FOR no particular reason, this week's Best Days of Their Lives pictures feature school harvest festival services.

Do schools - focussed on the national curriculum as they are - still pay much attention to this fine old tradition?

In October, 1976, Tonge High School held a harvest festival service with a difference at Bolton's Ashburner Street Market.

More than 500 pupils, traders and shoppers attended the service, which included music provided by the Tonge High School Brass Band, conducted by William Walsh.

Traders from the market boosted pupils' offerings, and 150 parcels were distributed to old folk in the Tonge Moor area.

The headmaster, Ernest Makin, said: "The service seems to have cemented the close relationship between the traders and the school."

Another headmaster, Donald Beswick, of Devonshire Road Primary School, Bolton, looked to have gone into the fruit and vegetable business in October, 1980.

After the harvest festival service, the gifts were given to the sick and elderly.

Pictures

Top - Vitamin-rich: Headmaster Donald Beswick was swamped by offerings from Devonshire Road Primary School children at the schoool's harvest festival in October, 1980.

Bottom - Plough the fields and scatter: Tonge High School's harvest festival at Ashburner Street Market in October, 1976, included music from the school's brass Band, conducted by William Walsh.