How far can restoration be pushed? Mining Photograph

[Prouty99]

That last photo has convinced me that the original is a photo of the employees and owner of a fairly large dairy farm.

Metal buckets, white clothing and hats.

If you had ever milked a cow you would know why they are wearing hats.

There are two halves to a dairy farm, the grass, the hay, fences calving etc, and the milking side,
Milkers dress in white and handle the milk from when it leaves the cow until it leaves the farm,
Farm workers muck out wash down and grow the grass, and move the hay into the cowshed.

A modern milking parlour feeds the milk into a bulk tank straight from the cow, with no human contact, but you still need to be sterile to dip your jug into the bulk tank to pour on your cereal.


Just my thoughts, but a close relative still milks 150 cows, as did his father and ggfather

Mike

Good grief, 150 cows? Busy guy that's for sure. that is proper hard work

So from the photo who do you think is the owner? I guess the guy wearing the plus fours isn't a regular farm worker, and my feeling is that the chap to the left of him is the other odd one out from the group although his hat still bothers me. Also if he is one of the two owners then I doubt he would want to be photographed with a farming tool and mistaken for the common folk.

As for the tool he is holding aloft my gut reaction is a cradle scythe (A serious bladed piece of kit and not something you would hold aloft)

Whatever that tool is interestingly looks left handed as a right handed one would jut out to the left whereas his juts out to the right behind his own head

If he did have something to do with milking what colour do you think his uniform would be? As a negative it appears both he and his companion with the spade have the lightest colours which means that as a normal image both are actually wearing the darkest colours of the group.

Below is a photo of someone holding a cradle scythe, although he isn't holding it bolt upright and his is a right handed one

[mazi]

Ok, for what its worth the guy with the shovel, it’s not a spade, is the owner.  On the left the guy with the bilhook and hat at an angle may be son or brother, and I still think it’s a female next to him, she would make butter or cheese with the surplus milk in summer, so part of the team.

On a farm of this size everyone would do the work, owner included, it was not that profitable back then, before the days of the milk marketing board and guaranteed sale of your quota at a fixed price

Mike

[Prouty99]

Ok, for what its worth the guy with the shovel, it’s not a spade, is the owner.  On the left the guy with the bilhook and hat at an angle may be son or brother, and I still think it’s a female next to him, she would make butter or cheese with the surplus milk in summer, so part of the team.

On a farm of this size everyone would do the work, owner included, it was not that profitable back then, before the days of the milk marketing board and guaranteed sale of your quota at a fixed price

Mike

Ah right...A shovel. Why didn't I spot that? So it isn't for ground work It's for mucking out in a dairy?

[Prouty99]

It also occurred to me that there seems to be a short shadow behind the two men to the far left which may suggest that the photo was taken before lunch around 10 or 11 am with the sun to the photographers rear and right.

I guess work starts really early on farms

[mazi]

I

I guess work starts really early on farms

6am 365 days a year  .  The bulk tanker arrives about 10-30, if the milk has not cooled to the correct temperature he won’t collect it and £300 quid goes down the drain.

 Mucking out is mechanised mostly nowadays, but the cows seem to object to a mechanised udder washer  .

Hygiene is vital, if the bacteria count is too high or the butterfat too low the buyer will reject it

[mazi]

I guess everyone is getting bored with me flying the flag for my relatives, and of course I could be completely wrong

[Prouty99]

I guess everyone is getting bored with me flying the flag for my relatives, and of course I could be completely wrong

Well we have a change of location now

I spoke to the owner of the photo and it's the usual 'I have no idea it came from a box of photos' kind of thing

What I did glean however is that the area of this farm is in the area of South Darbyshire, right on the border of Darbyshire and Staffordshire in the broad area of Mickleover, Repton, and Ashbourne

He had relatives from Repton and Mickleover, and another in London Road Ashbourne

He also believes that the person in the photo to the left back row (Our tall gaunt friend ) may be his relative Len White. He also reckons that the other relatives in Repton and Mickleover had the surname 'Roberts'

Now looking for a farm surrounding Mickleover in 1920 is relatively easy using ordnance survey maps of that timeframe (6 farms)

Repton for the same timeframe (1920) works out as 11 farms

Ashbourne on the other hand you can throw a rock in any direction and hit a farm (59 farms) but the closest date I could get a map for this area is 1897

So 76 farms in total

The Mickleover connection looks interesting as the relative there is the one with all the money at that time so maybe that relative was a farm owner?

Honestly I can't believe the amount of farms at that time but I suppose this is Darbyshire after all

Trust me Mazi, I'm not getting bored with your farming family, I wouldn't have learned half of the stuff I have learned over the last few days had It not been for your help on this. I'm from Wigan remember, we dug all our farms up to create mine shafts. A farm for me is a rarity

[Prouty99]

Nope, my mistake, the money was in Repton with the White family, and the money originally came from John Eales White esq 1801 - 1855 of the Taunton Brewing company of St.James in Taunton. The family sold the brewery at its height and moved to Fleet street in London before upping sticks and moving to Repton in Darbyshire

the tall chap on the back row of our farm photo is believed to be one of the White's descendants

Ok, for what its worth the guy with the shovel, it’s not a spade, is the owner.  On the left the guy with the bilhook and hat at an angle may be son or brother, and I still think it’s a female next to him, she would make butter or cheese with the surplus milk in summer, so part of the team.

On a farm of this size everyone would do the work, owner included, it was not that profitable back then, before the days of the milk marketing board and guaranteed sale of your quota at a fixed price

Mike

Ah right...A shovel. Why didn't I spot that? So it isn't for ground work It's for mucking out in a dairy?

I took on board your point about this being before the days of the milk marketing board and guaranteed sale of your milk at a fixed price, although I just found out that Nestle had a facility called the creamery in Ashbourne from 1910 and produced carnation milk. They even built their own private sidings to accept 'milk trains' from as far away as London. The tracks were finally lifted in 1965 and the factory closed in 2008

So a pretty big buyer of milk in the area of this farm !

[mike175]

I think there is a danger of making too many assumptions from limited evidence, although of course anyone is entitled to make whatever they wish of their own family photos 

The quality of the original image is too poor to be certain that there is only half a hayrake (which I'm fairly certain it is) and if it is perhaps it was broken. I'm fairly certain it isn't any type of scythe.

If the man on the right is carrying a shovel rather than a spade it is rather a small one for mucking out the cows, a job I spent many happy hours doing in my younger days 

It is risky to make assumptions about a man's status from his clothing. I once wore an army officers great coat and a lovely thick (and itchy!) pair of policeman's woollen trousers in the winter on the farm despite never having served in either capacity. Poorer people often wear second-hand clothes.

If you have a potential ID for one of the characters in the picture I would start researching him for clues as to the location of the farm, otherwise it sounds like the proverbial 'needle in a haystack'.

Just a few more thoughts. I feel I almost know the men now, after studying the picture so long 

Mike.