WHEN Jean Parvin applied to become a lollipop lady in her home village she was the only person who wanted the job.

Thirty-five years later she is County Durham's longest- serving crossing patroller and has helped thousands of youngsters get safely to and from school.

Mrs Parvin has seen great changes in the children, and the traffic passing through Wolsingham, in Weardale, over the past three decades.

She is popular with all the children at the village's comprehensive and primary schools, and remembers leading the parents, and even grandparents, of many of them across the same road when they were pupils.

She said: "I've helped three generations of some families get across the roads in Wolsingham. Things have really changed in that time.

"The uniforms used to be really strict, which was nice, because pupils looked smarter and proud to belong to the school community.

"There are so many more vehicles on the road today, and I see drivers using mobile phones, drinking cups of tea and putting on make-up on the way to work.

"The job has changed a little, too. I can help anyone cross the road now. Two elderly ladies make doctors appointments when they know I'm working."

The 66-year-old could have retired six years ago but her love of children keeps her as enthusiastic as ever for the job.

She said: "My two sons, Terry and Tony, now 43 and 41, were at school when I started and my husband, Bill, and I fostered 21 children in 20 years.

"We also helped run the village youth club for 20 years, so I've got to know and care for lots of children, which makes this job wonderful for me."

On Wednesday, Mrs Parvin will join long-serving colleagues from across the North-East for a tea party at Newcastle Civic Centre in celebration of the golden jubilee of the School Crossing Patrol Service.

The service was launched nationwide when the School Crossing Patrol Act was passed, after the London boroughs began to employ traffic wardens to see children safely to and from school in the 1940s.