‘first trip since the accident’ – the visitors book is full of glowing compliments for a night out with a meal where everything that can go wrong, does, but all in the best possible taste. The only trip boat to be reported to the Department of Transport for bringing trip boats into disrepute, the trips were sold out on all the evenings Joe could run it, without advertising, by recommendation only. All sorts of trips, from the English rugby squad to corporate entertainment, to the posh hunting set, to family gatherings with a fish and chip supper and groups of old aged pensioners’ tea trips, all were entertained hilariously – especially the women’s institute who daren’t walk along the gang plank and insisted Joe carry each one over his shoulder and up the bank.

The Department of Transport sent an examiner and his wife unannounced for a spot check on one of the evening trips – both said it was the best evening out they’d ever had, but were concerned that, had their been a real accident, the guests would think it was staged, and wouldn’t leave the sinking boat. They were especially concerned that Joe, with the only Boatmaster’s licence (yes, he can be trusted to take large groups of people out to sea and MARRY them) had at one stage fallen in the river. Joe managed to persuade them that he hadn’t fallen in, he’d just been checking the prop for weeds. And they did have to admit that, had we had a real person overboard, we were better prepared than any other crew to rescue them as we had a practise every night.

Because of the problems with authorities and safety issues, and the small number of people the boat could accommodate, Joe transferred his wacky river trips to a restaurant in a hotel on dry land. The dinner, sold only as Café Chaos to some corporate guests, turned into a riotous evening. A lot of the gags perfected on the trip boat were used – with free wine and beer flowing. The remarks were that they had never laughed so much or had such a good night out. The alcoholic organist got in a mess on the rising platform, two guests had a domestic dispute and had to be asked to leave, having given the head waiter a black eye, the head waiter was in tears as the staff went from bad to worst, and the evening ended in a battle of paper napkins as the smoke alarms went off, the flambé trolley caught fire and the automatic watering system came into effect, sprinkling over any enthusiastic guests.

Deciding that "FLOORING IS BORING", he used the ideas from his boat trips and Café Chaos, and semi retired to America in 2003, where he set up and ran a popular comedy dinner show in Orlando, Florida, called FIASCOS (where dining meets disaster). In true British spirit, despite not being quite ready for opening night, with the builders still working on the scaffolding to get the venue ready on a shoestring, an ever changing audience could be entertained with first class food, great entertainment (some of the magic tricks worked, but the circus acts definitely needed assistance) and a distraught head waiter (Grumpy Joe) trying desperately against all odds to make the evening a success for the guests celebrating birthdays, anniversaries, weddings etc. Joe was trying desperately against all odds to give the guests a fantastic night out, let down by staff and technology. Although this was greatly appreciated by the English tourists, and with many thanks to Cal and the Virgin Holiday reps, who regularly brought coach loads of visitors, Fiascos was hit in 2004 by three major hurricanes, losing its roof, and could not survive.

During this time, Joe’s kids were left to run the family flooring business. The business which had been flourishing nosedived. Joe’s son, Michael, and his book-keeper, David Sharratt, (look him up on the net) whilst employed by Joe, set up a new company called Portable Floormaker Limited on 6/1/2005. Joe’s company Portable Floormakers Limited was put into administration six months later on 30/06/05 by Michael, and twenty minutes later the new company Portable Floormaker Limited purchased the assets of Joe’s company from the administrator at a knock down price. When Joe came back from America, he no longer owned his business, had no money and no income.

At 68 years old he had to try and pick himself back up and start again. He tried several unsuccessful projects and realised that he had to get back into the business he knew to survive. (He was buying cars at the auctions for a thousand pounds each and eventually selling them for £500.) Joe and his daughter, Mary, started with literally nothing to rebuild their flooring manufacturing business. They were hit by legal costs and court cases. The new company, Portable Floormaker (name changed by one letter – most customers and suppliers weren’t even aware this had happened) has aggressively tried to stop Joe. They had acquired from the administrator all the trademarks for his inventions, and have tried to get him committed to Pentonville jail for contempt of court for using similar names for the products he invented.

The majority of Joe’s customers in the tent rental business have supported him, and the business is growing despite various sabotage attempts. The night before we were due to attend our first exhibition, the Showman’s Show in Newbury, the tyres on all the cars outside our home were slashed. Someone (we can’t prove who) has clearly got a grudge and an impeccable sense of timing.

Coming up to Hotel Oympia, where both companies were exhibiting, Friday 1st February at 3.30am, we had a fire started under our portacabin office, just where the telephone cables, fibre optic and network distribution is situated, which took all our phone lines and internet connections out. We also had a petrol bomb through the office letterbox. Luckily, our landlord, the farmer, spotted the smoke and woke us, and the fire was put out without too much damage, although the cost of repairs was over two thousand pounds. This is the third time we have had our phone system maliciously interfered with.

On the same night, at 2.30am, four cars were vandalised outside Joe’s daughter’s home; all the tyres were slashed and a slab was used to smash front and back windows. No other cars in the street were touched. Seems like that person with the grudge and the impeccable sense of timing is back. The local police are taking the threats against Joe very seriously but can’t offer much help and can’t act without evidence.

Joe celebrated his 70th birthday on 1st March 2008, and feeling vulnerable, but determined not to give in to bully boy tactics, decided to set up booby traps and deterrents at home and at work, and if he can’t stop the vandals, at least he’ll have the satisfaction of scaring the sh** out of them or covering them in chicken poo.

Anyone who wants to support Joe in his fight for justice and to get his business back so he can retire and take life easy, contact us. Any fighting or trainee lawyers who could help without charging a fortune, please contact us. Anyone who thinks Joe deserves better, join the fighting fund – court costs, solicitor’s fees, repairs, CCTV, saving the family home, as well as setting up a business from scratch. Joe has a wealth of hilarious stories and can be persuaded to give after dinner speeches and appearances at bargain prices to fund the fight.