CHAPTER 9 – August 2002
9th August – Friday
These last ten days have been so busy, not with working but with entertaining and being entertained. John's mum spent just over a week with us before we took her to stay with Jim and Ann at Coughton near Ross-on-Wye where we spent a couple of days. Their house and garden is so beautiful and standard of living way above any I could have envisaged when I was a child.
Signs of harvest were everywhere evident as we travelled over to Ross. Unlike my early childhood though there are only straw bales being moved about by tractors and trailors. Sheaves of corn are nowhere to be found demonstrating the continuing mechanisation of harvesting.
Back in the early 1950s life would be extremely hectic at this time of the year. Although it was essential to get the corn cut in dry weather it was also vital to have a stretch of hot days so that the stooks could dry out and be gathered in before getting wet again. After the Oats had been cut Dad would move onto the Barley, Rye and Wheat in that order. Nowadays there is no Oats or Rye grown in Yorkshire. Rye was the very worst to stook followed closely by Barley. The spiky ears seemed to get inside our clothes, scratching us to pieces.
The gaumers would be put on to the trailer and hooked onto the back of the tractor. Two pitch forks and a couple of ropes would be put into the trailer. Minnie and Jean would ride in the trailer with me and usually Jock the dog would come along for the ride. Before I was old enough to drive the tractor from stook to stook, when I was about nine or ten, I would try and keep out of the way on the trailer. Minnie was a good loader and if Dad was busy Jean or Squib would be the one to toss up the sheaves. Minnie would carefully layer the sheaves in a criss-cross pattern to make the load as secure as possible. If she was at the far corner of the load I might drag the sheaf over to keep up the speed. Everything seemed to be done at top speed. When the load was done a rope would be attached to a hook at the front of the trailer and tossed up so that we could grasp it and drag it over the top of the load and let it down the other side where it would be wound round another hook, taken to one at the back and the process repeated. Sometimes Minnie would ride home with me on top of the load but sometimes I would stay up because I was frightened of the climb down. Back home in the stackyard a ladder would be lent against the load and then I could get down safely.
Back in the stackyard I would be sent to fetch the drinkings which our team would eat before unloading the trailer. That being done (of which more tomorrow), I would be sent back in to collect the drinkings to take back to the team in the field.
By the time I met John harvesting had totally changed. No longer did we have to lead sheaves but rather heavy straw bales which had replaced them. The first time John came to spend a day on the farm he had an experience that will never be forgotten. By this time, when I was eighteen, I was the loader and considered to be quite good at that. John always used the excuse that his hands must be kept soft in order to work with the delicate nylon yarn that he handled each day. Consequently he was more of an observer than a useful worker. On that particular day we were leading bales from the Jimmy Longs down Oxen Lane. Brother John insisted that the load we were working on was good enough to take a couple of extra layers. I didn't agree with him but it would mean that we could clear the field if he was right. So this very high load was made and secured with a rope. It was also decided that we could hook a second load onto the back of the first to save yet another journey. A friend called Des drove the tractor pulling the two trailers, Sut, Minnie's husband sat inside the tractor cab whilst John and I rode on top of the first load. We lay side by side John's arm being under my neck. As we drove along by the railway line the telegraph wires seemed to hang only inches away from our faces. As the tractor pulled out of Oxen Lane onto the road through the village the bales became very unstable and a crack opened up. Suddenly half the load had disappeared and John with it landing in Mrs Theakston's garden. Momentarily it seemed that my half of the load was going to remain just wavering but sure enough down I tumbled with bales falling about my head. We were fine and much amused as everyone fussed around not noticing that poor old Sut was pinned under a pile of bales unable to move. I can remember little about the clearing up but there was certainly a mess and this wasn't the first time this sort of thing had happened. Why had we listened to brother John. The loads were clearly too big to be safe.
From memory this was probably one of the last years that I helped on the farm so it's a good memory to be left with.
10th August – Saturday
Speaking to Margaret on the phone just now I heard that the flooding in Yorkshire has left the corn rotting in the ground. The weather patterns do seem to have changed over the last fifty years. Yesterday there were widespread flood warnings throughout Europe and Austria had its wettest August day since 1896.
It is only as I am prompted to consider my early history that I recognise just how lonely family life was when Margaret and Gerry left home. I suppose we all took each other for granted as we shared bed and bedroom all of our childhood life. When they left home I certainly remember visiting them often.
I was told so often by Mam that I should have been a boy and it was always stressed that in farming families boys were more important than girls. Perhaps that is why I tried so hard and so young to work properly on the farm. I can't remember Gerry and Margaret spending as much time as I did working on the farm and they were certainly never in any doubt as to their femaleness. In contrast I never wanted to be out of my trousers and I never had any wish to learn how to do things in the house. It was only in my forties that I began to recognise the strength of the women in our family and that I was pleased to be a woman. To her dying day Mam retained some strange belief that John and Andrew were more important in the scheme of things than Margaret, Gerry and me, and yet it was always the women in the family who made sure that she was able to live at home until the very end of her life.
Looking back to the harvesting I can now see why it was so important that I should impress Dad with my ability to work. I wanted to be recognised as being of equal value to my brothers. Probably I spent most of the time getting in everybody's way but I got full marks for effort.
Depending when the loads arrived back in the stackyard they would either be unloaded and stacked quickly and sent back into the field in an attempt to get as much back as possible before the weather changed. If the day was getting on a stacksheet might be thrown over the load and be stacked the next morning whilst uncut corn dried out enough before bindering.
The full trailer would be parked up alongside the Dutch Barn, the ropes taken off before Minnie climbed the ladder to the top of the load. She would rhythmically throw off sheaves of corn for Dad to build the new stack. This required several pickers who would pass the sheaves from one to another so that Dad had no more to do than build the stack. As the stack grew the elevator would be cranked up so that Minnie could drop the sheaves regularly onto the elevator belt that would carry them up and dropping them onto the growing stack. The elevator was forever breaking down and someone or other would have to climb along the belt to free it up in order to get it going again.
Eventually the stack would be right up to the roof of the barn leaving Dad and the pickers crouching low as every space was filled with corn. I always worried as to how we would get down as even the longest ladder would never reach right up to the roof. It was better if there was half a stack on which to jump as I was always a bit nervous of ladders. It's clear that I was never in any danger as there were never any accidents.
It is likely that harvesting with a binder would be very difficult in these wetter summers as so much depended on being able to cut the corn whilst it was dry and get it lead in before it got wet. With modern combines and drying equipment it is easier to harvest but even this modern technology can't overcome the amount of rain which this summer has given us.
26th August – August Bank Holiday
Since moving to Mortehoe, which is a seaside village, I have found that Augusts are just as full as when I was a child although in quite a different way. Whereas in my childhood the summer school holiday was very busy helping with the harvest, August now is spent entertaining family and friends.
Wendy, Kelly and Amy have spent a very happy ten days with us before being picked up by Andy. The weather was glorious which enabled them to spend many an hour on the beach with John who has decided that the ninety-four steps down to the beach are his absolute limit!
As a child there were times during the long summer holidays when I did have days or parts of days when I would have to amuse myself. Dinah usually went away with her mum for several weeks to a small Northumberland seaside village called Newbiggin which meant that I had to amuse myself.
On our back lawn was an old apple tree that was ideal for climbing and also good for swinging. Pieces of old rope were thrown over the lowest branch and a piece of wood from the wood pile fixed onto the rope to make a seat. Sometimes it was more comfortable to sit straight onto the rope though as a wrong piece of wood was unreliable. The rope would break many times in a season but would be knotted together again until it happened all over again.
At this time of the year the apples would be growing nicely but still a long way off being ready. However, that didn't stop me trying to catch an apple with my feet as the swing swung high into the branches. The apples on this tree though were very sour and eaten only as a last resort.
It's impossible to understand why I didn't suffer with severe stomach aches considering how much unripe fruit I ate. A few feet away from the big apple tree were Granny's small pear trees which at this time of the year had very hard, little brown pears which were almost impossible to get my teeth into. Of course I ate everything including the white, unripe pips. I'm surprised that any fruit made it through to full ripeness but we did have many fruit trees and together with my brother John I would go scrumping the neighbour's fruit which always seemed much sweeter than our many baking apples.
My favourite apple was from the Keswick tree, one of the many trees lining the dyke along the lane. I loved these apples when they were still very green and unripe. Somehow when they were ripe and a pale green, almost yellow, they were less flavoursome and too soft. At the same side of the lane were the Victoria plum trees with the best fruit dangling right over the dyke. On the opposite side of the lane were a couple of big baking apple trees which were quite tasty. The best eating apples of all were across the stackyard in Grandad's private garden that was protected by a hedge and a big single gate. He also grew peas in his garden and that was an added attraction for John and me. However, we were most definitely not allowed on this hallowed bit of ground and for most of the time we stayed well clear. I can't say that we never went in but when we did it would only be to help collect the peas and then under supervision.
I could never understand how Granny could make such light apple pies when Mam's pies seemed to be all crust and little fruit. This achievement of Mam was quite impressive considering that we had fruit in abundance.
After the apples had been picked in the Autumn, trays of fruit would be stored under Mam and Dad's bed along with hazelnuts picked from trees down the lanes. Their bedroom never seemed to loose the pervading smell of ripe fruit. I could never understand why we couldn't just enjoy lots of fruit as soon as it was picked instead of skimping, with the result that all our apple-pies were heavy and crusty with the minimum amount of filling.
Perhaps the above explains why I have always enjoyed baking apples used in crumbles and pie whilst at the same time resenting having to buy them from the vegetable shop. My reputation as a scrounger of fruit, from friends and relations with big gardens, is well earned.
30th August – Friday
After two to three weeks of glorious summer weather today is grey, dull and windy. Kelly and Amy are back at school following their long summer holidays. Back fifty years the harvest would be coming to a close if the weather had been good through August.
However, summer was by no means over for us as a family even though the nights had begun to draw in. The first week in September was the time when Dad would have a week off work and we would sometimes manage to get a holiday.
The last real family holiday I can just remember was the time we went to Wales on the train. I must have been six as Andrew had not yet been born and Margaret and Gerry were still at school. We were a good sized group as added to our six was Margaret Newby, a school-friend of my sister Margaret. She often used to come and sleep over and I remember just how much I used to like her in spite of the fact that I split my head open on the wall in the back yard when she was spinning me round by an arm and a leg.
The Welsh holiday was a resounding success. At that time in our lives we all knew how to enjoy each other's company. Dad was a different person away from the farm and loved going for long walks with us. Even Mam seemed to be more relaxed away from the farm. Although I have always looked up to and admired Dad's family I suppose it must have been hard for Mam to live on their doorstep. I think this holiday and the Christmas following were the last times that Mam really enjoyed herself with Dad and the four of us. Andrew arriving as Margaret and Gerry grew up, started work and then left home changed things dramatically.
This Welsh holiday was spent in a rather rickety chalet at Abergwelly but imagine our delight at finding that in the next two chalets was some sort of 'Boys Brigade'. Over time we had all caught something of the scouting spirit as Dad was the village scout leader and was very friendly with the area Scout Leader Harry Bramley who lived at North Duffield. I do remember our family joining together to play lots of games with the boys in the next chalets. However, the most vivid memory I have is of a large group photograph being taken just outside our chalet. It was to be the first time of many when I was to act like a baby in refusing to be on any photograph. Fortunately Mam and Dad had the good sense to ignore me totally and the only person to be sad about the whole affair was me. I am even sadder now as I sort through the old photographs to find that I don't figure along with those wonderful young boys. Perhaps I was just learning to be shy of boys. I do remember being infatuated by one of them. They were all much older than me of course.
At the time sisters and brother were all engrossed in getting on with their own lives at school and it is only as I have been writing this journal that Margaret and I have spoken of the problems caused by having a late summer holiday. Dad was always under the impression that the first few days and the last few days of a school term were wasted so that it didn't matter that school began a few days before our return home. What he didn't realise was that time-tables were written out, books distributed, dinner partners chosen and other essential details which made school easy to manage. We always got off to a bad start with a new teacher through no fault of our own. It was taken for granted that the needs of our farming life took precedence over anything else that might be going on in our lives. I often wonder what I could have achieved along with my brothers and sisters if our parents had put school needs first and recognised the value of doing homework. They never knew just how our friends were encouraged at school and how it would never occur to our contemporaries that it was not such a bad thing to miss school.
