Kathleen Padgett, of Fairford in Gloucestershire, has sent this group from Form 4A at the Keighley Girls' Grammar School performing a musical 'French Gavotte' in 1940.

She appears, fourth from the left, as Kathleen Hanson and names the others as Doreen Smith, Doreen Akrigg, Margaret Balmer, Jean Hogson, Joyce Dean, Rene Wright, Jean Ogden and Nancy Hopkinson, with Eileen Hoyle seated.

"The costumes were made by the art staff and ourselves," she recalls "and in colour were gorgeous. The patterns were hand-painted on to the materials." Even in black and white the effect is striking.

The performing arts were encouraged at the Girls' Grammar School.

Extra-curricular activities included a verse-speaking choir and a dramatic society, which ironically, during Peace Week in 1938, put on a play called 'Women at War.'