A VILLAGE shop that dates back more than 150 years has closed after the postmistress retired after 35 years behind the counter.

Yvonne Hood said she bought the shop and post office in Clyro, near Hay-on-Wye, as a business she could run while raising her two sons - but it is only now the 67-year-old is retiring.

The shop has stocked every item needed, from newspapers and groceries to local honey and bacon, but Yvonne’s retirement means as well as the closure of the historic shop the village will lose its only post office.

Yvonne and husband David, a carpenter, bought the shop and post office in September 1981 and moved into the house next door, where they will still live.

"I think my predecessor Gwen Tong was here 26 years but the shop was going well before she was here and I think the post office had been in three different locations in the village before it came into the shop when Gwen was running it."

Yvonne said the shop was trading during the 1860s when the famous diarist and clergyman Francis Kilvert lived at Ashbrook House next door to the shop.

"The shop was here before Kilvert’s time," said Yvonne who said her home is 400 years old and the shop, which is an extension, is 300 years old.

"There is bound to be a history to the shop and I might have time to look into it when I’ve retired."

Bizarrely the shop had featured in a television series about Kilvert during the 1970s which Yvonne had seen on TV.

The couple had moved to Hereford and then Eardisely, from Cardiff, after getting married and bought the shop after after a contact at work told David it was for sale.

Previously the couple had only ever been to Clyro for a meal at the Baskerville Arms.

"I didn’t think I would be here 35 years," said Yvonne who had worked as a civil servant in Cardiff before being a full-time mum.

"I wanted something to do, but didn’t want to go off to work so I could be here for my sons.

"With the shop I could be here when my sons were growing up, that to me was all important. I would be in the shop and they would be in the house next door.

"They were seven and eight at the time and we thought we might be here 10 years or so but we saw them them through Clyro and Gwernyfed schools and now my grandchildren are at Gwernyfed.

"Years ago, when we were living in Hereford, we had gone to the Baskerville Arms as we were told it was a good place to eat but I never thought then I would end up owning the shop, not at all."

As well as selling all the village’s essential supplies the shop, on Church Road, is at the centre of the village life.

Yvonne, who is a member of the local Women’s Institute, keeps the keys to the village hall in the shop and stocks the church magazine.

Having got up to open her shop for 9am every morning for the past 35 years, during which time Yvonne thinks she and David have only taken five holidays, she says she is looking forward to retirement and a lie in.

But she said she will miss the day to day interaction with her steady stream of customers.

"The one thing I will miss is the customers, the people, they have been marvellous."

Yvonne said her customers also helped her through the only illness to have kept her from the counter.

"I have got some lovely customers and when I first took over I went down with anything anyone brought in. I was ill for about a month and David had to take over the shop but my customers were absolutely marvellous and were cooking things and helping him.

"But I don’t go down with anything now, but I haven’t been ill since."

Yvonne said no-one had wanted to take on the business, which she blamed on the changing nature of rural life.

"Hay is only a mile down the road and a lot of people work outside the village now and do their shopping in the major towns," said Yvonne who also said since buying the shop the main road had been built, by passing the former centre of the village.

Customer Dorothy Dempster said she would be sorry to see the shop close. She said: "It is absolutely the focus of the village, everything goes on here and people can leave messages with Yvonne and she is involved with everything.

"She is going to be very, very missed. She’s done absolutely stirling work all the time she’s been here and nothing is too much trouble for her."

Nicholas Keeble added: "Yvonne is the most helpful postmistress in the country."

To mark Yvonne’s retirement residents held a celebration at the Baskerville Arms.