Souvenir, frost-fair keepsake

Winter frost fairs were held regularly on the frozen Thames from the late 16th century. The most famous frost fair of the 17th century occured in the long, cold winter of 1683-1684 and included a street of booths, puppet shows, bull-baiting, horse racing and ox-roasting. The ice was safely thick enough for shop keeps to light fires in their tents to keep themselves warm. John Evelyn recorded in his diaries that
'Coaches plied from Westminster to the Temple, and from several other stairs too and fro, as in the streets; sleds, sliding with skeetes, a bull-baiting, horse and coach races, puppet plays and interludes, cooks, tipling and other lewd places, so that it seemed to be a bacchanalian triumph, or carnival on the water.'

Evelyn also noted 'ladyes took a fancy to have their names printed, and the day and the yeare set down when printed on the Thames'.
This is probably the first reference to printing presses at the fair but they soon became a standard feature of the annual fairs. Printers set up names and messages to order in pre-set decorative borders printing them on the ice for a few pennies. By 1814 there were up to ten printing presses operating at the fair printing not only mementoes and keepsakes but also cards and leaflets.