Dame for a laugh

May 9, 2007: Forty-one-year-old Fred Thomas has won a competition which will lead to him dressing up in drag ti promote a Cornish brewery.

	l Skinner's MD Steve Skinner with the living embodiment of Betty Stogs, Fred Thomas.

Fred, from Sticker, in Cornwall, won a contest to become the living embodiment of Betty Stogs, the folklore character that inspired Skinner's popular 4% session beer.

In the wake of widespread publicity earlier this year, Steve Skinner, managing director of the Truro-based brewery, was inundated with applications for the Betty role. These included photos of buxom wenches and, he has no doubt, a number of less printable hoaxes and wind-ups.

But there was nothing false about Fred Thomas’s credentials and he will now be the human version of Betty – going on tour to celebrate Skinners’ tenth anniversary and raising money for their adopted charity, the Children’s Hospice South West.

Fred will bring the befuddled Betty Stogs character to life with personal appearances at pubs across Cornwall over the summer months. Each special night will feature a 30-question fun quiz, with prizes, compered by 'Betty'.

Fred is well qualified for the role, having already played dame twice for the Sticker Players pantomime. Skinner's sales representative Ann Rogers, a former dressmaker, has made his costume.