For more than half a century, my friend May Hall, who has died aged 98, was the life and soul of the village of Sunningwell, between Oxford and Abingdon. It all began with the village hall, where she and her husband, Ron, took over as caretakers in 1963.
Soon she was on the parish council, chairing it for some years. She also served as a magistrate in Abingdon from 1968 to 1981, and as a governor of Sunningwell primary school, which had been built opposite her house. She threw herself into church activities – contributing her own brand of Christian socialism until differences caused her to join the Baptists, where she had a hand in everything, still the chapel cleaner in her 90s.
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