OBITUARY
Doris Evelyn Mercer who was born on 20th November 1912, just seven months after the Titanic sank, sadly passed away on 7th November 2010, aged 97. She spent all her life in Oxford, and most of it in Jericho. Nearly all her life in number 18 and 20 Nelson Street. She had some early childhood life in Cowley, but moved with her parents and brother Cecil to number 20 Nelson Street in the early 1930s.
She met and married Leslie John Mercer on August 20th 1940, and moved into number 18 Nelson Street. Sadly Les passed away in 1972, and Dot (as she was known) was a very tough and independent lady, and spent the rest of her life living on her own, and coping very well until her later years. When the old 18 Nelson Street was knocked down for new development she had a brief spell in Jericho Street, and when the new flats in Nelson Street were finished, she asked the council if she could have number 18 back, the council duly obliged, and the new number 18 was in exactly the same spot as the old number 18, so in effect she had lived there for 70 years.
Dot worked all her life, firstly - as far as we know - at Morrell's Brewery at the Lion works in Oxford, then later at a large grocery and greengrocery shop on Cornmarket Street called Grimley & Hughes. After that she worked as a cleaner at the Scala Cinema on Walton Street, which is now the Phoenix Cinema, and finally moved on to the Oxford Playhouse on Beaumont Street, where she worked as a housekeeper until her retirement at the ripe old age of 75. A well know resident of Jericho she could often be seen riding a cycle around the area until late into here 80's. She would have kept riding it if her children Geoff and Lesley had not taken it off of her for her own safety..! She leaves her son Geoff and daughter Lesley, five grandchildren, and eight great grandchildren.