More on KentOnline
More on KentOnline
It all started with a light hearted remark made at a summer fair, but thirty years later Cindy Evans is still Madginford Primary School's lollipop lady, and she has no plans to hang up her high visibility jacket soon.
Mrs Evans, 63, now spots the adults she once ushered to safety as Madginford pupils, walking their own children to the Bearsted school.
A former hairdresser, the grandma of four started her role while her two sons Matthew and Christopher were pupils at the school, in November 1990.
Mrs Evans, who only lives a five minute walk away from the site, was offered the position after she heard the head mistress speaking about the vacancy at the summer fair.
"I said jokingly 'I will do it', and low and behold she came knocking on my door. I said I will do it for a couple of years while the boys are there and I just stayed."
"I would take the boys to school and then wait for them to finish. At first they thought it was hilarious, I used to wonder if they if would ever be embarrassed but they just accepted it."
"I was just enjoying it and they could never find anyone to take it on if I was off, then I got to twenty years and I thought I will never make it to thirty but I did."
She added: "I have done it in heat weaves, gale force winds, torrential rain, it doesn't matter what the weather is, I'm out there."
"Now we have changed it slightly and have risk assessments, back when I started none of that existed, I stood out there in a couple of feet of snow."
She has made good friends over the years through her post and the children are always very polite.
"The younger siblings call me 'pop pop lady' and another one calls me 'Mrs Heavens', it's a lovely way to start the day," she said.
The school has grown since she started and she says people used to walk more to the Egremont Road site.
Mrs Evans was also a dinner lady at the school for 22 years and now spends her time between drop off and pick up times looking after her young grandchildren.
She's been through a few neon yellow hats over the years, but is still only on her second lollipop sign, with no plan to put it away yet.
