Sylvia Gray

Sylvia Mary Gray (3 July 1909 – 27 April 1991) was an English businessperson and women's institute leader. She was the owner of the former coaching inn the Bay Tree Hotel in Burford, Oxfordshire that employed female members of staff for a career in hotel management and was a member of Witney Rural District Council, serving as its vice-chair for her final four years there. Gray was chair of the National Federation of Women's Institutes (NFWI) between 1969 and 1974 and was a member of various boards of public bodies. She was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire in 1952 and was upgraded to Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1975.

Early life Gray was born at 44 Clifton Road in Rugby, Warwickshire on 3 July 1909 and was the daughter of the racquet maker Henry Bunting Gray (whose family had made rackets coaches at Rugby School since 1867) and his wife Elizabeth Mary Frost. She had two siblings. Gray was taught at Wroxall Abbey. Gray purchased the former coaching inn the Bay Tree Hotel in Burford, Oxfordshire in the Cotswolds in 1935, and she would own and run the hotel for near to the next half a century. A 1971 resolution clarified that this meant it should have not been interpreted as stopping the WI village from being concerned with issues relating to religion and politics "provided the movement is never used for party-political or sectarian propaganda." and was upgraded to Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1975 "in recognition of her public service nationally on bodies". On 27 April 1991, she died at her home in Burford. Gray did not marry.