PUPILS of Guard House Junior School gleefully show off gifts received from Santa at their Christmas party in December, 1954.

The school had been officially opened in February that year by the Princess Royal.

In the first copy of The Guardsman school magazine that year, Brian Ellis, of class Junior 1, described his Christmas: "On Christmas Eve I heard some rattling about and then I thought I heard somebody come upstairs. So I tried to go fast asleep and I waited a little while but I was only imagining things. Then my mummy came in and spoke to me. On Christmas morning I got up and I had three books. I went to waken my sister and she got out of bed to see her books and her big dolls house and then I went to play with my fort. All of a sudden my mummy came into our bedroom to see our toys.”