At an age when most people have been enjoying retirement for nearly 20 years, June Dixon is still enjoying the job she says has kept her young.

The 84-year-old has chalked up 50 years with the same city firm – and this was celebrated with colleagues at Pioneer keen to mark the milestone.

June joined the city food firm in 1966 – a year when The Beatles were still the biggest band around and England won the World Cup.

Now, five decades later, she is still going strong.

“I can’t believe it’s been all this time,” said June.

“I have to be working. I can’t just sit and do nothing.

“Even if I’m in the house I don’t just sit. I have to do something – though I’m not a fanatic who cleans non-stop – and I do love to be among people.

“That’s what I like going to work for. I like the company and being among people.

“And they’re all half my age. When I’m there I forget that I’m as old as I am.”

June, of Lingmoor Way, Harraby, started out at the firm as a comptometer operator – using one of the first calculators – on October 10, 1966.

She has no plans to retire and wants to continue working her one or two days a week while she can.

“I’m no different from anyone else but I’ve been one of these lucky people.

“If you’re not happy in your job it must be awful.

“Right from the very start I’ve always liked where I worked.

“So that must make a difference. I just can’t believe how they put up with me,” she added.

When her youngest son started school she decided it was time to go back to work.

At the time she applied for the job.

Being a comptometer operator was something that usually required a six-week training course but June was already a skilled operator, having been trained up and worked at Ferguson Bros at Holme Head when she left school.

Pioneer wanted a junior full-time operator but June wondered if they might take a part-time senior one instead.

She started, aged 34, at the Lowther Street office.

In those days she worked 9am to midday and 1.30pm to 4pm to be home for her children.

Until she was 74, she worked full-time but she now works two days a week.

Over the years a lot has changed at Pioneer, which has grown to become a huge food delivery service and retail business employing more than 300 people.

June quickly got used to working on computers.

She moved with the business from Lowther Street to the then-new headquarters at Rosehill in 1974.

She had a stint as wages clerk before suffering a heart attack a few years ago, which forced her to stay off work for six months, something June said she was “a bit put out” by.

June continues to show dedication and devotion to the company.

She has worked under three bosses – starting for Thomas Robert Jenkins, then Andrew Jenkins and now Graham Jenkins, the managing director – and seen a number of colleagues come and go.

Although she feels work has kept her young, June thinks that if she hadn’t lost her husband her path would have probably been different. Leonard died suddenly 28 years ago, aged 58.

“I got a bit of a shock then and I was in shock for a while but I just had to pick up and carry on,” she said.

“I don’t know whether I would have been here 50 years if my husband had still been alive.

“If he’d retired he wouldn’t have had me working. Work just kept me going, I went right back.”

June’s colleagues helped her celebrate by treating her to afternoon tea on Sunday and celebrations continued at the office to mark her long-standing achievement.