Doris Goddard (31 Aug 1936 - 23 Dec 2025)

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In loving memory of Doris Goddard who sadly passed away on 23rd December 2025

Doris Elsie Diana Goddard was known as Dot or Diana to her family, to her friends from the stamp world, the Swindon u3a, and the Ermin Street allotments.

She was born in August 1936 into a farming family at Woolton Hill near Newbury.

She was a studious girl and loved her books. This love led to a place at grammar school – where she was forced to play lacrosse, which she hated. She then went on to East Hampstead Teacher Training College. She always wanted to teach infants, and her first teaching post was at Eastfields Infants school in Newbury. Her next teaching job brought her to Swindon – although she once said that it could easily have been the Falkland Islands, or even Australia, as she had set her heart on teaching abroad at that time.

Diana had three daughters - Alison, the eldest arriving in 1965, followed by the twins Julie and Paula in 1970.

After raising her children she returned to teaching 20 years later, running classes for adults who wanted to learn to read and write.

But little did she know that a new venture awaited her - running a stamp and postcard shop with her husband Ken. The shop was originally in Commercial Road, Swindon, before moving to Wyvern Square, it stayed open almost 20 years.

Diana was a keen gardener and decided she needed more acreage than her small back garden, so she took on an allotment at Ermin Street. Another hobby involving digging was archeology. She passed an A/S level in archeology with a grade A, and took part when the Time Team TV programme came to Swindon.

In later years Diana travelled the world, as she had wanted to as a young teacher, going on holiday with Ken to such far-flung places as New Zealand, the USA and the Canary Islands.

Diana and Ken lived their entire married life in Frilford Drive for more than 50 years until Ken died in 2013.

At the age of 89, after a short illness, Diana passed away peacefully at home. She was surrounded by family and photographs of her loved ones, and was watching the birds coming to her beloved garden.