Children of Worth Village Primary School prepare to dance round a maypole about 1940.

Their May Queen and her attendant stand in the centre. Some simple choreographic guidelines have been chalked on the classroom floor.

May time traditions featured prominently in schools of the period. May Queens, sometimes elected by ballot among their classmates, were attended by retinues of maids and guards of honour – 12 boys in Robin Hood costumes at Cowling Primary School in 1953. Classrooms were decorated with plants and blossoms.

Keighley Parish Church Girls’ Friendly Society crowned their annual May Queen in the National School, while children of St Anne’s Roman Catholic Church ceremonially crowned their statue of Our Lady, singing O Mary, We Crown Thee With Blossoms Today.