A determined defender of the special qualities of Summertown and Woodstock, Kate Stanley, has died at the age of 88.

For more than 50 years she was a resident and familiar figure in both communities, often rallying support to protect and promote its institutions such post offices, libraries and shops.

Mrs Stanley was an active member of the Liberal Party in North Oxford, a longstanding visitor to the blind and a meals on wheels worker.

She also worked as a volunteer in the archaeology department at the Oxfordshire Museum in Woodstock and provided key research to a book on economic food, Make Ends Meet.

Born in 1920 in Surrey, her father was a shipping line executive. She attended Athol Crescent College in Edinburgh, before moving to Cambridge where she married Louis Stanley, a writer and broadcaster, who was to become a leading figure in the Formula One racing world.

When the marriage ended in 1948 she came to the Oxford.

Her last year was spent in the Green Gates Nursing home in Summertown, where she died on September 18 after a brief illness. She was cremated at Oxford Crematorium.