James Gray, who was born in 1910 and grew up on the cobbled gaslit streets of Edwardian London, died the day after his 98th birthday.
Mr Gray, right, left school at 13 and married his first wife, Jane, in 1929. They had four sons, who were evacuated to Oxford during the Second World War, where Mr Gray and his wife joined them in 1942. He was conscripted to the Army as a Sapper in the Royal Engineers and demobbed in 1946.
Settling in Oxford, Mr Gray worked at Pressed Steel in Cowley until retiring in 1973.
He moved to Headington Quarry after the break up of his marriage and later married his second wife Gladys.
The couple moved to Ardley, near Bicester, where they owned the Corner Garage, and Mr Gray worked the petrol pumps until he was 86.
After Gladys passed away, Mr Gray returned to Trinity Road, in Headington Quarry. He died at the Oxford Community Hospital in Headington, on June 12.
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