ON his first visit to Malvern’s Three Counties Show – as it then was – Jack Ballard was in nappies eating an ice cream. Three decades later the nappies may have gone, but the passion for ice cream remains for the 30-years-old son of an Abberley farming family.

It was back in 1988 that Ian and Tracy Ballard took their new baby son to The Midlands premier outdoor event, in a pushchair and resplendent in a new sun hat. It was a hot day and so Tracy bought him his first ice cream, which young Jack, as babies do, managed to get all over his face. He cut such a cute picture, the family caught the eye of Evening News photographer John Pratt, who took a series of pictures.

And that’s where it all might have ended had not Mrs Ballard taken Jack, again eating an ice cream, back to this year’s Royal Three Counties Show and 30 years to the day bumped into News photographer Jonathan Barry. She related the story to him and Jonathan decided to update the saga with a new shot of Jack and a vanilla ice.

Returning to WN HQ in Hylton Road, Worcester, Jonathan began sifting through our mountain of old photographic negatives and remarkably – considering a lot have been ditched over the years - managed to find the original 1988 image of baby Jack. Bizarrely it had been filed not under “Three Counties Show”, but “Miscellaneous” , so it really was a needle in a haystack job.

Since his high profile role all those years ago, Jack has been to university, travelled the world, worked as a seed merchant and in recruitment and is now employed by insurance giant NFU Mutual. “I can’t really remember anything about that first visit to the show,” he said. “And no, I haven’t still got the hat!”

Sadly Ian Ballard, who ran a pioneering deer and wild boar business on the farm, died 11 years ago and Tracy now manages the 152 acre operation, which is mainly arable. She said: “The Three Counties has always been a special event for us, but I never imagined we would see that photograph of Jack again.” All credit to her son, he took Mum’s enthusiasm on the chin.