Farming Day by Day the 1960's

Farming Day by Day – the 1960s

Hardback book, 264 pages inc. 19 photographs

John Winter

Published 2002

Price £12.95

ISBN 1-903366-21-6

As the 1950s closed and rationing passed, farmers and their workers might have expected a golden age. After all, everyone acknowledged that British farming was one of the great success stories of the post-war era.
To decide whether the 1960s was in fact a golden decade, turn to this selection from John Winter’s reports in the Daily Mail which were written so that literally anyone would find them interesting, both the millions of lay readers and the specialist farmer or agriculturalist.
The early sixties were indeed a time of optimism, with ever more livestock, favourable price reviews and the golden harvest of 1964. But as the decade continued, along with the £10 a week farmworkers’ wage and advances in technology came Fred Peart’s ‘golden pitchfork’, fowl pest, foot and mouth outbreaks and rows over the marketing boards. The benefits of the brucellosis eradication scheme had to be balanced against battles over poor price reviews, spiralling costs of food, concerns about farm safety and the misuse of chemicals. Even the weather seemed to get worse.
Overall, a good decade or a bad one? This selection of crisp articles, often passionately on the side of the farmer and farmworker, reveals the issues big and small, and the people who brought them to life.
The articles were selected by an experienced editorial team:

Editorial team
Peter Bullen FGAJ
Recently retired from a long career in agricultural journalism, Peter Bullen worked with John Winter on the Daily Mail from 1963 to 1971. He was subsequently Political Correspondent of Farmers Weekly and Political Editor of Farmers Guardian. He is a former Chairman of the Guild of Agricultural Journalists and currently Chairman of their Charitable Trust.

Phillip Sheppy MBE FRAgS
Phillip’s varied career in agriculture includes work with the Federation of Young Farmers’ Clubs and the English Guernsey Cattle Society. From 1970 until his retirement in 1994 he was Chief Executive of the National Proficiency Tests Council; he is currently Honorary Librarian to the Royal Agricultural Society of England.

Derek Watson FGAJ
Derek’s 50 years in agricultural journalism includes periods working for Farmer and Stockbreeder and as Editor of the Farmers Club Journal. He is a winner of the Netherthorpe award for his outstanding contribution to agricultural communication and he was twice awarded silver medals by the International Federation of Agricultural Journalists.

Farming Day by Day the 1960's - John Winter


		Fred Peart (right), photographed in 1967, was Minister of Agriculture 1964-68.

To bring home the disastrous effect of the November 1967 foot-and-mouth outbreak John Winter wrote movingly about Harold and Sylvia Jones who farmed at Nantmawr in Shropshire. The caption to Chris Barham’s photograph reads, ‘The Jones family at their deserted farm with Nell, the collie, the only animal left alive’.

		A constant theme of the 1960s was the flight from the land by farmworkers, due either to low wages compared with industry, or the reduced need for labour following mechanisation. Scenes like this 1963 manual handling of sugar beet in Suffolk were on their way out.