ALBERT Ford, one of the Covered Market’s most colourful characters, has died aged 67.

The father-of-five, who ran the Plain Leather store, died on May 30 of suspected heart failure.

His funeral will be held on Monday at 12.45pm at Oxford Crematorium, with fellow traders expected to attend.

Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York City, Mr Ford was one of four boys, three of whom would go on to be drug addicts. His working life began as a 14-year-old delivering flowers for a florist in Madison Avenue.

After taking drugs himself as a youth, Mr Ford joined the US Air Force, where he served for four years, with the last year served in Vietnam.

Then he worked for Pan American Airlines for four years before spiralling into a seven-year heroin addiction.

He worked as a lorry driver and spent the next few years in Italy, England and then New York, before marrying his English wife who gave birth to two sons, moving to Oxfordshire before the marriage ended. His second marriage produced twin sons.

Mr Ford was inspired to work in the leather trade after seeing his brother Richard make belts for children in New York. After a number of years working at markets and country shows, he opened his first shop in Cowley Road just off The Plain nearly 40 years ago.

It was a small shop and the rent was just £5 a week.

In an interview with the Oxford Mail last month, Mr Ford, who lived with his third wife Hiroko and 10-year-old daughter Masako in Oxford, said his job and its interaction with the public was “magical and addictive”.

In January last year, his company launched its own collection of leather bags and cases called The Plain Leather Collection.

He added he would not have been able to run the company without the support of ‘powerful Japanese wife Hiroko’ and thanked his computer-literate daughter for helping with social networking sites.

Mr Ford ran a series of parenting classes from Elm’s Children’s Centre in Botley called Man Enough, to help dads connect with their children as well as classes at Bullingdon Prison.

Mr Ford leaves wife Hiroko, daughter Masako, and four sons from previous marriages.

Mrs Ford plans to keep running the Plain Leather business.