Here we look at archive photos from 1977, the year of celebrations for the Queen’s Silver Jubilee.
Apart from the Royal festivities life went on as normal and there were queues outside a bakery following a bread strike - and queues for buses in a snowy Queen Street.
The queue outside Ideal Bakers in Kingston Road, Oxford, was repeated across the county, and across the UK.
READ AGAIN: Shops closed at Oxford railway station
Many bakery workers had gone on strike and that had led to a shortage of bread and the inevitable panic-buying.
The Oxford Mail reported: “All over the county, it was the same story - long early morning queues, rationing and very little bread.
“Store managers used adjectives like ‘chaotic’, ‘hectic’ and ‘at fever pitch’ to describe the scenes outside their shops.”
As the strike began, Tesco in Cowley Road, Oxford, had just 300 loaves and a queue which stretched the whole of its 150ft long frontage.
The bread sold out in minutes.
Some shops restricted sales to regular customers - and would sell them only their “usual amount”.
READ AGAIN: Landlord joyful after winning pub award
One group of housewives found a novel way to beat the strike - 20 signed up for a 10-week bread-baking course at West Oxfordshire Technical College.
Others were equally resourceful, emptying the stores of flour and yeast to bake their own bread and buying crisps and biscuits as standbys.
The strike helped small independent bakers who were able to increase production. Biggers in High Street, Eynsham, baked day and night, while a breathless assistant at Berry and Sons, of Headington, said: “We are carrying on until we drop.”
READ AGAIN: Florence Pugh reflects on being told to lose weight
After a week of strike action, they were feeling the strain.
Albert Braham, of Ideal Bakers, said: “We are working through the night and it’s taking it out of us.”
Two days later, employers and unions settled the dispute, which had begun over bank holiday pay.
Help support trusted local news
Sign up for a digital subscription now: oxfordmail.co.uk/subscribe
As a digital subscriber you will get:
- Unlimited access to the Oxford Mail website
- Advert-light access
- Reader rewards
- Full access to our app
About the author
Andy is the Trade and Tourism reporter for the Oxford Mail and you can sign up to his newsletters for free here.
He joined the team more than 20 years ago and he covers community news across Oxfordshire.
His Trade and Tourism newsletter is released every Saturday morning.
You can also read his weekly Traffic and Transport newsletter.
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel