When Lloyd Hughes Owens created a series of albums in the late 1970s and early 1980s there were people alive who could remember seeing Fred Able in Bampton with his little cart, two donkeys and his dog.

This article was written by Fenella Gray in the summer of 2012 where she documents the history of the Community Shop up to that point.
In 2008 the Archive made a film about the Community Shop up to that point. For a while, the shop had to close because the owners of the premises felt the storage facility at the back was a fire hazard but happily, the shop re-opened not too long after next door but one in Rosemary Lane with much improved facilities.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Hkz-LOLJmk This is the link to the 2008 film made by the Archive

These are just five of the adverts in the July 2012 issue of The Bampton Beam and are for

Little Westbrook self catering in Bridge Street
A personal trainer
Prestige Buildings
Bampton Garage
S J Cooper, builder

Originally called the Bampton Charity Shop, it had a name change and a legal status changed to enable it to donate monies to other charities in Bampton. Apparently a charity cannot give money to another charity and Trevor Milne-Day gave his time to deal with the legal matter of the change. In this article Fenella Gray talks about the history of the shop from its inception in 2004.

A bird was found to have made its nest inside the letterbox at Bampton and Brize Norton Railway station by Mrs Emmie Papworth who along with Mr F G Cannons was a post lady in Bampton about 1960. It was thought to be a member of the tit family and was disturbed only once while the eggs were being hatched.