Founder of Thame Taxi Company Dies Aged 90

GWEN Bambrook, the founder of Bambrooks’ Taxis, and the widow of John Bambrook who later started the family motor repair business in Chinnor Road, Thame, died last Thursday, April 21, at Stone House Nursing Home.
Gwen was born at Potrobello near Watlington on August 11, 1914 and Christened Gwendoline May Lloyd. She left school at 14 and started work in the dairy at Lower Dean Farm were she lived and worked as the dairy maid making butter and cream.
Gwen’s eldest son, Roy, explained how she would get up early to collect the milk from the cows to cool it and then to separate it and use the cream. The butter and cream would then be sent up to Watlington Park to be used in the big house.
One night in 1932 she was persuaded to go to Henley Regatta Fair where she met up with a very nice young man called John Bambrook. Their friendship grew and after six years of courtship they were married on November 5, 1938 and went to live in Chinnor for a short time.
They later moved to Park Street, Thame, in November, 1939 where there first son, Roy was born. In February, 1942, Gwen’s second son, Kenneth, was born.
Gwen and John and the two boys went to live in Towersey for four years. In 1952 the moved back to Thame to Chinnor Road where she started a Taxi Business and the rest is history, as they say, as was recently reported when the family business was sold recently.
(See ‘End Of An Era For Thame Family Business’, Main News section, April 05.)
Gwen’s funeral will be held on Friday,April 29, at St Catherine’s Church, Thame, at 2.30pm