EAST Lancashire is set to go crackers about clackers as the latest 1970s craze bounces back into our toy shops, and our lives.

Pauline Hawkins, who had just left primary school when the craze first arrived, went around Blackburn to see how the new millennium version was shaping up.

THE balls on a string have hit the shops but hopefully they will be safer this time around after scores of youngsters three decades ago suffered injuries by clattering the plastic spheres against their wrists.

Less than two years ago yo-yos bounced back into our lives and were, for a few months, popular in the playground again. Sixties favourites Bill and Ben have returned to our television screens and have also been made into toys.

Scooters, albeit in a souped up, shiny metallic, foldaway form with an horrendous price tag, returned with a vengeance and were on most children's wish lists at Christmas.

So why have Clackers made a comeback 30 years after 100 million sets were sold around the world?

The BBC2 Saturday night series reminding us of the songs, innovations, TV shows and faces of the 1970s (this weekend it's I Love 1978) may have contributed to our memories of all things childish. And toy inventors, having grown up with innovative toys, may have decided to put their own spin on an old idea.

Allan Sage, UK distributor for the Klik Klak range manufactured by Paradiso, which are expected to arrive in Toys 'R' Us stores today, said: "It is tied in with all things retro. Everything is coming round again.

"Now they have ironed out the safety problems -- in the '70s some of the Clackers shattered, now the material they use is virtually indestructible -- they are in demand again." But has East Lancashire succumbed to the latest craze, or are today's children too mature to bother with them?

It's perhaps too early to say, as they have only been on the shelves at Mercer's toy store in Northgate, Blackburn, for a couple of weeks. But thirtysomething staff who remember them first time around have had varying degrees of success showing today's youngsters how the toy works.

Sales assistant Cath Fox, 35, has got the knack again. "We have been demonstrating them to parents who have said, 'oh, I remember them'. They do get addictive. When we have been demonstrating them in here we've found you cannot put them down," she said.

And Julie Borszcz , who admits to being fortysomething, said: "You do get better at it. It's all in the wrist action."

Manageress Rose Fowler said they had sold several sets of Kliker Balz, which cost £3.50 compared to the £4.99 Klik Klaks. She said: "Quite a few adults have bought them, because they remember them. They still remember the sore fingers!"

Scott Turner,23, of Audley, Blackburn, said "I was brought up in Chatburn, and can remember the rich kids in the village having them. We made them from conkers and string."

Sally Duckworth,33, from Lammack, Blackburn, remembers having some when she was six years old. "I drove my mum mad with the constant clacking noises."

Mathew Simkin, eight, from Mill Hill, Blackburn, a pupil at St Aidans Primary School, Mill Hill said "I'm really struggling to get the hang of these. I think they will be popular with my mates at school."

Alison Duxbury, 39, from Mellor, who had some clackers when she was at junior school, said: " We had hours of fun with these, so I have just bought two sets for my children, William and Henry."