Fit Faces at Fairlynch 1: Drake's School, East Budleigh, 1940

Isn’t it frustrating  - and sometimes embarrassing - when you try to remember a name of someone you met, and just can’t manage it.

Photos in museum collections can be just as annoying when only a few of the faces have been properly identified, or when names have been misspelt.  

So it was a pleasure to meet former Drake’s School pupil Michael Adams when he called at the Museum recently, helpfully  providing some missing names of his friends from over 70 years ago. 

Amusingly, one of these turned out to be a young Roy Letten, a former British Railways employee who sold the last ever tickets at Budleigh Salterton station on 4 March 1967. Here he is, in a photo which I’m going to use in the new edition of Fairlynch Museum’s booklet The Budleigh Salterton Railway.  

In the school photo seen above, Roy is fifth from the left, in the middle row.

Now in his eighties, Michael Adams lives in Exeter but keeps in touch with friends and relatives in the East Budleigh area where he grew up.     

So here are the names. Perhaps one of my readers can help identify the unknowns:

Back row: Mr Fuke [J.B. Fuke, Headmaster], Dulcie Collins, Ena Quick, [unknown], Margaret Ebdon, Winnie Farr, Dorothy Luxton, Betty Horne, Rosalind Bolt.

Middle row: [unknown], [unknown], Ken Matthews, John Leamon, Roy Letten, Norman Skinner, Michael Adams, Henry Down,  [unknown], Eric Vinnicombe

Front row: Tommie Auton, Lilah Ponsford, Winnie Heard,  [unknown], Margaret Bray, Evelyn Parker, Eva Richards, Joyce Wright, [unknown]

I can see that this post could be the first in a never-ending series, which I’ve called Fit Faces. Do look out for them and help us match the names to the people. 

Drop me a line at mr.downes@gmail.com if you think you can do some matchmaking.