THE early 1960s brought new prosperity to Oxford.

The Cowley Road was changing as shoppers’ habits were altered. More of them had cars and could get around the city far more easily.

On July 31, 1962, the Oxford Mail reported on the ‘changing face of Cowley Road’, as parents took their children shopping between 5pm and 8pm rather than the previously favoured Saturday afternoon.

People were being drawn in from ‘country areas’ to the street’s stores.

That ‘housewives, office and factory girls’ could pop into the shops to visit the hairdresser because of longer opening times was a sudden novelty.

Supermarkets opening from 8.30am and closing at 5.30pm on weekdays and 5pm on Saturdays proved another draw.