A major new festival to celebrate Colchester's historic past and its vibrant present is on the cards.

Plans for the festival in May, 2001, would include a welcome to the Parachute Regiment as it settles in to its new home.

The ambitious event is the brainchild of the Rotary Club of Colchester which wants to sing the praises of the town.

And it could adopt children's nursery character Humpty Dumpty as the festival's mascot.

According to legend Humpty Dumpty was a cannon which fell from St Mary's Church, in Church Street - now Colchester Arts Centre - during the Civil War and was immortalised in the children's rhyme.

Yesterday the club held a meeting to discuss its ideas with Colchester's deputy mayor Christopher Garnett, who will be mayor when the festival would be due to start.

Rotary member Michael Siggs said: "We are only putting feelers out at the moment. We don't celebrate the history of Colchester enough.

"What we are planning is a celebration of Colchester and all that's good about Colchester and its history. It will have a big impact and we want to bring tourists to hear about the glories of Colchester."

But he stressed the Rotary Club was still at the ideas stage and it was talking to local groups to discuss the plans.

"Before we can make any big launch we must make sure the ideas are feasible and the people in the town support it," he explained.

He said the club also wanted to arrange a special event to welcome the Paras into Colchester as they settle in to their new home after moving from Aldershot, although he ruled out a tattoo as too expensive.

Other suggestions for the festival include a festival at the Mercury Theatre and musical events. and encouraging communities surrounding Colchester to invite representatives of their twin communities to visit during the proposed event.

Mr Siggs said: "Every district in Colchester is linked to some area abroad."

He said Rotary also wanted to see an exhibition of arts and sculpture to show off work from Colchester as part of the event and to encourage choirs to get involved.

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.