Caterer managed cafes and kitchens across city (From The Oxford Times)

Dorothy Wheeler

8:50pm Thursday 27th October 2011 in Local Obituaries

An Oxford caterer who managed a string of cafes and kitchens has died aged 82.

Dorothy Ann Wheeler from London Road in Headington died on Saturday, October 8, after suffering from kidney failure.

Mrs Wheeler (nee Ludlow) married Bernard Wheeler in 1958.

The couple had two children David, 51, and Lynn, 49, and three grandchildren – Emily, 21, Patrick, 17, and Evan, 15.

Mr Wheeler died in 2003.

Mrs Wheeler trained as a caterer and managed the Lyons Tea Rooms in central Oxford for about five years.

She also managed catering at St Edmund Halland at Oxford Brookes in the 1950s when it was the Oxford Polytechnic.

After her children were born, she ran the White Rabbit cafe in Cowley, then managed catering at Oxford Instruments in Osney and then at Windmill House in Headington. She also worked at St Clare’s College and Summer Fields School in north Oxford.

As a young woman she loved dancing and theatre but after retirement she took to writing poetry, local and family history.

She later extended her dressmaking skills to craft activities including quilting, smocking, embroidery and card making.

Her funeral took place at Oxford Crematorium on Wednesday, October 19.