Sound Recordings, Essex

Description

Arthur Wapling, recorded in East Mersea; talks about farming methods; ploughing with horses - describes a stetch, dividing the field, (water) furrows and drainage; modern day farming - compares working hours with what they were in the past; labour supply and costs; (Suffolk) farm horses; reference to horses still working in Norfolk; local agricultural shows ([?Little/?Great] Bromley, near Colchester and Clacton-on-Sea); Tendring Hundreds; local boatbuilder; changes in the village and the growth of caravan sites; decline of the local fishing trade; changing employment situation (more engineering jobs); informant's work as a seed farmer - describes seed collection, using a stationary combine, spring/autumn sowing, the effects of poor weather on harvests; the oyster industry at West Mersea; describes oyster beds; winkle picking; County Fairs - now dominated by agricultural machinery, also horse jumping, animal parade and judging; informant judging/competing in ploughing matches; hedge laying; thatching corn stacks; thoughts on children's behaviour, parental control and punishments; collector asks some questions from the Dieth-Orton Questionnaire, used for the Survey of English Dialects. [Tr. 2] [Collector announcement]; Fred Martin of Cornish Hall End talks about ferreting for rabbits [wife contributes]; describes the method of thatching a haystack; other farm jobs, including stockman, shepherd, sheep rearing, dipping and shearing by hand; farm horses; describes the job of a horse man; agricultural wages; ploughing with horses; horse man marking the field; transporting wheat/barley/corn to mills by waggon; condition of the roads; stone picking for road mending; cart/waggon maintenance; carting manure onto fields; carting in 1917 (chaff, straw to railway station for Army horses); the set stick for keeping cart traces apart; agriculture in the village - labour, mangel-wurzle growing, sugar beet, mechanisation, tractors, hedging and ditching, amalgamation of fields; describes hedge laying; trimming faggots for kindling - describes binding faggots, price per score. [Tr. 3]

Metadata

Identifier syvlgmw5
IRN 414840
Class Mark LAVC/SRE/A789r
Level Item
Type of Record Archives - ISAD(G)
Peristent Link http://prototype1.library.leeds.ac.uk/syvlgmw5
Collection(s) Leeds Archive of Vernacular Culture
Category Archive
Parent Record Audiotape Sound Recordings
Creator(s) Berntsen, Howard N
Date 1959-1961
Size and Medium 1 x 14.6cm open reel spool, Duration: 86' 52".

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