Shopworker Mara taking a break in Cathedral Square

Mara worked in the Curtess shoe shop nearby and was on her lunch break with her supervisor, who was not available for the reunion photo in 2016 where Mara is holding a newspaper with the very appropriate newspaper headline ‘Get Back on the Bench!’

Mara said: “I started at the shop when I was 18 and did six months’ work experience and then I was taken on full-time and worked there for nine years.”

Mara later worked for the Gateway supermarket in Rivergate, which is now Asda, then the Kempston shoe shop and later gave up work to look after her mother.

She added: “I loved meeting all the customers at the shoe shop and it got very busy on Saturdays and during the sales.”

Also in the original photo is Timothy Whites, which is now Nando’s, which was very popular and could also be accessed by a Bridge Street entrance, and the Norwich Building Society, which changed to the Yorkshire.

Chris said: "I remember the ladies chatting to the gardener watering the flowerbeds and trying not to get splashed with mud!”