Video transcript
I lived on a farm, north of a small village called Hedley on the Hill in Northumberland.
We were dairy farmers which was our main source of income. We grew crops
including corn too. We harvest the crops in July and August. A binder drawn by a
draught horse cut the corn and tied it into bundles called sheaths. Men followed,
standing them up into V shapes called stooks. These were taken by a horse drawn
bogie into a stackyard and made into stacks.
Threshing day was usually in the winter months. Two men brought the thresher into
our stackyard the night before, one of the men looked after the engine, which in early
days was a steam engine, later a tractor. Also the day before the neighbouring
framers had been contacted to send a man to help. This was never a problem as
threshing days, although hard work, was also a social occasion. The young men met
their friends and heard all their news. The farmer’s sons usually came and the food
was very good as farmer’s wives competed to have to best food.
The night before was also a busy time in the farm house kitchen. Potatoes and
vegetables prepared, the steak was slowly cooked and cooled ready for the pie crust
in the morning. Sometimes it was roast beef and Yorkshire puddings but I think most
of them preferred mother’s pie. Mother also made her Christmas puddings early so
they were often served on threshing days too. Also, rice pudding for those who
preferred it.
Threshing day, every one was up early as animals had to be fed and the cows
milked. The dining table extended to seat ten or twelve and table laid for lunch.
Breakfast was after milking. The two thresher men had come early too to prepare
their work then joined the family for breakfast in the kitchen. Porridge if they wanted
it, then bacon, eggs, if near pig killing day, they had black pudding and sausage too.
Threshing day began at around 8am. The young men from the neighbouring farms
had arrives by then and usually knew what job they had to do. The thatching had
been removed. A man got on top of the stack and forked the sheaths to the bench.
Three people on the bench, sometimes it was a woman, placed the sheaths so that
the ears of corn were all facing in the right direction. The second cut the binder twine
and moved it to the thresher man who fed it into the large drum moving very fast.
This took the ears of corn from the stalks, known as straw. This was, again, tied and
moved out on a belt where it made it into another stack of straw. Later years it was
moved into a bailing machine. The grains of corn had gone into a sieve where the
grain was separated from the husks and bits of straw etcetera, known as chaff. The
chaff went down a shoot and was raked up and was burned afterwards. The grains
of corn went down two shoots where sacks were hanging on the bottom. A man
watched them fill, lifted them off and put new sacks on. And the strong young men
carried the full sacks weighing eight to ten stone into where they were stored, usually
barn or granary.
Some of the wheat was sold to the corn merchant. The oats and barley crushed and
fed to the animals. Straw was used for bedding the animals. The farm cats and dogs
also liked threshing day. They used to surround the stack when it reached the
bottom waiting for the mice leaving their homes. The cats usually caught some, I
don’t think the dogs did but they enjoyed the chase. Threshing day ended about
5pm.
In the 1960s the combine harvester took over, less men, less work, lots more money
but not as much fun!