HUMANITY was celebrated by thousands in record-breaking fashion this weekend thanks to the efforts of a former Dursley resident.

An estimated 15,000 people formed the world’s biggest human peace sign to kick-off this year’s Glastonbury Festival – the brainchild of SJ Smallpage, a nurse at Gloucestershire Royal Hospital and festival volunteer.

Together with a friend, SJ came up with the idea with the aim of getting about 200 people together as a sign of unity.

Instead as many as 15,000 people accepted the 36-year-old’s public invite and came together last Thursday.

SJ, who has volunteered at the festival for the past five years, said that the gathering showed the festival’s family feel and strong sense of unity.

“It was such a happy occasion,” she told the Gazette. “People came out in public together to show that they are not going to stand for the evils which we have seen in recent weeks.

“People there were crying and coming up to us and thanking us for organising it – it seemed to grasp everyone.”

After SJ’s invitation started gaining traction on Facebook, she called on the support of one of the festival’s top organisers, Liz Eliot, who helped mark out the sign’s outline and organise people.

A helicopter was also arranged to capture the view from the skies.

SJ, who lived for ten years in Dursley until moving away recently, said that her help had been “invaluable”.

“Without her and her team there’s no way we could have done this, she was invaluable,” SJ added.

“When it became clear that we were going to be having at least a couple of thousand people turn up I didn’t know how we were going to organise everyone but she was amazing.”

The previous world record for largest human peace sign was 5,814 which was set in New York in 2009.

Although the record has not officially been verified, it is estimated that at least 10,000 and up to as many as 15,000 took part in the Glastonbury gathering.