Couple to leave riverside pub after three decades

A COUPLE are to leave the pub they have run for 30 years.

Tony Read and Pat Thatcher, who took over the Flower Pot in Aston in 1992, are Brakspear’s longest-serving tenants.

They will leave next month but will then become customers as they live in the village.

The couple took over when they learned the landlord was leaving even though they had no experience — Mr Read had been a builder and Mrs Thatcher a caterer.

Mr Read, 73, said: “We were in here one Sunday night with a gang that used to always come in and the landlord, Graham Jones, said he was packing up, so I said to Pat, ‘Do you fancy a pub?’

“She said ‘yes’ and that got the ball rolling.”

Being close to the Thames Path and having a large garden, the Flower Pot is a popular stopping-off point for walkers and cyclists, particularly in the summer.

Mrs Thatcher said: “It was quiet when we started. The weekends were busy but not as busy as now.”

The pub has been used as a location for films and TV shows including Miss Marple and Pie in the Sky and has been visited by a number of celebrities. Mr Read said: “Tom Jones has been here and we had Brigitte Nielsen when she was still Sylvester Stallone’s wife.

“They did an episode of Pie in the Sky here and they did a four-hour long thing called The Sculptress with Pauline Quirk where she murdered her parents.”

Another visitor was footballer turned actor Vinnie Jones.

Mrs Thatcher said: “He was my favourite. I have a picture hanging up of me with him. He used to shoot on the estate and he’d come in here for dinner.”

The pub has another attraction — Britain’s largest private collection of cased fish with more than 100 adorning the walls, including a pike that weighed more than 50lb. Mr Read said: “The fish were here when Mrs Mace, an ex-landlady, had it. She had about a dozen cases in here. Then when Graham Jones took it over for five years, all the fish went.

“When I took it over, I said I was going to get the fish back and it went from one extreme to the other and there are about 90 cases now.

“Some are staying but we don’t know now as they had an interior designer come in, although he said, ‘You would be a mug to get rid of this lot’.

“I know the bar is staying as it is and that’s full of fish.

“If the next landlord doesn’t want them they will go to auction.”

The couple’s favourite is a large case with two salmon that they caught but they won’t be taking it home as a memento. Mr Read said: “We have only got 6ft ceilings in our cottage. You’d have to get on your knees to look at it.”

The couple will call last orders for the final time on Saturday, September 17 when the pub will host a disco, hog roast and a buffet.

Mrs Thatcher said: “We will put on a bit of a spread; it’ll be a little bit of a bash.”

The couple will soon be back but at the other side of the bar.

Mr Read said: “People in here ask what we are going to do when we retire and I tell them, ‘Exactly what you are doing now — sitting there enjoying yourself.”

They also plan to spend time with their three daughters, Max, Michelle and Loraine, and their grandchildren and great grandchildren.

“Work has been seven days a week but it has been a good pub,” said Mr Read.

Tom Davies, chief executive of Brakspear, said: “Tony and Pat are legendary in Aston and the surrounding area as the landlord and landlady of the unique pub that is the Flower Pot. Thirty years really is something to be celebrated.

“Paddy the parrot has become almost as synonymous with the pub as the couple and has definitely enhanced the eccentricity and quirky nature that has put this pub on the map.

“We wish them well from the bottom of our hearts and know that they won’t be strangers. It has been a pleasure working with them.”