Milking machine fitting - double byre job

Farming in the North Pennine Dales
By Eric Wilson

Now back over the river Tees and up to the fringes of the Durham pit district, another day and another milking machine installation. This one was different in that it had two byres separated by a walkway. No problem we thought – a little bit of piping high enough to walk under would easily connect the two buildings and supply vacuum to each.

We disagreed with the ideas of the farmer who wanted the pipe to go underground. He said they got some very hard frosts and didn’t want any bother in the middle of the winter. We thought that he didn’t understand it was a vacuum pipe, and there was nothing to freeze! If it was put underground, it would create a low point in the line which could collect condensation, and which unless drained out could possibly freeze.

He would listen attentively to all we said and just when we thought we had convinced him, he would say “Aye, but ahd still like it unnergrund”!

We got the salesman to have a word. He could talk the hind leg off a donkey, or a cow for that matter. But after half an hour and a lot of head nodding, the response was still the same - “Aye, but ahd still like it there Philip – unnergrund”.

As a last resort, we mentioned the situation to the boss who said he would call in, ostensibly to check how the work was progressing. But his other plan was to explain that an underground pipe was not necessary because it carried vacuum – not even air.

He was also thinking of the cost, as these jobs were quoted for and a price agreed before the work commenced. When the boss realised that he also was getting nowhere with the argument, he brought up the subject of extra cost – thinking that would surely touch a new nerve. But no – the farmer agreed to the extra cost, even dug the trench and tunneled under the foundations at each end. We had to put drain pipes at the low points just in case of frost.

The salesman reported later that the farmer only used the machine at busy times of the year. When everything was covered in snow, he too liked to hibernate in the warmth of the byre and spend a bit of time keeping his hand in, just in case one day the engine wouldn’t start. Well that was his story.

Meeting t' Baldersdale bull

Farming in the North Pennine Dales
By Eric Wilson

My next encounter with a bull was in Baldersdale, one of those smaller offshoot valleys that branched off Teesdale but didn’t go anywhere except to a few isolated farms. The farms were more a way of life than a means of making a fortune, most of the occupants having secondary work to improve the cash income, especially in winter.

The milking plant I went to install at one of the smaller holdings was for seven cows and was essentially to make milking easier night and morning, before and after the owner’s other work. He was gradually building up his stock numbers, and I was therefore quite surprised to find a bull tied up in the end stall of the small byre. I advised the farmer that it would need to be moved to enable me to do the job.

He assured me that “Billy” the bull was very quiet and controllable, and could be moved by just slipping a halter over his head and leading him to the stall at the other end of the byre. My idea was to pipe up one end, move the bull and finish off the other end. I noticed the bull did not even have the usual ring through his nose and the owner even gave me a demonstration to prove how quiet the bull was.

The reason for all this was that he had to go and fulfil his obligations at his secondary job and would be away until late afternoon. All went well and the time came to move the bull. I was by then encouraged by the fact of it being so docile while I had been working around it. I went through the motions of talking to the beast of course, and after putting on the halter, slipping the chain to lead it out.

Still feeling a little apprehensive, I was holding on near the end of the rope. The bull had to reverse a little to get turned round. I had just turned round to see where I was stepping when there was one almighty crash which seemed to rock the building on its foundations.

I must have leapt a yard in the air, instinctively letting go of the rope as my pulse rate went into overdrive and I scrabbled about trying to find my feet expecting the final charge I suppose. Suddenly it seemed very quiet, the dust had settled and to my surprise there was the bull down on the ground with it’s fore feet splayed out pointing east and west, head in the dung channel and completely incapable of going anywhere. It had clearly slipped as it had tried to turn and had taken a nosedive.

I suppose it can hardly be said that the bull had a forlorn expression on its face, but the whole scene at that moment certainly had a farcical look. I had no idea what to do to get it back on its feet, so went outside to try to regain my composure. After spells of deep breathing while trying to decide what to do next, I had visions of broken legs and having to get the vet in to shoot the bull. How could I get in touch with the owner and so on.

I had all sorts of questions with very few answers, and it started to look like an episode from “All creatures great and small”. I don’t know why we tend to think the worst when confronted with these situations. But I eventually ventured back into the cowshed and the bull was just standing there as it nothing had happened.

I tentatively picked up the end of the halter rope, led him to the stall and the other end of the byre, chained him up and that was that. I celebrated with half a cup of half-warm tea from my flask and finished the job.

Fitting milking machines – Lance’s great idea

Farming in the North Pennine Dales
By Eric Wilson

One of the disadvantages of fitting milking machines in that part of the world was the fact that many of them were installed while the cows were inside for the winter. This meant we were working among the cows, as well as what they deposited on the floor.

Most of the cows were more or less used to someone working around them but the breeding bull or bulls that were also tied up in one of the byres were a different story. Like bulls anywhere, they were unpredictable and certainly didn’t take well to strangers, especially when they made unusual noises and carried long lengths of pipe. It was prudent to check that they were securely chained or better still, get the farmer to move it out of that particular byre until we were finished.

I always remember being told the two things you should never trust are bulls and Alsation dogs! Whoever said that had apparently forgotten about car dealers and insurance agents, but there was a lot of truth in the statement as far as bulls were concerned.

The next job we went to looked promising, a nice big double–sided byre with brick walls which didn’t fall down when you made a hole through them. The only resident was a big Shorthorn bull, which was chained up in the end stall. On checking it seemed to be secure so we unloaded the van and prepared to start.


We usually did a survey of the site and discussed the how’s and where’s of the job before getting started. All seemed fairly straightforward. There was nobody about but we had a sketch plan of the proposed layout so we made a start. As soon as the noises associated with cutting and threading pipes and knocking holes through walls started, the old bull started to bellow – intermittently at first, but gradually developing into a continuous cacophony of sound, starting with a loud bellow and ending up in a shriek. This sequence was repeated over and over again.

The building acted like an echo chamber, the noise reverberating util it was impossible to hear ourselves think never mind speak. My assistant in this job was Lance who tried his best to counter the bull’s noise by yelling back at it with expressions like – “shut your cake ‘ole” and some not so polite.

Then Lance had a bright idea. The opposite stall had three or four bales of hay stacked in it, so he hopefully presented the bull with a slab of not very good hay. The result was instance silence. It reminded me of that piece of advice you might see in a woman’s magazine to a wife with a bad tempered husband – “feed the brute”!

Unfortunately it didn’t last. The bull scoffed the hay and was quiet for a while, then gradually built up the crescendo once again. Lance kept repeating the cure until we wondered if the bull could consume any more hay and still keep breathing. But it was still on its feet when we left for home.

We didn’t look forward to another day of the same, so the next day we were determined to find someone to move the beast somewhere else. As we approached the byre the cows were just being turned out after milking, and when we got inside we found the bull had gone as well. The cowman was there “mucking out” so we passed the time of day with him, but dare not ask about the male of the species.

We presumed that if he had expired through over eating, then he might broach the subject but he never did. It was a great relief to be the only ones making a noise to finish the job.

Fitting milking machines and cheeky kids

Farming in the North Pennine Dales

By Eric Wilson

Lead mine tailings in Upper Yorkshire Dales

The next job was pretty well straight forward, or at least it would have been if it hadn’t been for the farmer’s kids. I think it must have been school holidays and they had been sitting in the window waiting for us to arrive. I say “us” because we usually had a trainee aboard. In this case it was Nigel, an athletic type of lad who didn’t believe in modern climbing aids like ladders. He just climbed up the walls!

We barely had time to open the van door and the kids were there; a girl who said very little and an older boy who never shut his gob. At first we though he was a bright young lad, and went along with the theory that he had to ask questions to learn. But when he asked the same question five or six times on the trot, it began to get rather wearing.

It was what, which, and why to everything we attempted to do. The other hassle was to keep him out of mischief and try not to do him an injury with the long lengths of pipe we were slinging about.

It got round to 10am and Nigel thought he would have a cup of tea. He took out his flask and looked around for somewhere to sit down, only to be confronted with the inevitable of “what are you going to do?”, and “what’s that for” and so on.

Nigel suggested to “Junior” that perhaps his mother would have some lemonade or sweets for him. But it was to no avail and the chattering continued. He told Nigel that he (Nigel) couldn’t have his tea or a snack because he hadn’t got a table to eat it off.

That gave Nigel an idea. He told the kid he didn’t need a table. He took a sandwich from his box, put it in his mouth and proceeded to climb into the roof of the byre where he hung upside down with his legs hooked over a beam, and continued to chew. The results were dramatic, the kids eyes bulged and remarkably he was lost for words. He took off out of the buildings, closely followed by his sister and we didn’t see anyone again until nearly lunch time.

Then the mother appeared in the doorway holding the two children by the hands to ask if we needed any tea making, while glancing around the roof , no doubt looking for the “monkey man”! I don’t know who was more curious in the end. We finished the job without any further visits from the kids, so we never did discover what they told their mother. Another of life’s little mysteries.

The byre - a lovely warm place to be on a frosty morning

Partin wi’ brass

Farming in the North Pennine Dales
By Clive Dalton

A tale Eric Wilson told me that he never got down on paper was his regular experience of having to part a Dales farmer from his “brass” (money). Eric used to relate how he would be summonsed up the Dale by a farmer who had called in to the company yard and showroom on market day, and now wanted to buy this new bit of machinery because things were moving away from horse power to the early tractor power. The machines of most interest were new tractor mowers driven off the tractor Power Take Off, and improved machines to turn and condition hay.

Eric would leave his office early in the morning to arrive at the farm around morning tea where the crack (talking) would start – about anything other than the need for his visit. This process would continue till dinner (lunch) and into the afternoon.

The core of the discussion was the accepted need for the new machine but the scandalous price it was and what a life-threatening job it was going to be to find brass to pay for it. The machine was always “far ower dear” and that he’d had second thoughts and would try to get through another season without it.

While Eric spent his time pointing out the machine’s “features” and how much more work could be done, faster, and of better quality, the farmer would have little of it. The farmer kept coming back “t’t cost” and the problem of him having to “gan te’t bank” for a loan, and how “borrowin muney” had never been part of the family ethic – as there could be another 1930 slump “arroond t’ corner”.

Afternoon tea of ham sandwiches, cakes and fruit tarts came and went, with still no sign of a deal. Discussion continued of pending disasters for the farm and the Dale caused by the season, the government and the world, until supper of cauliflower cheese and afternoon tea’s leftovers arrived.

After this was devoured and fireside chairs were drawn up and pipes filled with fresh baccy, Eric said he used to make a move to leave having given up on a deal.

“Aye well, Aa’ll be off then”, Eric said was the trigger. He would be going out the door putting his cap on making for his van when the farmer would shout from the kitchen - “Aye alreet then, yid better send ‘is yen o’ them machines up then.” Aa’ll hev te find brass from’t somewhere!

“Mek sure ye deliver it for nowt, and send lad up wi’ it te mek sure it works. An’ Aa’ll be expectic guarantee for ten year an’all.

It had been a long hard day!

It had been a long hard day Eric said!

Selling milking machines

Farm Machinery in the North Pennine Dales
By Eric Wilson

Photo: Limestone walls in Durham Dales

But of course, all through the hectic activity of haymaking, someone had to be there in the cow byre, twice a day to milk the cows and see to getting the milk cooled and into the twelve-and-a-half gallon churns for collection. Once a day the churns had to be transported out to the road where each farm had a milk stand on which the churns were placed for pickup.

The milk stands were constructed to be about the same height as the flat-deck trucks belonging to the Express Dairy Company in our district. They collected the full churns of milk and left the empty ones that had been washed and sterilised at the company depot.

After all, this is what it was all about. The hay that had been painstakingly persuaded to become edible fodder for the animals, was bread and butter for the cows that produced milk during the time fresh grass was not available in the Dales meadows. This in turn provided the monthly milk cheque that was the regular income the Dales farmers relied on for survival.

This brings me to the other main activity our company involved with. This was not actually milking the cows, but trying to sell the farmers a milking machine to make the monotonous milking chore easier for him (or more often his wife and family). And remembering of course that I was in the business of getting a commission from a sale.

Selling milking machines to Dale’s farmers required different approaches depending on the circumstances and the personalities of the clients. Originally the milking machine manufacturers had their own sales reps who were allotted districts or areas for selling in. After making a sale, arrangements would be made for a “company installer” to be accommodated for as long as it took to complete the installation. This involved fitting the piping and taps for the “vacuum line”, installing a vacuum pump with the means for driving it, and other ancillary equipment such as the sanitary trap, vacuum controller and so on.

The equipment to drive the machine was usually situated away from the cow byre as the means of driving the pump was usually a 1.5hp petrol engine which could be rather noisy. If the farm was on mains electricity a 1hp electric motor usually replaced the engine.
The electric motor eliminated the noise and engine starting problems, but could create new problems if there was a power cut or voltage drop. People on the same supply who were not farmers all knew when it was milking time as their lights often went dim.

However, small businesses were springing up to service farmers, and milking machine manufacturers found it easier to appoint agents who in turn employed local people to install the equipment and kept a stock of spare parts. This arrangement simplified the installation situation considerably, as the local man could travel to and from the job each day, and didn’t need to live-in with the farmer like the itinerant company man.

Our company was eventually agent for four different brands of milking machine,(Gascoigne, Fullwood ????) so if prospective buyers looked in our direction, we had a good chance of making a sale. Milking machines at that time were all what were called “bucket plants”. There was a single vacuum tap installed between each two cows in the byre, the cows being chained to a dividing stall, originally made of wood but later made of concrete or tubular steel.
A special bucket with a lid that carried the pulsator on which hung the teatcups and all the rubber pipes, was placed between the two cows, and each milked in turn into the bucket which held about four gallons.

A spare pail was part of the equipment. It had a loose lid so when the milking pail was near full, a change of lids was made and the full pail carried to the dairy. At the dairy the milk was put through a cooler and then through a “sile” or filter into the empty churn. Many of the so-called dairies were fairly primitive but improved rapidly when strict hygiene regulations were introduced. The “not–so particular” farmers suffered injury to their wallets if their milk was returned from the dairy company for any reason. They usually learned quite quickly after that.

Many of the cowsheds or byres were very eighteenth century in design. They had thick stone walls with stone slates on the roof. They were occasionally two-storey with a loft or granary on top, which usually meant there was very little headroom. I think the ancient “window tax” must have been in vogue when they were built, and there was a permanent semi-darkness inside which at least hid the grime on the walls and the cobwebs cascading from the roof that built up over generations.

The major tuberculosis testing programme was in full swing however at the time, and the results were catastrophic for some farmers, some getting positive readings on the whole milking herd leading to their slaughter and great economic loss.

Hygiene regulations were getting very strict in both the cowsheds and in the dairies. In one period we installed quite a few solid-fuel boilers and steam sterilising chests in which all the milking units, pails etc were steam treated. They seemed to lose favour once better chemical detergents and sterilising fluids became available.

Eventually the cow’s accommodation improved to the extent that is was often better than farmers’ houses. One big complaint was that these new byres were colder in winter and the farmer could no longer take a pail and tuck himself under a nice warm cow to avoid the wintry blasts.

I had one customer who in winter, regardless of the time of day, could immediately be found in the byre, with a pail handy just keeping warm! I had not been able to persuade him that a machine would get the job done faster, but when he was obliged to update his buildings, I got his order. He said that his byre lost it’s homeliness and the cows didn’t look all that happy either. But his wife had found him things to do to fill in the extra time he had suddenly found. Digging the garden and repairing the hen houses, etc, were some of these.

After installing a milking plant, it was customary for the fitter to instruct the farmer on how to use the machine for one or two milkings. This involved showing how to strip or take the units apart, and how to wash them effectively. Putting the machines on the cows could be a particularly hazardous occupation, as word had got about and it wasn’t long before a few visiting neighbours – who had just happened to be passing, called in to join the family, the kids and dogs to watch the new milking machine working.

There were not many telephones about at the time, usually one at the village Post Office, so how many folk got to know about the milking baffled me. I was sometimes tempted to take a crafty look around the surrounding hills to see if the ancient beacons had been lit! As can be imagined, the usual calm tranquility of the byre was more than a little disturbed by all the activity. The cows’ heads were waving about watching the audience and when the bright and shiny milking unit was placed between a pair of animals, their eyes took on the appearance of the proverbial organ stops or chapel hat pegs.

New milking machine - let’s start with Betsy

Farming in the North Pennine Dales
By Eric Wilson

Invariably the farmer would suggest starting with “Betsy”. “Anybody can milk Betsy, she’s as quiet as a lamb” he would say. So she was duly chosen to be introduced to the joys of machine milking.

On more than one occasion, after picking up the equipment from the dung channel, washing and re-assembling it, after starting with a so-called quiet cow like Betsy, I changed the plan. I decided to ask the farmer which cows gave him most trouble at milking time.

Strange as it may seem, they were usually the ones that gave least trouble with the machine. They must have disliked hand milking so much that they accepted the machine more willingly. At the time it seemed as though some of the cows would never take to being machine milked, but a few days later the sound of the engine being started was the signal for them to let their milk down, and they gave no further trouble.

The odd rogue cow cropped up now and again. She was usually spruced up and quietly entered in the market some distance from the local one, where not too many questions needed to be answered, although it did become the norm for the auctioneer to announce to prospective buyers that the cow in the ring had been machine milked.

It didn’t suit everyone that it had been machine milked as not all dairy farmers by this time had milking machines. Local wisdom had it that it was harder to hand milk a cow if it had been machine milked, but fortunately I never had to experiment or demonstrate in that direction.

The previous attitude that the farmer had taken with his cows played a large part in the success or failure of their initiation to machine milking. I recall installing a small plant for a part-time farmer in the nether regions of Teesdale – he augmented his income by working a few shifts at the local quarry. The installation was easy, one byre had ten cows and the vacuum pipe went straight through the wall to a typical farm shed, where a space was cleared to accommodate the engine and ancillary equipment.


The job was finished in double-quick time ready to milk that afternoon, and I anticipated a reasonably early finish. My plans to go dancing that evening were clicking through my mind as I checked that all was ready. But those famous words of Rabby Burns about “the best laid schemes of mice and men”, were to be proved correct once more.

The farmer arrived and we proceeded to the byre, laden with all the paraphernalia of modern Dales dairy farming. He was still shod in his quarry boots and he walked up to one particular cow and gave it a massive kick in the ribs, telling her in no uncertain terms that “Nah yer buggar, ahs ‘ere”!

I was flabbergasted. Our boss who had many years’ experience on the job always advocated a quiet approach, and here was I, relatively new in the cow milking business with nine cows trying their level best to escape from the byre. One cow was literally trembling, no doubt wondering where the next hob-nailed boot was going to land.

Usually I would put the teatcups on the first time to get the cow used to them, then show the farmer how to hold the cluster without losing the vacuum until he got the hang of it.

After the above pantomime, I decided that I was not going to be the one to be kicked around the byre and explained that there wasn’t any future in me doing the milking. I was merely there to show him how it worked, the rest being up to him! He got there in the end. I had a late tea and didn’t feel much like dancing after the dancing I’d done in the byre to avoid flying feet.

I presumed that particular cow had given the farmer a hard time, but I saw him about a week later and he thought the machine was a “cracker”. I concluded that he had reached an amicable agreement with the wayward cow, and I did not dig any deeper.

Hay collecting & handling

Farming in the North Pennine Dales
By Eric Wilson


Following the horse-drawn gate sweeps and the pike bogey, the tractor mounted hay sweep had it’s turn in the scheme of things. This was a frame with a number of long wooden tines made of ash – some up to 10 feet long and the sharp end equipped with a cast iron turned-up point. This was initially attached to the tractor front axle and driven along the windrow of dry hay in the direction of the stack site or the barn.

Getting far too much on the sweep was the biggest mistake for a beginner running out of tractor power and a huge heap of hay that couldn’t be moved – inevitably at the wrong end of the field. It was a good job all the hand hay forks had not been thrown away as they had to be used to rescue this situation.

Another tricky operation with the tractor hay sweep was going back empty for another load with the tines running on the ground, and a tendency to speed up a bit to make up for lost time. It was very easy to dig a tine into the ground, which went off like a rifle shot to become instant kindling wood.

Though the balers mentioned above all made what was described as high-density bales, there was also a low-density baler on the market. This machine was made by a German firm – Welgar, and was distributed from a Darlington company. Welgar also made high-density balers.

The low-density baler gathered up the hay into a measured bundle, without chopping and compressing it as happened in the high-density machine. Because the hay in the bale was loose, it was more important to get the low-density bales under cover as soon as they were made or they could soon be wet right through.

Soon a lever appeared on the front frame of the hay sweep, with a light cable attached to the top and threaded under the tractor, over a small pulley and attached to the hydraulic linkage. Voila! – a hydraulic hay sweep had arrived. This was not for lifting hay of course, but a great improvement in speeding up the job when travelling empty.

Collecting bales came to be the next problem. More balers were appearing on the scene and those farmers who had invested in one got their hay harvested quicker and were available to do a bit of contracting for relations, friends and neighbours. So picking up bales and getting them safely under cover came to be the hard part of the operation.

However, based on the old teaching that “necessity is the mother of invention” it was not long before bale sledges appeared. These were a basic wooden sled with a platform that would carry six bales at the back stacked in twos, and a space on the front for the operator. The bale catcher grabbed the completed bale as it came out of the end of the chamber and turned to place it on the mini stack on the back.

The sled was towed behind the baler and was fitted with a tilting device to tip each stack of six bales neatly on the ground. At least that’s what the sales brochure said. Actually they could work reasonably well provided the bale catcher was an athletic person. An expert water skier would be ideal –provided the tractor driver behaved himself at the row ends and it was a nice flat hay field to work in – not an apt description of conditions encountered on the average Dales farm.

Fortunately there were still farmers and their families, plus local villagers, who could be relied on to front-up to man-handle the precious hay crop from awkward little fields to a place of safety from the weather. And some of them always saved enough energy to proceed afterwards to the village inn to boast about their achievements, following the slaking of the thirst to “settle ‘t dust”!

Various new types of bale collectors appeared on the market that did not require a person on the back. Some made an attempt to deposit the bales in a reasonable sort of heap, others just left them literally in a heap. There were odd ones that tried to convert the bale back into it’s original state of loose hay scattered all over the field!

Another boon to bale storage was the bale-elevator, which was quite portable and adjustable for height at both ends. This was a great improvement on the somewhat clumsy setting-up procedure needed with the loose hay elevator. In fact with a bale elevator at the shed end, and a good pick-up gang working between field and shed with a 3-ton flat deck truck and pick-up elevator, it meant the farmer could pause for breath occasionally.

Paid by the bale, these gangs would work all night if the conditions permitted and the late English twilight meant they could see what they were doing right up to 11pm.

Haymaking in the Dales could often be a prolonged occupation, depending entirely on the weather. Just when it seemed to be lasting indefinitely, suddenly it was all over, leaving you gasping and wondering what you were doing before it all started, seemingly so long ago.

Haymaking tools - Strewers, Turners and Rakes

Farming in the North Pennine Dales
By Eric Wilson

In a bad season – weatherwise that is, the “good hay” previously mentioned came at a premium in the Dales. Farmers faced long hard hours of labour tossing the stuff about, hoping the black clouds were heading away from the hay field and that the dew would not fall before the sun set and the boss had to let you go home!

At such a time it could finish up as bad hay. Apart from all the family being engaged with short hay forks and wooden hay rakes, the machine that could save the day was the “strewer”, or tedder, made by W.N.Nicholson of Newark.

Originally with shafts for the horse and later with tractor drawbar, this machine was pretty drastic in its treatment of the hay. It was also pretty drastic on the poor horse as it was a heavy drag. The rows of spring tines on a revolving drum picked up the crop and flung it up (strewed it) to the high heavens in an endeavor to aerate it and move it to fresh dry ground. If hay lay too long in one place it “damped up” and took up moisture from the ground so that the process had to start all over again.

A “good” Dales summer weatherwise was very hard to define, because it could be sunny and dry on one side of the hill and raining on the other. However, occasionally the Dales were blessed with a good haytime, when a bit of planning could be indulged in instead of the usual panic about the weather and when the rain would arrive.

Certain fields could be cut when decreed to be at their best, weathered for as long as it took, then out with the swath turner. This was an ingenious device that looked like two giant metal spiders that revolved when the machine was towed down the line of the cut swathes. Each spider driven by cogs from the land wheels flicked over the thick end of the swath that had been created by the swath-board of the mower. These machines were made by Blackstone from Lincolnshire.

Unfortunately those responsible for increasing the length of the cutter bar to five feet when tractors came in, didn’t realise the swath turners were too narrow to cope with two wider swaths. But when everything fitted, and a nice sunny day to boot, it was a treat to watch the faithful Dales pony turning swaths at what seemed to be a pace to suit the occasion, and without much guidance from the driver on the seat. Also the tools needed could stay in the toolbox as there was little stress on the machine.

The other implement usually used in the pre-tractor days was the horse hay rake. This was about 8 feet wide as I recall with a cast-iron seat and the maker’s name cast into the sit-on part. Comfort was not necessarily a consideration, and although it was shaped to fit the average posterior, any additional refinement was achieved by adding a folded-up meal sack or using a large handful of soft dry hay free of thistles.

The hay rake consisted of a number of curved tines on a frame which had large iron-spoked wheels at each end. The tines were tripped either by pulling on a handle at the appropriate moment, or if the machine was a “self tipper”, kicking a foot lever which engaged a pawl in a notch in the wheel so that the wheel’s momentum tripped the tines. This saved the big effort of pulling on the lever while moving. All you did was kick the lever and wait till the handle came back into your waiting hand. So easy!

The purpose of the horse rake was to gather the hay into a “windrow” so that it could be swept into heaps by the hay-sweep to form pikes, somewhere near the site where the stack would be made.

But soon a combination machine known as a “swath turner and side delivery rake” superceded both the swath turner and the hay rake. This was a frame and wheels carrying two large discs that were spaced laterally to suit the width between swaths, and offset one behind the other. Long-tined bars connected the two discs at four mounting points on each disc and each bar carried a number of tines for turning the hay.

When turning swaths, a centre section of each tine bar was removed so that each disc turned a separate swath. But the sections could be refitted to make one windrow from two swaths, always provided the centre sections could be found and had not been included in the last load of hay!

The next great departure from the norm arrived on the scene in the shape of the finger-wheel rake. It took some time to catch on, as it had no means of propulsion apart from the contact between the fingers on the wheel and the crop lying on the ground. This concept was not easy for farmers to grasp so we had to arrange demonstrations at various venues around the Dales.

The machines were developed by a Dutch firm called Vicon and sold under licence by the Blanch company in UK. Vicon joined with Lely and the machines were sometimes referred to as a Vicon Lely.

I remember the first demonstration I attended with the firm’s representatives in attendance. Well, the finger wheels revolved all right, but instead of the tines picking up the crop they just combed neatly through it and barely disturbed a blade of grass.

A startling discovery was then made by the firm’s mechanic who had just come along with the rep for a ride out, and no doubt to sample the brew at a few local North country inns. The tines were all fitted the wrong way round at the negative angle. So this effectively defeated any positive ideas the designers may have had when they dreamed up the idea.

My boss Sid Dipton was livid. He had recklessly ordered six of these new machines to get the quantity discount, five of them still in their crates. The demonstration was a disaster and the possibility of a sales bonanza was rapidly receding, accompanied by the smirks and grins of the other dealers who had turned up to watch and pick faults.

The outcome was that after a frantic phone call by the rep to the factory to warn them of the situation, the machines were returned to our workshop where the task of changing round about 2000 tines was discussed on the machines we had bought.

Needless to say the boss delivered an ultimatum. It was Friday and none of our staff were keen to spend the weekend on such a monotonous job. So he just told the rep – “Fix it or take them away”! Someone did lend them some tools and come Monday morning, two weary-looking company men emerged – after a late breakfast, to announce that all the tines had been turned round. We took them at their word as they had sticking plaster on their fingers to prove it!

The next demonstration proved to the farmer and his staff that the machine did work, and with others of similar design, they became very popular over the next few years. This type however was rather too big and unwieldy for the upland farms but before long they were catered for also with the advent of the Fahr Centipede and another similar machine from Melotte. But the one that really caught the imagination was the Vicon Acrobat, also a finger-wheel rake, but with four reels and longer more flexible tines.

This was a mounted machine, meaning it was fitted to the hydraulic linkage of the tractor, and did not have any wheels on the ground. It was eminently suited to those who had invested in a hydraulically equipped tractor. Hydraulics and power-drive shafts were rapidly becoming standard equipment on tractors and fortunately some standardisation was established in shaft sizes, either one and one eighth inches, or one and three eighth inches for the splined drive shafts, or what were known as category 1 or category 2 linkage pins. The larger size eventually became the norm.

One of the big drawbacks of operating machinery in the Dales was the narrow gateways, flanked by two stone gate posts that would not have looked out of place in Stonehenge! At either side of these monsters was a dry-stone wall.

Eventually the gateways had to be widened as the cutting and drying of the grass became a faster operation and more farmers were encouraged to “get the baler in”. They were also being persuaded by the younger generation who attended the Young Farmers’ Clubs and were becoming knowledgeable about the mechanical side of farming.

First job - mowing grass

Farming in the North Pennine Dales
By Eric Wilson

It started to look as if t’ grass was going to grow despite the severe winter of 1947, and against dire predictions against such a possibility. The record snows had arrived late that year to catch everyone out.

Once a Dale’s farmer is absolutely sure that “grass is goin t’ grow”, the next thing to start worrying about is - how to cut it down, again because this is the mainstay of the farming cycle, - harvesting “winter feed” because without it nobody (beast or man) eats.

So what’s to do? Better have a “leeoouk” at the mower, to start with. Now where was it left? Filling in gaps in that stone wall “ower by’t eight acre”! Oh dear, now he remembers. This is where I came in, having recently transferred from the redundant ranks of aircraft fitters ex RAF, to the fledgling industry of farm machinery and agricultural engineering-to-be; post-war variety that is.

By 1948 I was selling and servicing what few farm machines were available in the Dales, and through the medium of the “moorland drums” I had heard that a certain farmer could be “in’t market” for a new mower.,Of course things were changing. For some time we had been supplying upland farmers with the Allis Chalmers model B tractor, which previously had only been used for “row-crop” work on arable farms down country.

Most of the “die-hard” older Dales’ farmers swore never to replace their “osses” with “them new-fangled contraptions” called tractors! But of course some had different ideas, and once Harry Ferguson came along with his TE series and their hydraulics, the flood gates opened. The Allis B was a very nice basic tractor – I guess you could say the B stood for “very basic” as it was literally a horse with an engine. The only “equipment” provided was a drawbar.

My potential customer in need of a new mower had an Allis B tractor – so he was something of a revolutionary. Now as tractor drawbars don’t marry up very well with mowers with “oss poles and swingle trees”, he had to face more decision-making and money-spending before he would be able to cut any grass at all. In other words – he would have to really modernise and this meant money!

It happened that manufacturers in North Yorkshire were busy once again converting back from guns to plough shares, so to speak. One such family firm which had specialised in mowers for some years (Bamletts of Thirsk), had not been slow in realising that their traditional horse-drawn mowers were hardly going to satisfy the needs of farmers who were replacing horses with tractors.

So the “tractor conversion” kit was born. It was nothing too scientific at this stage. Instead of the horse pole, a sturdy piece of 6 inch x 4 inch timber was fitted (preferably oak), the length calculated to suit the tractor drawbar, and a bracket made up to allow for lateral and vertical adjustment.

Then after the customary round of “wheeling and dealing”, discussions with neighbours, arrangements about discounts and/or delayed payment until “t’lambs were sowld”, the Dales farmer became the proud owner of the tractor conversion kit.
It could hardly be described as a giant leap forward in grass mowing. Many problems arose. The horse may have been eliminated, but an extra person was required to sit on the mower seat to operate the cutter-bar lifting-mechanism at the corners and when backing. You couldn’t reach these levers from the tractor seat.

Then it soon became evident that given the untiring power of the tractor, a lot more grass could be “laid down ”in a morning with the tractor as there was now no need to “spell the ‘osses”. This was not always a good thing as the “making” of the hay still depended on the old fashioned follow-up methods, a lot of hand raking, forking and so on. There were not many balers in evidence at that time. Also, the horse-mower cutter-bar was driven from its land wheels, and its speed geared to suit the steady plod of a horse under load. When “yoked” to a tractor, the temptation was to go that little bit faster which soon took its toll on the mower’s working parts.

It also became apparent that with the extra horsepower available, a wider cut was possible with the tractor. So cutter bar widths crept up to from 4 feet-6 inches to five feet over the next few years, and a trailer mower designed specially for tractor use evolved, complete with “self-lift box” for the cutter bar, operated by the tug of a cord from the tractor seat. Progress was on its way. The mower’s wider cut then created problems with the machines that followed, as they had all been designed to follow the narrow cutter bars of horse-drawn machines and could not be altered.

These follow–up machines were all equipped with shafts for the horse, so for a few years the horse was retained to do all the haymaking jobs other than mowing. These jobs consisted of of swath turning, windrowing, tedding and raking, as well as sweeping the windrows to form “pikes”. Apart from denoting a freshwater fish or a medieval weapon, a “pike” to a Dale’s farmer was invariably a pile of hay built up to protect it form the weather until leading and stacking day arrived. Then as many neighbours, as possible would be summoned to assist in the arduous task of leading and stacking the hay in convenient places for feeding to stock in the winter. The hay would go into barns in the corner of the Dale’s meadows, or a stack would be built outside in the field and later thatched to protect it from the weather.

Those farmers who had invested in the Allis B tractor could now be described as “advanced” in the area of mowing, as the Allis-Chalmers Company had developed an ingenious mid-mounted mower cutter-bar to fit these tractors. It fitted below the belly of the tractor between front and rear wheels and required an add-on belt pulley unit fitted to drive the wooden “pitman” or connecting rod.

Shortly after this, another revolution arrived – hydraulics. A small hydraulic pump and ram were fitted to lift the cutter bar, and suddenly some more hard work was eliminated. It was now sheer joy to sit and mow grass with the operation in your full view, without the need to constantly “kink” your neck to look behind. Alas! One problem solved but another created. It was now possible to cut even more grass at one go, which then had to be worked by horse machines to make into good hay.

Other popular mowers were developed and were mainly rear-mounted such as the International B23, and of course for those fortunate enough to have secured a revolutionary Ferguson tractor, there was the Ferguson mower which was designed to only fit the amazing little grey Fergie. As the Ferguson sales pitch confirmed “when you buy a Ferguson, you don’t just buy a tractor, you buy a system.” This was a clever way of not saying that when you buy a Ferguson we’ve got you hooked!

Another mid-mounted mower that we had the agency for was the “Featherstone” made by the Featherstone Mower Company. This became quite popular because this firm took the other approach and produced mowers for most of the popular tractors that were around at the time. The cutter bars were the same for all, but they made up mounting frames to suit Ferguson, David Brown or Fordson Major, and others as required.

Farming in the North Pennine Dales

Eric Wilson - Profile

George Eric Wilson was born in Barnard Castle in County Durham in England in 1921. He went to the local school and on leaving at age 14, he went to work at Gainford as an apprentice joiner. In 1940 he volunteered for the Royal Air Force and spent most of the war in India and Burma. After demobilisation in 1945, he went back to his hometown and started work as a fitter in an agricultural engineering business, later advancing to become salesman.

In 1967, Eric, his wife Nancy (from the same area) and four sons came to Hamilton, New Zealand to work for Bisleys Agricultural Engineering Company. In his retirement he turned a lot of both New Zealand and exotic timbers into beautiful objects of art, and talked of his farming days up the Dales which Northumbrian Clive Dalton encouraged him to document. The result is some priceless agricultural history. Eric died in 2007.