The May celebrations are an excuse for everyone to let down their hair and enjoy a few hours of fun and laughter.

Many readers will remember taking part in festivities at school and later in the towns and villages where they lived.

In Picture 1, May Queen Rachel Hodgson, 11, keeps smiling, despite stormy weather which nearly made the 1985 dancing in Witney a non-event.

READ MORE: Polling station quieter than usual as voters speak out

Organisers feared they would have to postpone everything until June. But the rain stopped in time for children from Batt and St Mary’s primary schools to get into their traditional swing.

The youngsters, aged five to 11, were watched by admiring mums and dads as they danced around two maypoles decorated with streamers on Church Green.

Jessica Prout, seven, in Picture 2, was crowned May Queen at Chipping Norton infants and nursery school with Nicholas Edwards, six, as May King in 1990.

The school in Burford Road kept up the tradition of celebrating May Day with a procession and dancing.

Morris dancing and other traditional folk dances were performed by the 200 pupils, much to the delight of parents.

Pupils at Grove Church of England Primary School, in Picture 3, entertained a large crowd with their maypole dancing in Wantage market place in 1967.

The celebrations at Longfields Primary School, Bicester, in Picture 4, had a distinctly local flavour in 1977.

The festival revived the town’s own May song as well as a morris dance which originated in the neighbouring village of Bucknell.

It also included maypole dancing and a gymnastic display by pupils.

Picture 5 shows 11-year-old Fay Hickman, flanked by her attendants, in 1994 being pulled through the village of Combe, near Woodstock, after her crowning.

There were more smiles when Amelia Smith, 10, left in Picture 6, was crowned May Queen at a ceremony in St Catherine’s Church at Towersey, near Thame, in 1990.

She is seen with her attendant, five-year-old Hannah Williams.

Each year May festivities get under way with May Morning celebrations in Oxford.

Help support trusted local news 

Sign up for a digital subscription now: oxfordmail.co.uk/subscribe 

As a digital subscriber you will get:      

          
  • Unlimited access to the Oxford Mail website   
    •       
  • Advert-light access       
    •       
  • Reader rewards       
    •       
  • Full access to our app 

About the author 

Andy is the Trade and Tourism reporter for the Oxford Mail and you can sign up to his newsletters for free here. 

He joined the team more than 20 years ago and he covers community news across Oxfordshire.

His Trade and Tourism newsletter is released every Saturday morning. 

You can also read his weekly Traffic and Transport newsletter.