As promised, we’re continuning to plough through those 1960s Batsford pub guides underlining interesting nuggets: this time, it’s the turn of John Camp’s Oxfordshire & Buckinghamshire Pubs.
Pub guides aren’t really designed to be read, and long stretches of this one are pretty dry, but there was just enough salt in the caramel to keep us going to the end.
Part 1: Oxfordshire
The Lambert Arms, Aston Rowant: ‘Special drinks’ include Courage’s E.I.P.A. — would that be East India Pale Ale? The beer index at the back doesn’t elaborate and this is the only pub in the book serving it.
The Inn Within, Banbury: ‘It is a free house, but might better be described as a “free-for-all” house. Victorian in design, one of the several barn-like bars is decorated almost entirely with mirrors, the result being an impression of being in the centre of a long series of identical rooms stretching away into the void.’ An early use of ‘barn-like’, there, now frequently applied to Wetherspoon pubs and similar. Was this Scaramanga’s Fun House arrangement not confusing to drunks? ‘At various times one may enjoy roller-skating, all-in wrestling, or simply relax and watch a boxing match!’ (There’s more on all this at the Banbury Guardian.)
The Reindeer, Banbury: ‘The great glory of The Reindeer was, at one time, the Globe Room… [with] magnificent plaster ceiling and panelling said to have been designed by Inigo Jones. Ceiling and panelling were removed and sold to an American collector, but before this act of desecration could be completed an enlightened corporation bought them back, and happily they remain in this country… Unhappily there were not re-installed in the Globe Room.’ A rare bit of good news: eventually, they were.