POLICE have set up a one-mile exclusion zone around an unexploded bomb on Otmoor. The live 250lb device, dating from the Second World War, was discovered earlier today on Ministry of Defence-owned land. Army bomb disposal experts from
OXFAM will have to wait another year for the chance to land a six-figure cash windfall after tennis star Roger Federer’s shock exit from Wimbledon today. The late Martin Newlife, of Tackley, bet £1,520 on Federer to win the men’s singles title at least
A CHARITY which is being forced to close next month says the stigma surrounding unemployed people needs to change. Scout Enterprises, in Ridgefield Road, Cowley, has helped thousands of people gain qualifications and find work over the past 15 years.
THEY did not manage to pull the wool over the eyes of renowned magicians Penn and Teller. But double act Richard Young and Sam Strange, who dazzled audiences when performing on ITV1 show Penn and Teller: Fool Us on Saturday, received high praise
THE return of sunny weather proved a welcome – if short-lived – bonus for the launch of the UK’s first solar powered business park in Oxfordshire. More than 3,000 solar panels have been installed at Howbery Business Park, near Wallingford, and in Monday
MAGISTRATES have criticised “severe and swift” Government cuts as their Didcot courthouse prepares to hear its last case today. The 54-year-old Mereland Road court was listed for closure under cost-cutting plans announced last year, despite a £1.4m revamp
All Saints Church of England (Aided) Primary School - partly closed. All Y5/6 and Y2 classes closed. Classes F1(BK), Y1(RS), Y3 (AW) and Y4 (MB) also closed. Aston & Cote Church of England Primary School - Classes 1 (Foundation) and 2 (year
ARR, me hearties! It’s time to borrow your aunty’s pet parrot for the Oxford Moonlight Stroll. This year’s event is taking on a pirate theme to raise funds for Sobell House hospice charity. Organisers aim to sign up 1,200 walkers to raise more than
TRADERS in Didcot are planning to launch a loyalty card scheme to continue their fight against the recession. Last month, the town was named one of the top 10 in the country for battling back against the economic downturn. Now, Didcot Chamber of Commerce
The Sunday Times’s Hugh Canning described Opera Holland Park this week as “London’s less posh answer to Garsington” — which neither organisation is likely to consider particularly complimentary. Having attended productions from each on successive nights
Malmaison Oxford has become an important part of the city’s social scene since it opened shortly before Christmas in 2005 in what had previously been Oxford Prison. So popular has it proved that at times it seems almost as hard to enter as it once was
According to Charles Moore writing in The Spectator, the Secretary of State for International Development Andrew Mitchell is intending to hang a portrait of his missus in the reception hall of his offices. Moore wrote: “Mitchell ordered the flag be flown
Natalie Clein performing Elgar’s Cello Concerto was reason enough to be at the Sheldonian on Friday. The event was made even more alluring by the chance to hear the young Venezuelan Christian Vasquez conducting the Philharmonia Orchestra. Not surprisingly
The performance of Nichola McAuliffe as a malodorous, cantankerous tramp is the most compelling feature of Hull Truck’s gripping revival of Alan Bennett’s 1999 National Theatre hit The Lady in the Van. Theatregoers are advised to catch this remarkable
University admission is too important a matter to be arranged — shall we say fixed? — by interviews conducted by dons. This is my opinion and it happens also to be that of Simon Hughes, the Government’s advocate for access to universities. As reported
It must have happened to many a headteacher: a visit from a pushy parent demanding that their child be admitted to a school. It certainly happened to the Master of Magdalen College School when Welsh singing teacher Clara Davies arrived in Oxford determined
Imagine being able to prepare a gourmet meal for your friends under the instruction of an expert cook, serve it in an informal friendly setting, then walk home, leaving all the washing up to be done by someone else. Friendly dinner parties in a
Both peas and broad beans are in season, available throbbing with life from pick-your-owns, allotments and gardens. Both can be purchased frozen too — but obviously it is far more satisfying to use vegetables you have harvested yourself. Sandy says that
Zuleika Dobson is 100 this year. Or rather the book about her is (Zuleika Dobson, or An Oxford Love Story, 1911). She herself, had she ever been more than a figment of the imagination of Max Beerbohm (1872-1956), would have been a decade or two older;
the remaining cast return for an explosive third chapter, which is the first of the series to be screened in 3D and IMAX 3D. Like its predecessors, Transformers: Dark of the Moon is a ridiculously entertaining thrill-ride that jettisons script, dialogue
One of the great things about Oxfringe — indeed about any fringe festival — is the opportunity to see avant garde events. Space, by Timothy Mann (right), was definitely in that category — weird but rather wonderful. A highly accomplished performer, his
PEOPLE convicted of offences at Didcot Magistrates’ Court recently: Jeffrey Slater, 27, of Allington Lane, West End, Southampton, admitted possession of cannabis (Class B) in Abingdon on March 29. Fined £200, a £15 victims’ surcharge and
Tomahawk Theatre Company returns to Oxford Castle from Monday until July 16 with its new production of Shakespeare’s perennially popular A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The castle is one of the city’s best loved attractions and offers a lovely setting for
We are talking here not of Mozart’s opera The Marriage of Figaro but the 1784 play by the French dramatist Beaumarchais, on which it is based. Premiered on the British stage as recently as 1974, it remains little seen in this country. The Watermill’s
Opera Holland Park’s 2011 season began in sparkling style with a rib-tickling, and exceptionally well-sung, production of Donizetti’s Don Pasquale. This tune-packed, light-hearted work shows us that always reliably comic figure — an old man making a
Geoffrey Chaucer completed 23 of his bawdy, irreverent Canterbury Tales. Now the Pantaloons open-air theatre company are touring the lot, in what they describe as their “ambitious and hilarious new complete version”. But that involves more than 70 parts
A WEST Oxfordshire tourist attraction which has been closed for two years is set to reopen next month. Cogges Manor Farm Museum, in Witney, was run by Oxfordshire County Council, but it withdrew funding in 2009 after financial losses. Volunteer-run
IT MAY look like a building site, but behind the construction debris new life is growing. Wood Farm Primary School, in Headington, Oxford, is having a multi-million pound rebuild. So staff decided to use materials from the project to create vegetable
About 2,000 homes and businesses in Oxford were hit by a power cut this morning. Properties in The Towing Path, Weirs Orchard and around Donnington Bridge lost power at 9.40am, and drivers on the A34 HInksey Hill Interchange faced long delays after
There will be a new name on the Oxford & District League pairs trophy after defending champions Kevin Baker & Ivor Clarke (The Cricketers) crashed out of this year’s competition – at the first hurdle. It followed a 2-1 first-round defeat by Kevin Giles
ANDY Montague was just 22 years old when he drowned after apparently suffering an epileptic fit. The young father had finished a nightshift in February last year when a friend dropped him off at Trow Pool, Bucknell, near Bicester, so he could do some
Aston Rowant will host one-day international women’s cricket next Thursday as part of a tournament involving England, Australia, India and New Zealand. The NatWest Women’s Quadrangular Series gets under way tomorrow, with England hosting India at Derby
Stanton Harcourt’s Ollie Pascoe smashed the final 50 of a mammoth 152 in just 11 balls. Pascoe achieved the remarkable feat as Stanton thrashed Minster Lovell 2nd by 144 runs in OCA Division 6 on Saturday. And in so doing, he claimed family bragging
House prices in Oxfordshire have risen by more than £2,000 in the last year, bucking the national trend. New figures show the average price of a property in the county in May was £239,259, compared to £237,198 for the same period a year ago, a rise of
EAST Oxford residents have called for tighter regulations on shared houses. More than 60 people attended the first East Area Forum at East Oxford Primary School on Monday to discuss Oxford City Council’s sites and housing development plan. It is proposed
AEA Technology 3.6 BMW 6234 Electrocomponents 268.9 Nationwide Accident Repair 96.5 Oxford Biomedica 5.85 Oxford Catalysts 84 Oxford Instruments 918 Reed Elsevier 548.75 RM 155 RPS Group 243.1 Courtesy of Redmayne Bentley, Abingdon
ALEX Jewell’s maiden century was not enough to save Oxfordshire from a 116-run defeat to Devon in the Western Division at Great & Little Tew yesterday. Jewell made a fine 130, but Oxon’s decent rearguard effort finally ended at 6.05pm when the excellent
THE kitchen is filthy, the bathrooms are rotting and you can even see the rooms below through the bare, dilapidated floorboards. Yet its tenants each pay £85 a week rent to live here. The house in Salford Road, Marston, is so squalid council officers
A YOUNGSTER is back from America after a life-changing operation which could eventually see him take his first steps. Family, friends and even complete strangers helped raise the £60,000 needed to send four-year-old Ronnie Jacob, who has cerebral palsy
A printing company founded in 1925 by Lord Nuffield has gone into administration, with the loss of 53 jobs. Administrators from accountancy firm BDO arrived at the offices of Nuffield Press, right, in Abingdon, on Monday and told early shift
GIRLS at Headington Preparatory School in Oxford gathered yesterday to watch a time capsule being placed in the foundations of a new building. The contents of the capsule, chosen by the girls, included a school timetable, a page from a newspaper, a
We were sure it was not just us. It seemed the city had been burdened with its fair share of power cuts over the past few months. And, for many, Monday’s blackout was the last straw. Businesses and shops were left in the dark, losing customers and
THE Oxford Mail has published a number of letters recently about the repatriation of dead servicemen from Afghanistan. Oxfordshire County Council and Thames Valley Police, in consultation with partner organisations, have been working for some time on
ROGER Tucker does not approve of folk who “put foxes on pedestals” (Oxford Mail, June 22). By this I assume he means those people who have the modicum of intelligence required to understand their behaviour, see beyond the hackneyed cliché of the fox killing
THE Government is showing concern over the sexualisation of the young. Yet at the same time, it insists the young have sex education. Does this mean that the Government is facing both ways at the same time, making them two-faced? GLYN LIMMER, Roosevelt
THE whole community is pulling together to help Carswell Community Primary School in Abingdon finish its project to create a dream outdoor area to fire the imaginations of its Key Stage One pupils. Plans to develop the school grounds started in 2009,
evolution? Fresh era? Not long ago bus services in Oxford were mainly run by one company, so that ticketing problems were non-existent. There was easy interchange between routes, in contrast to the lack of connectivity across the centre that nowadays
GLITZ and ballyhoo surrounded US President Barack Obama’s recent UK visit. It was ostensibly a friendly visit, but in reality was designed to ensure the British (and EU) establishment conform to the USA’s design for the Arab world. The tone of recent
THE striking Oxfordshire teachers deserve our full support. The coalition Government has launched an unprecedented attack on teachers and other public service employees. The Tories and Lib Dems want public service workers to pay more, work longer and
Last week one of my friends had to make an emergency trip to A&E after an incident that will forever have him known among his friends, and no doubt his local Accident and Emergency department, for the next 100 years as ‘The Space Hopper Injury Guy’.
IT’S the toughest job Les Tyler has ever had to do, but he is keeping a promise by digging his own father’s grave. Mr Tyler, 47, from Didcot, is mourning the loss of his father George Tyler, 72, who died following a long battle with prostate cancer on
POWER cuts in Oxford have become a serious problem and are damaging the city’s economy, it was claimed last night. A blackout on Monday was the seventh in the city in 18 months and caused havoc for shops and businesses, forcing many to close
OXFORD United goalkeeper Ryan Clarke insists he is not complacent about maintaining his place as Chris Wilder’s No 1 next season. With the U’s boss needing to replace Simon Eastwood, who has joined FC Halifax, Clarke says he will take nothing for granted
A TOTAL OF 59 schools have confirmed they will face disruption tomorrow, when up to 3,700 teachers strike over changes to their pensions. While many primary and secondary schools confirmed they would shut or partly close to enable exams to go ahead,
‘USE of the strike weapon is a bad lesson to our children.” Those were the words last night of county council leader Keith Mitchell as thousands of teachers prepared for industrial action tomorrow over pensions. Most of Oxfordshire’s children will feel
TEENAGERS would usually get a detention for painting on the side of their school library. But art students from St Birinus in Didcot were asked to paint a giant mural of the town’s favourite books on theirs. A huge bookshelf image was painted in one-hour
THE owner of a car showroom in Witney is shutting up shop after 50 years in the High Street. Martin Kernahan, of Kernahan’s of Witney, said the Ford dealership showroom was now too expensive to operate and would close on July 31. The company’s body
OXFORDSHIRE’S Adam Wootton and Craig Hinton have made it through to next month’s Open Championship at Sandwich. Wootton, who has been an Oxford City member for more then ten years, finished second in his qualifying event at Rye, in Kent.
