Pupils at Landscove C of E Primary School dressed the potato as Father Christmas with a white beard and red bobble hat before positioning him in the shuttle.
The "spacechip" – named Spudnik2 – was then tied to a helium weather balloon with a camera attached and launched from the local village car park in Devon.
They watched as it soared 17 miles up – reaching 90,000ft – before the balloon burst and the shuttle floated back down to earth on a parachute and landed 140 miles away in Hampshire.
