CHRISTMAS isn’t Christmas without a visit to Santa for the children.
Who remembers visiting him in his special grotto at Nevilles department store, which once stood in Darwen Street, Blackburn?
This advert from 1971 announced he was arriving in town, on Saturday, November 21.
Families were urged to look out for him in Preston New Road and at Sudell Cross at 2.30pm.
He would be at Nevilles by 3pm, when he would be pleased to meet boys and girls of all ages – and their mothers and fathers, too.
Santa had been invited to the store’s toy fair, which displayed all the latest toys which would, no doubt, be on many youngsters’ Christmas present list to him.
Nevilles was founded in the 1870s as a hardware store but grew to occupy multiple premises at the bottom of Mincing Lane. It had a mock Tudor front and children were excited to visit their toy wonderland.
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