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This photograph of children playing in the snow at Silverhill Primary School, Mickleover, brought back fond memories for former teacher Sheila Amer, of Belper, who wrote in to the Evening Telegraph to reveal the story behind it. The giant snowballs, it seems, were created for a very special purpose – as Sheila recounts here.

The photograph was taken at Silverhill Primary School where I was the teacher responsible for environmental studies.

As part of a nature reserve being created in the school grounds, I had the head teacher’s permission to include a pond.

The father of one of the children in my class brought along a JCB digger and dug a hole in the far corner of the school field, at the bottom of a slope.

A small party, consisting of fathers and a male member of staff, helped to lay the butyl lining and create a path round the pond. Then it had to be filled – and the pond was rather a large one.

I borrowed several hosepipes from parents and connected them up with pieces of copper tubing, attached the end to a tap in the kitchen and turned it on.

On the Friday night, frost was forecast, so I gathered in all the hosepipes.

Over the weekend, it snowed – and snowed.

On the Monday morning, we were wondering how we would ever get the pool filled when I had a brainwave.

I suggested to the head, Ann Ellis, that we should hold a competition among the juniors for the biggest snowball.

Then the children could roll their giant snowballs down to the pond and when the snow melted, the pond would be filled.

So that is what we did.

The Evening Telegraph sent a photographer to take pictures of the snowballs, with some of the children who made them, and the photograph in last week’s Bygones was one of them.

There was also a report in the Evening Telegraph on Friday, December 18, 1981, and this was picked up by the Daily Telegraph which reported the story the following day.

After Christmas, one of the boys in my class came to me with a newspaper cutting and said: “My uncle’s just been in Thailand and he’s sent you this.”

It was a piece abut the giant snowballs in the Bangkok Post!

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