Source: Wikimedia Commons
In 1974 a farmhouse that fed itself was managing four incompatible climates in one underground room, by hand, against the weather, from October until June.
Potatoes wanted cold,…
Source: Wikimedia Commons
It was at the edge of town, near the tracks if the town had tracks, in a long building with a loading dock down one side and a…
Source: Wikimedia Commons
In 1974 a fourteen-year-old in a farming county could be hired for the summer by turning up at a crossroads at four in the morning and giving a…
Source: Wikimedia Commons
In 1960 watercress was grown in shallow gravel beds fed continuously by spring water, on farms that existed where the geology put the spring and nowhere else.
It…
Source: Wikimedia Commons
In 1955 a hill shepherd lived out on the ground for six weeks at lambing, gathered a whole hill with two dogs and a whistle, carried everything up…
Source: Wikimedia Commons
In 1960 sugar beet were pulled out of the ground by hand, knocked together to shake off the soil, and topped with a heavy hooked knife swung thousands…