The Vale of Glamorgan - a hive of industry 31 July 2012 In the nineteenth century new docks were built at Porthcawl to help handle the worldwide demand for coal. This view of Ewenny Pottery dates from the early twentieth century. A limestone quarry near Aberthaw in the 1950s. Barry docks, c.1910, with ships moored to buoys waiting to load coal. The Vale of Glamorgan - a hive of industry Although the Vale of Glamorgan has been predominantly agricultural, there are a number of historically important industries in the area, some of which are still operational today. Some of those industries grew from the characteristic limestone geology of the area, while others are due to the area's lengthy coastline or relatively flat topography. Pottery There has been a pottery at Ewenny since the early fifteenth century. Successive generations of the Jenkins family have run it since 1610, and it remains a flourishing business today. Quarrying Limestone was widely quarried in this area. It was used for the building industry, and it was burnt to produce fertiliser and cement. It was also shipped across the Bristol Channel to Somerset and north Devon. Mining The valleys just north of the Vale Glamorgan held vast reserves of high-grade steam coal. Not even the huge, thriving docks at Cardiff could handle the worldwide demand for this premium fuel. In the nineteenth century new facilities were built at Porthcawl, Penarth and Barry - where just over 11 million tons were exported at its peak in 1913. Barry docks are still used today.
Do you remember Doctor Carrot and Potato Pete? 30 July 2012 The Food Rationing Scheme of 1940 Potato Pete and friends. At the beginning of the Second World War, Britain imported 60% of its food. With the shortage of food during the First World War still fresh in the memory, the government introduced the food rationing scheme in January 1940. Ration books were distributed and every home had to register with a local butcher, grocer and milkman who received enough food for their registered customers. The first foods to be rationed were butter, sugar, bacon and ham. Over a period of time, more food was added to the system, and the rationed amount varied from month to month due to availability of different foods. From December 1941, all quality foods were included in the 'points' system. Every person had 16 points per month to buy a selection of foods such as biscuits, tinned foods and dried fruit - if available in the shops. This was an effective system as it enabled the government to allocate a higher point value to items when stocks were low and to lower the number of points when items were freely available. Naturally, children were treated differently and they received additional foods essential for their growth and development such as milk, orange juice and cod liver oil. Britain was not the only country with food rations. A shopkeeper cancels the coupons in a British housewife's ration book for the tea, sugar, cooking fats and bacon she is allowed for one week. Most foods in Britain are rationed and some brand names are given the designation "National". Vegetable Gardens Ensuring that the family's rations lasted until the end of the week was a big problem so the 'Dig for Victory' campaign was launched in October 1939, encouraging families to prepare their own food. Everyone was encouraged to turn their flower beds and lawns into vegetable gardens. People were urged to keep chickens, rabbits, goats and pigs – a particularly popular animal as it ate any leftovers from the kitchen. Considerable time and was spent on propaganda promoting ingenuity and economical savings when preparing food. Home economists were employed to travel around Britain sharing tips on how to cook with the scarce resources available. The Ministry of Food started publishing Food Facts pamphlets in 1940, and magazines, newspapers and daily radio programmes such as The Kitchen Front and the Radio Doctor were full of ideas and recipes to enable families to make the most of the weekly rations. Potato Pete and Doctor Carrot – two characters created to promote vegetable eating appeared in most recipes. The public were encouraged to experiment with new and unusual foods. One fish which proved very unpopular was the modern favourite, tuna, while whale meat was even less popular. Vitamins Food shortages worsened at the end of the war, when dry weather and poor harvest of 1945 affected the availability of both potatoes and bread, which were rationed for the first time. By 1948, the food allowance on average was much lower than during the war. Restrictions on tea were lifted in 1952 – a huge relief for a nation of tea drinkers. Eggs, cream, sugar and sweets were removed from the system in 1953 and butter, cheese and cooking oil in 1954. Fourteen years of rationing ended on 4 July 1954 when restrictions were lifted on meat and bacon. Rationing forced families to change their eating patterns. Rationing enabled the poorest sections of society to eat more protein and vitamins, which led to a substantial upturn in the health of the nation, The general health of children improved, and on average they were taller and heavier than pre-war children. There was a decrease in the number of infant deaths and an increase in the average life span.
The ration years of the Second World War 30 July 2012 Dig for Victory, by Mary Tunbridge. Marguerite Patten Marguerite Patten OBE has been teaching Britain how to cook since the 1930s. During the Second World War, as a leading Home Economist for the Ministry of Food’s Food Advice Division, Marguerite and her colleagues worked tirelessly to make people aware of the importance of keeping their families well fed on the rations available. The diet, imposed by necessity, was low in fats and sugars and high in fibre and vegetables with Potato Pete and Lord Carrot leading the way in this surprisingly healthy new lifestyle. The Food Advice Division travelled all over Britain and set up demonstrations in markets, shops, factories, canteens and welfare clinics to buoy the nation into getting through the war on the Home Front with the same spirit as the Forces in action. A contributor to the Kitchen Front, broadcast daily by the BBC, Marguerite was able to pass on her favourite recipes to the nation, and these recipes more often or not contained potatoes. When war broke out in 1939, farmers were told to increase potato production by ploughing up grasslands and the quantity of potatoes produced increased significantly as the war continued. As a result of this careful planning and planting, rationing potatoes was not necessary during the war. Potato Pete Potato Pete and friends. Marguerite and her colleagues at the Ministry of Food Advice Bureau urged the nation to eat potatoes twice a day. Not only are the humble spuds a fantastic source of energy in the form of carbohydrate, but they are also rich in Vitamin C. To encourage consumption, a cartoon character called Potato Pete was invented with his very own song, cookbook and leaflets. Cake and pastry mixes could be bulked out with potatoes to save fat. Marguerite recalls ‘Home-grown vegetables were a very important part of our diet. We were encouraged to eat plenty of potatoes in place of bread, which used imported wheat, and for the valuable vitamins they contain. Carrots, parsnips and swedes were also used in a variety of recipes and green vegetables were very important and great emphasis was placed on cooking them correctly’. Cooks were advised to always scrub potatoes, not peel them, as up to a quarter of the potato and essential vitamins could be lost in this way. Scalloped potatoes, champ, potato fingers and potato Jane were all popular war time recipes, promoted widely by the Ministry of Food’s Advice Bureau. Although the food was monotonous with meagre rations of meat, eggs and butter (and the total absence of many foods that we know take for granted), the health of the nation was surprisingly good despite the physical and emotional stresses that so many endured. Infant mortality declined and the average age of death by natural causes increased. For many poorer members of the community, this enforced rationing introduced more protein and vitamins to their daily diet, whilst for others a significant reduction in the consumption of meat, fats and sugar was a major benefit to their health. Dig for Victory Home gardeners added to potato production in a response to the ‘Dig for Victory’ campaign. However, the Ministry of Agriculture urged home growers not to grow too many potatoes at the expense of other vegetables, and to stick to the official cropping plan. Varieties such as Arran Pilot, Duke of York and King Edward were recommended and are still as popular today. Austerity gardening, as it became known, is demonstrated to perfection at St Fagans National Museum of History’s B2 prefab garden with vegetables, fruits and herbs all grown using the techniques and cropping plans recommended by the Ministry of Agriculture during the 1940s.
Radio 2 Arts Show - tonight Sara Huws, 27 July 2012 Twice in one week? Just a quick post before I succumb to blog fever:On tuesday, I visited the BBC in Llandaf to talk a bit about my work, and St Fagans in general, for the Radio 2 Arts Show. This week, Penny Smith is standing in for Claudia Winkleman, so it's a good job I decided to forego the nude-coloured-lipstick tribute I had planned. The interview was conducted across the BBC aether - me in front of a box of very compelling lights and buttons, them in a padded room in London - and so I did end up feeling overdressed all the same.Anyway, we had great fun, even though the question of the Welsh language's perceived lack of vowels did come up, which can sometimes lead to a leap in my blood pressure. I consider it a public service to have tackled that myth with grace and aplomb. Tune in to see if you agree! Radio 2 Arts Show - 22:00 Friday 27 July
Making blogs while the sun shines Sara Huws, 26 July 2012 Reading back over my entries, it seems I only really like posting here when the sun is shining! It's another beautiful day at St Fagans and it seemed only right to fire up the blogging engine and start writing.You'll find us in a very cheerful mood at the moment: after many months of working collaboratively, we handed in a dossier as thick as a loaf of bara brith to the Heritage Lottery Foundation. They, in turn, pored over it and decided to award St Fagans with a whopping grant of £11.5 million, to fund its redevelopment. We still have a few quid to raise in order to reach our goal, and so the '£1 appeal' was launched last week. Its message? If you've got a pound to spare, then we promise to do something amazing with it!Our plans for the future, while unbelievably detailed, still seem a bit distant and unreal - but soon enough, you'll start to see the site start to change. The museum, as an entity, will change, too - and we hope you'll come along with us for the ride. We want to open up how we work, and give people from all walks of life a chance to take part in the day-to-day life of the museum.At the moment, though, it's business as usual.My Tudor Plant walks went off without a hitch (and by hitch I mean rain and slugs). I was joined by students from England, France, Germany and Japan, as well as a couple of English/Welsh/Spanish families. I was a linguist in a former life and so dredged as much vocabulary as I could from the back of my mind, so that everyone could follow the tour. We tasted and smelled our way around the gardens, where 16th century varieties still grow. We usually discourage people from picking plants while they're here, to leave enough for our furry/feathered residents - but on this occasion, we were allowed to have a nibble here and there. Thankfully, Bernice and Paul from the gardens department have been kind enough to teach me which ones to eat, and which to avoid!Yesterday, I met with students from Cardiff University yesterday, to talk about how we can use information and objects from excavations to engage the public. We looked at all sorts of things: from the pigments on the church walls to cauldrons and Tudor toilet-seats. This morning, I helped Sian and Ian take eighty-four (we counted) cardboard shields up to the Celtic Village for a painting workshop.The reason I find myself in the office is because I am preparing a lecture for the Eisteddfod. I'm honoured to be speaking, and want to make sure I show off St Fagans in its best light! The topic of the talk will be murals from the Vale of Glamorgan - reading about all these little fragments has me keen to traipse around a graveyard with my camera pretty soon.I hope you're enjoying this sunny spell - if you're thinking of coming to see us, then have a look here for our upcoming events. If you're coming by bus, remember that, as well as the number 32, you can now catch a band new shuttle bus, the number 5, which takes you from the steps of the National Museum in Cardiff, right to our front door.PS: next time there'll be pictures, I promise!
