Norwich Whifflers

SNAP has a long and illustrious history, being originally a character from the Guild of St. George, who survived the Reformation, the Commonwealth and other changes in English History until the 1950's (albeit not always as a civic dragon) when it appeared he was finally put to rest. Snap was revived as an integral part of the Whifflers in 1997. There are some old accounts of Snap, although the following is more recent, it gives some flavour of how Snap was regarded and behaved.

 Snap is based on the extant originals in the Castle Museum and is a very traditional design. The current Snap is made from a wickerwork frame suitably braced and supported. The willow withies for the body came courtesy of Ted Ellis, from his own fen.

The head is carved and painted wood with hinged jaws fitted with peg teeth that make a snapping sound when closed rapidly. It is thought that the original dragons were also fitted with the means of making smoke, but as they regularly caught fire and were expensive to replace this idea was dropped for the current Snap.

His neck is a single piece of wood protruding into the main body of the beast and simply hinged where it comes through the basket frame, so that the operator or "entrails" can manipulate the head and neck. Similarly, the jaws are operated by a wire cord (part of a bicycle brake cable) attached to the bottom jaw, fed through the upper jaw and then back into the main body.

The tail is steel and aluminium and acts as a counterbalance to the head and neck and is attached to the frame on the inside of the body with a stout spring. This enables the tails to bounce and move with the rest of the body and head. It is finished off by some bells that jingle as Snap prances about or parades sedately down the road.

The skin is painted canvas wrapped about the basket frame, head , neck and tail and sewn into the wickerwork. The paint detail, although crude, represents interlocking scales and is painted in different many colours. As with all Dragons, Snap has a pair of wings, made of wood, chicken wire and painted canvas. They are hinged to the main body, so they open and close, and on a good day will flap as he moves

The "entrails" support the weight of Snap on a WW2 set of army webbing straps, also from Ted Ellis, tied and woven in to the main body. Snap is approximately 4 metres long and is very heavy (we have not weighed him, but it is approaching 1 cwt (112lbs) or about 50Kg). It takes two men to lift snap so the operator can get inside and into the webbing straps. Once inside Snap, the operator cannot see behind him at all and very little to the side. On a long procession, like the Lord Mayors procession in July, the weight of Snap and his length and general size has to be carefully managed otherwise he would knock people over with his tail. Snap needs lots of space to manoeuvre!

Snap lives, at the moment, not far from the Norfolk Showground overlooking the Ringland Hills. Each custodian has to care for, maintain and repair Snap to make sure he is always in peak operating condition. Getting the current Snap anywhere requires a very large vehicle. Snaps most famous appearance (on television) was on Horse Guards Parade in London for the Queen Mothers Birthday parade in 2002.

As it is hoped that Snap and the Whifflers will all be more regularly involved in civic duties the intention is to design and build a new lighter Snap that can be dismantled into several pieces and more easily transported. An initial design of a traditional style Dragon has already been made available and a scale model is said to be under construction at the moment. Now all we have to do is make sure it works and find the money to build him.

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