100 years on the road for funfair boss Ina

If they were lucky, families attending the Dizzylands Funfair at The Junction in Antrim over the weekend will have been receiving their tokens for the rides from a living legend.

Ina Bell might come across as a softly spoken pensioner, but she’s no pushover - and she’s also the boss of a business which has been providing entertainment all over Ireland and the UK for four generations.

To look at her, it’s hard to believe that she turned 100 in April, but longevity and hardiness is in her genes - her father lived to 101 - and she has no plans to retire.

Antrim folk will remember her holding court when the fair came to places like Ballycraigy, and the rides have been a feature at The Junction since it opened over 20 years ago. Whether it was The Orbiter, the Waltzer, the swinging boats or the shooting gallery, the matriarch has seen and done it all over the years.

Ina herself comes from funfair royalty. She’s one of the famous Mohan family, but together with her husband, she forged her own path in the industry, with her children and grandchildren now continuing the tradition. There is an amusement centre in Newcastle, County Down, but Ina has never been able to stay in one place for two long.

While she is fiercely proud and incredibly private, Ina granted the Guardian an interview, which we conducted from the driving seat of the family pick-up truck!

A true force of nature, Ina is by turn feisty, charming, and absolutely hilarious. And a word to the wise - she does not like card machines.

Before she arrived, son Albert told us his family are ‘very strong people’ .

“She would never retire or hand over the business, she is not built that way!” he said.

“She built it from the ground up, she is a very determined person and has inspired us all to continue to be successful. She is definitely the driving force behind it all. People have wanted to do TV interviews with her but she has always said no, she is very private. She was born into it and so were my brothers and sisters and our children too, we had no choice! And she would say it was the same for her.

“She often says she is going to get one of those prodders you get for farm animals to keep us on our toes. These days she sits in the boxes and gives out tokens and she loves to meet and chat to people and watch the young ones having fun on the rides.”

And as for Ina herself?

“People say I have had a long life, but it doesn’t seem that long to me!” she said.

“I have two boys and two girls and they have all gone into the family business except one daughter, who looks after old people, which is a very important job. The grandchildren work in the business too.”

She joked: “Sometimes I have to hit them with my walking stick if I catch them not working hard enough.”

“I loved my swinging boats and my shooting gallery, but we don’t have the shooting gallery any more, it was getting too complicated. The Waltzer has always been very popular. Of course, when you are young, you remember all the lovely things.

“But there was a lot of being outside in all weathers and everything had to be maintained by us. My father was a blacksmith and had a forge, if anything needed fixed, he fixed it himself.

“I don’t feel like I come from anywhere in particular, I have always been on the road, that’s my life. It started out with horses and carts and then steam and then we transported everything on the Bedford lorries. I loved the Bedfords, you wouldn’t see one about the place now.”

The Guardian has met a few centenarians over the years, and we always ask them what their secret is to a long life.

“Work!” says Ina.

“Take care of yourself and ask God to take care of you. And keep active, do lots of walking. I am not able to do as much now as I used to, and it really frustrates me. Food and eating is important to keep healthy, I love my food, porridge every morning, there used to be a big pot of porridge on the go all day. And potatoes and cabbage and soda bread.

“I will keep working for as long as I am able, I have never left it and I never will, how can you leave music and lights and children laughing?”