Obituaries

Passed away 28 November 2022, aged 83

Tribute to Tony Wood, provided by his son Joe Wood (Old Trident, Wortley 1992-1997)

Everyone has said that my dad was a perfect gentleman, that he helped them and their families and their businesses and that he was truly compassionate. He lived to give.

Joseph Anthony Wood, Tony to all who knew him, was born on 20th May 1939, to Blanche (nee Holmes) and Ernest Wood of Birstwith. Tony’s brother Thomas had been born 18 months previously.

Ernest ran the family flour mill, F.T. Wood & Sons and the family lived next to the mill, in a house called Ashleigh.  The war started only three months after Tony was born and Ernest was very quickly called up to serve. From 1940 to 1945 Ernest was abroad. In fact, he only returned at the end of the war. These difficult years influenced Thomas and Tony for the rest of their lives. The boys had free run of the mill and the bakery, encouraged by their Grandpa. Thankfully, Ernest returned safely from war and one year later Ruth was born and four years later Jennifer.

Family holidays were to Bridlington and in later years to Filey, which was to become a favourite spot of Tony’s.

Thomas and Tony were sent to boarding school in 1946, firstly to Saint Olaves in Ripon and then to Trent College in Long Eaton.

They became driven by their mother’s burning desire for the success of her sons.  Tony was someone who would hide his light under a bushel. He did this in business and in his family life. He would keep quiet about his accomplishments.  So, it often comes as a surprise when anyone learns that when Tony was still at school (Trent College), he became a talented magician and fire eater! He joined the Magic Circle when he was 17, at the same time as a young man from Middlesborough called Paul Daniels!  With help from Uncle Thomas (OT, Wortley 1951-1953), Tony and his friend Geoffrey Atkinson (OT, Wortley 1951-1955) put together a fire eating act which they performed at the then Grand Hotel in Harrogate, as well as all over the country, including at Magic Circle conventions in Eastborne and Southport.

The act involved, at one point, Tony lighting a cigarette from a flaming arrow as it flew past him mid-air from a bow which Geoffrey Atkinson had just fired towards the wings of the stage where Thomas was standing-by to catch the arrow, out of sight of the audience, into an enormous mass of sacking covered in alum, to put the flames out. The next big magic trick took place when he was 19, which was an escapologist trick performed at the opening of the Knaresborough Annual Festival. Tony escaped from a big packing case which had been put on display in the marketplace in Knaresborough for the public to scrutinise, during the week or so leading up to the event. Tony was tied into a mail bag and then 4 locked into the packing case which was then lowered by a crane into the River Nidd. Given the freezing temperatures of the water and the depth, he had only a few moments to escape in front of the big crowds who gasped when he didn’t appear and then after some disturbance he came up.

Tony’s days doing magic and eating fire must have taught him a lot about stagecraft and how to deal with a crisis or two. He certainly needed those skills once he got started in the bakery trade.

The magic act and fire eating came to an end when Tony was called for National Service. Tony joined the Navy and put his National Service time to good use by training to become a mechanical engineer. This was to later help him enormously in the bakery business when all things productive became mechanical.

F.T. Wood and Sons had been going from strength to strength. After National Service, a training for Tony had been organised at accountants in Leeds to equip him for working at the flour mill. Thomas and Tony were going to be trusted to lead it into the future. The future was full of anticipation.  But then disaster struck; on Christmas Eve 1962 Ernest (Tony’s father) took ill and he passed away on Christmas Day. In those days there was a harsh regime of Death Duties to be paid to the government. This meant that Ernest’s sudden untimely death led to the business and indeed the family home being sold to pay those duties. The family flour mill unfortunately fell into the hands of a corporate business called Staveley Industries, who, only six months later sold it on again to Spillers. These events, leading to the family business falling outside of family ownership, had a profound impact on Tony.  Something which he spoke about from time to time in the future and which lead to him committing that whatever he did in business in the future, it would be a family business, for generations to come.

Tony had no hesitation in starting in business again, from scratch, on his own. That decision is what took him and Christine into baking and the founding of what has become the family business today, Country Style. They set about this with commitment and hard work, even before they were married. Tony married Christine on Tony’s 25th birthday in 1964. By which time, Tony’s “rank or profession” was rightly recorded on their marriage certificate as “Baker” and Christine’s “rank or profession” was recorded on the marriage certificate as “Confectionary Sales Lady.” This was an early indication of what was to become a unique, remarkable, lengthy, and extremely successful partnership in both marriage and in business.

Tony and Christine were married for 58 years. Their commitment to each other has been outstanding, as has their commitment to the bakery, where they worked night and day. Initially the baking was done in the extremely early hours by Tony and Christine and the selling of the products was done by way of van rounds, which they also drove themselves, through the growing housing estates.

In those days, housewives purchased their loaves of bread from a fleet of bread vans which did the rounds. In the late 1970s, our country was in a situation of widespread strikes and industrial disputes. One such strike was the Bread Strike of 1977. Whilst all of the big plant bakers were ground to a halt by reason of industrial dispute and a shortage of bread emerged, independent bakers, family bakers, were baking and selling every loaf they possibly could. The ovens were kept hot and full around the clock and this was a lucrative time. This paid for investment by Tony and Christine into freezing equipment and what started as a pioneering experiment into the sale of deep-frozen bread and bakery products.

They discovered that it would stay fresh for months and after a short second bake, it would be crusty and fresh out of the oven as if freshly made from scratch. To begin with they used the deep freeze to make stock in advance for peak sales at weekends, bank holidays and when there were big events. They soon realised that they could supply bread to new outlets which could not make their own bread from scratch but still wanted to sell freshly baked products. After study trips to the United States, including Atlantic City, Tony returned with an understanding of doughnuts, their production methods, the equipment that was needed and the market for them. It was on study trips such as these that he first contacted like-minded bakery entrepreneurs such as Paul Fletcher, Trevor Storer and Malcolm Skelton and these trips fuelled his ambition. The rise of the supermarkets brought about big changes. Tony and Christine’s work partnership was key to the transformation from a retail bakery to a successful wholesale business. Tony was no longer the actual baker, he was running a large bakery business and although Christine might still have been called a Confectionary Sales Lady, she was now calling on supermarkets and big national accounts.

Although work was a big feature in Tony’s life and he worked very hard, he overwhelmingly loved his wife and children. He ensured that there were joyful holidays in what became a long series of Volkswagen caravanettes (which also doubled as bread delivery vans during the week) and eventually a much-visited bungalow in Filey.

Tony continued his love of engaging with the bakery trade at exhibitions and trade shows once family had arrived. The whole family attended trade shows & exhibitions all over the UK & Europe, overnighting in the Volkswagen caravanette, parked up outside many an exhibition centre or conference hall.

The principle of never paying a dividend and always ploughing profits back into the business led to rapid expansion. The business took on contracts with British Rail InterCity to serve Danish Pastries onboard and it was soon proved that the business was capable of taking on large contracts. The experiments in the early days of freezing bread after the bread strikes lead to the development of “bake off” in store bakeries, which became a large part of the business. The business took on the accreditations it now needed. New financial systems and engineering resources were put in place.

Over the years there were many individuals who through loyalty, respect and friendship with Tony contributed to the establishment and development of the business. His popularity greatly contradicted his lifestyle. People wanted to do a good job for him, enjoyed working with him and wanted to see the business grow.

Tony liked to try things and he really liked a trier in other people. He favoured the underdog and liked to approach things from unconventional angles. Anyone who has directly worked with him will tell you of his incredible ability to ask highly challenging questions which suddenly make one view situations or circumstances in a totally different light. It was based upon incredible instincts which were mostly always right. But he was never the sort of person to say I told you so.

Tony always attended National Association of Master Bakers events and the friendships and bakery trade comradery of that organisation brought him great pleasure. It was kind of the organisation to bestow Lifetime Membership on him and Christine in 2018.

Tony was an extremely humble and down to earth man, who did not seek the limelight or public attention. For a man who shied away from the spotlight, he leaves behind a legion of fans. He was a private man who harboured many thoughts in his mind but only shared them with a select few.

Tony had enormous vision and foresight. He laid down things for the future and looked ahead.

In August [2023], Tony visited the bakery to see a large new production line which had just started making products after almost two years of planning, building, installing, and commissioning. To avoid the stairs, minimise steps and make the visit manageable for Tony, Joe organised to drive to the side of the building and go in through a fire exit which opened immediately into the bakery. As usual, Tony decided last minute that he wanted to set off much earlier than planned and arrived, as usual, a bit before anyone was expecting him to turn up.  Tony and Joe slipped into the bakery and wandered up and down past the new equipment and settled in a spot where Tony watched hundreds of lovely products whisking past like soldiers and colleagues finishing them off with skill and care. It was the largest scale that had ever done. Tony and Joe stood there together and watched. There were tears rolling down Tony’s cheeks, as he said, “I never imagined that this was how it would be.”

Whilst no one knew it would be, at the time, that was Tony’s last visit to the bakery.

Tony passed away peacefully at home at Birstwith, Harrogate with his family around him, on 28 November 2022 aged 83 years.

Tony leaves behind and is sorely missed by his wife Christine, sons John, Patrick and Joe and granddaughter Gretel.

Recording of Joseph Anthony Wood’s funeral service