For nearly 34 years lollipop lady Betty Ealand has braved the elements to ensure children at her local primary get to school safe and sound.

"I've never lost a child on my watch," Mrs Ealand, 64, who patrols outside Tewkesbury C of E Primary School, said.

"But I'm a big girl, so I think the car knows it will come worse off if it doesn't stop.

"And I'll go out in anything. I don't mind the rain, sleet and snow, but the fog worries me because it's harder to see the cars coming."

Mrs Ealand first donned her fluorescent jacket at her home in Tewkesbury on January 27, 1975, aged 30. The county council now estimate she has helped more than 1.5 million pupils cross the road safely.

"I had three children and my husband insisted I stay at home to look after them, but I am a people person so was like a bear with a sore head," said Mrs Ealand, who has been married to Andrew, 68, for 37 years.

"I had worked all my life and I was really terrible to him and he soon realised he was better off letting me out of the house because he was really suffering.

"I went to the school and asked and they said they would let me take Thomas, who is now 34, down there in a pram to do the job.

"He was only nine months old and he would be left on one side of the road and watch me and the cars. Everybody would want to talk to him so he was happy as well.

"Of course it would not happen these days, with all the health and safety regulations, but in those days nobody batted an eyelid."

It certainly was a little more carefree in those days. All her children including daughters Gail, 43, and Sharon, 42, would also accompany Mrs Ealand to her factory job as well.

"I would go and cross the children at 8.30am, go home for breakfast, then get to the box factory in Winchcombe and work from 10am until 2pm before getting back to the crossing for 3.30pm.

"I loved it then and I love it now. I thrive on people, love being surrounded by them and I am a self-confessed gossip.

"It's a job where you get to meet so many different people and having done it for so long I now see parents who I crossed as children bringing their own kids to school.

"I get very few problems, there are always a few children, of course, but they soon come round to my way of thinking. It's about talking to them and making them realise the dangers of crossing a road instead of talking down to them."

And Mrs Ealand has no plans to stop any time soon.

"I reckon if I can manage another six years and get 40 years under my belt I can look back and really think I have accomplished something."

Stan Waddington, Gloucestershire County Council cabinet member for the environment, said: "Betty's record of service, both to the job and to the children she's looked after down the years, is an example to us all.

"This is not the easiest of sites because the road where Betty works is very wide and she had to manage without flashing pedestrian lights to slow down traffic until 1997. And yet she has been there in all weathers – sun, rain, snow, winds – and always has a friendly word, a smile and a thank you to drivers.

"When you think of all the potential accidents that Betty has prevented, she has made an outstanding contribution to the community."