This was  the village bakery until 1939. It is now known as Pax cottage. The bread was baked in old-fashioned bread ovens and there used to be a lovely smell of home-made bread all down Back Lane.                                        

There were two bakers ,firstly Mr Stracey and later  on Phil Cook . Bread was delivered to Miserden , Sudgrove and  Edgeworth by pony and cart . Later on a model T Ford  replaced the pony and trap. One  memorable delivery was to the  Workhouse in Stroud. Les Brown remembered the inmates,  “they all wore long white  corduroy trousers and you used to see them by the garden wall, asking for fags and all that sort of thing “

Making bread in these old ovens was hot hard work which would start at 3 am when the ovens were  lit. The boys sent to collect the loaves for their  families were rewarded with “hot bread, – lovely bread, beautiful bread”

The cottage is probably decorated for the coronation of George V which dates the photo to 1911. It  would be interesting if it were possible to read the two notices by the door.

Research Juliet Shipman