Didcot Plant
Job's second bottling plant in Oxfordshire

Following the success of the opening of Hanworth Plant in 1930, Job's was expanding rapidly. A large proportion of the milk coming into Hanworth was collected from farms in and around the Thames Valley including Oxfordshire. It had long been the wish of the directors of Job's "to sell better milk in the heart of the land of production". So one Sunday afternoon in 1935 H.A. Roberts jumped into his car with Charles Pile and drove to Didcot, where he had heard that a small local co-operative known as the Berkshire Vale Farmers were in trouble and open to offers.

An aerial view of the bottling plant at Didcot taken in 1959

He bought it on the spot that same Sunday afternoon! It took almost as year to sort out and bring up to Job's high standards but was soon doing brisk business in cream, eggs, dried milk and especially it's own brand of Berkshire Vale Butter. Although the war put a stop to it's dairy product production, Didcot Plant was already by then an integral and prosperous part of Job's. In 1942 Didcot, on Ministry orders, turned over to liquid milk processing and sold it's first bottle of milk. Milk rounds were rationalised with no more than one private dairy and one co-op per street permitted. This strategy was so successful with the dairies that it continued on a voluntary basis ever since.

Didcot Plant had an active Sports & Social Club and even enjoyed the luxury of it's own venue, Job's Field, adjacent to Didcot Plant

Didcot Plant started from scratch in 1942 and ended the war with fifty-one rounds served from a retail branch that was on the same site as the plant itself. In order to keep up with demand, Didcot was raised to a capacity of a thousand gallons an hour, with secondhand machinery being sourced from as far afield as Ireland to enable this. During this period Job's expansion was relentless, with production increasing on almost a daily basis. Many smaller dairies were bought by Job's including Shipton Court Dairy in 1947 and many new branches such as Marston, Tilehurst, Oxford and Shinfield were opened.

Sadly Didcot didn't remain a part of Job's and was sold to Express Dairy in 1970 as part of a consolidation deal. This didn't go down well with many of the employees at Didcot and prompted this poignant piece of prose:-

Our Happy Family

To a little old shack in Kingston Road,
The strangers came from Hanworth,
Come work for us, those strangers cried,
We'll pay you what a man's worth.
Be safe, secure, for evermore, rely on us from 'Town'
A family then we'll always be, we'll never let you down.

We worked our best, we struggled hard, the business grew and grew,
For never was so much work done so often by so few.
Far and wide our fame has spread - credit to the 'Town'
Believe us said the family - we'll never let you down.

Our branches grew from Kingston Road to Cowley and Rose Hill,
To Marston, Lime Walk, Hedington, we worked and with a will.
'You're doing well, we're proud of you' they praised us up in 'Town'
"A credit to our family, we'll never let you down"

Then progress took a hand once more, to Pony Road no less,
We're still a great big family, I know, I think, I guess?
But if we are a family like they say up in 'Town'
Why chop our legs from under us, and sadly let us down?

We understand to save a tree, you lop the branch that's dead,
If we ere sucking vital sap they surely could have said,
With hearts of stone their axe has struck and chopped the limb that's sound,
They've broken up our family for a measly million pounds.

See also:-

Didcot Video - A tour of the plant taken on a cine camera in 1961

More Photos of Didcot Plant

"An Ordinary Man" An extract from Bob Smith's autobiography featuring life as a driver at Didcot

An outing to Didcot Plant for employees families from Tilehurst branch in 1958

Hi,

I'm Mark Apcar from Tilehurst, Reading. I went to the bottling plant at Didcot around 1958. I was about 4 years old in the photo above and I'm standing at the centre front to the right of the taller girl with the black jacket.  My mother is in the back row with the black jacket (standing under the 'A' in 'Job's Hall').  

They were great days of my life!  

Thanks 

Mark Apcar

Hello again,

This is from Bob Smith, as far as I can see the only contributor to the website from Didcot dairy.

I notice that there are considerable contributions from the Reading depots. especially Woodley. When I was a driver's mate in my early years at Didcot Dairy, my driver was one Len Branch and we serviced Shinfield retail depot and Woodley depot on a daily basis.

To the son of Les Neate (the yardman at Woodley) I believe I knew your father quite well as did Len, although being just a boy I personally never knew his name. The yardman at Shinfield was called Dennis Annettes I think.

To the the contributors from Reading depots to your site, there was life before Hanworth started to supply your milk. We did it from Didcot for years, its a shame no-one seems to be aware of this earlier history. If we were late we had all sorts of problems because of the congestion in the small yards when all the job and finished milkmen were there wanting to get home for the day.The relationship between the lorry drivers and the retail men wasn't always easy. We had to maintain a schedule so the milk floats had to be taken out of our way causing lots of aggravation. Some of the retail men would help us, help which we were eternally grateful for!
        
Does anyone remember the tree at Tilehurst that got constantly in our way when backing in. All of us had a bit of lucky wood off it, as we liked to call it, when occasionally we missed - oops!!  Can anyone  recall when Hanworth had to bottle all of Didcots production for a day when a huge electrical storm knocked out all of the local electricity supply? A driver we called "Husky" Teague with me as his mate delivered our last load of the day to Tilehurst at 2100, as you may gather it was a long day.

One other point I would make is that Didcot had a retail branch on the site and their own Fridge on the Dairy premises. The picture you had appealing for information as to where a certain retail depot was, looked suspiciously like Didcot. The reason I tell you this is because in the list of retail branches its not there, nor is the Dairy included as a premises in the website only being mentioned in passing.
 
Good luck

Bob Smith

Hi

I wonder if anyone might be able to assist me...

I’m writing a book about growing up on a housing estate called The Slade. The Slade was a homeless families unit based on an old army camp close to the Horspath Industrial Estate in Oxford.  

As kids one of the things we did during summer school holidays was sit on the wall outside Job’s Dairy and ask float drivers if they needed help with their deliveries and we all got jobs for the day which was a great way to earn some money for sweets. I was wondering if anyone could maybe provide some background info on the Oxford depot so that I can mention it in the book (it’s a work of fiction). The year that I remember is probably 1968. The Slade closed in 1970 and is now part of Shotover Country Park.

I just need some basic info if possible:-

How many floats operated from the depot?
When did the plant open/close?
Do any ex-employees remember the kids that sat on the wall waiting for a job? (at 4.30am too)

I seem to recall I worked for a couple of different milkmen, one who did the Wheatley round and one who did the Headington/Wood Farm round.

I also remember being invited to a Job's Dairy family day at Horspath Sports Ground where I met one of the milkman's own kids.

Apologies if this message appears a bit vague but I would appreciate it if anyone from Job’s can enlighten me!

Best Regards

Jim McNaught

Dear Editor,

My son Ben sent me the above link this morning when he discovered a reference to his grandfather, Harry Sutton, the dancing teacher. 

I married in UK in 1968 and emigrated to Australia with my new husband. Sadly my father passed away in his early 60s. My mother, Yvonne, still lives at the same address in Didcot as she did when my father worked for Job's.

I made a tour of Job's with my school, receiving free drinks, cakes and colouring books at the end.  It was really interesting.  I also attended many of the wonderful Christmas parties.  As I got older, I helped my father sometimes on his milk round through the country villages, especially at Christmas time, when he liked to do a double round on Christmas Eve to enable him to spend Christmas Day at home with the family.  I can remember it was a very long day.  We would start really early on Christmas Eve morning (when it was freezing cold) and then repeat the round late in the afternoon into the evening, through such villages as East and West Hagbourne, Harwell and beyond. 

My mother still loves to dance, when she can, and I am now dancing too and loving every minute of it. 

I am now eager to purchase a copy of Bob Smith's book to read more.

Kind regards
Lynne Tomlins

Adelaide, Australia.

Well I don't know if my email will reach anyone that I know from the Job's days but my name is John Miller. I know Bob and Anne Smith and also worked as a drivers mate at the same time as Bob so know exactly what he is talking about on the web page.

I left the UK some 40 odd years ago and have lived in various parts of the world including New Zealand and Rhodesia. I am now living in Queensland, Australia. My brother Martin Miller still lives in Didcot.

It will be interesting to see if I get a reply to my email.

Regards

John Miller


Hi,

DIDCOT PEOPLE - REMEMBER THESE? Walter (Jock) Mowatt's daughter Sandra has sent in some photos of Didcot social gatherings. Read her email and see the photos here READ MORE...