H D
THE
INDUSTRIES
ROUND OXFORD
A SURVEY
MADE ON BEHALF OF THE INSTITUTE FOR
RESEARCH INTO AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS
UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
BY
K. S. WOODS
lip!
I
OXFORD
AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
London Edinburgh Glasgow Copenhagen
New York Toronto Melbourne Cape Town
Bombay Calcutta Madras Shanghai
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
Humphrey Milford
THE
RURAL INDUSTRIES
ROUND OXFORD
A SURVEY
MADE ON BEHALF OF THE INSTITUTE FOR
RESEARCH IN AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS
UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
BY
K. S. WOODS
OXFORD
AT THE CLARENDON TRESS
1921
WAIN LIBRARY-AGRICULTURE D;
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
London Edinburgh Glasgow Copenhagen
New York Toronto Melbourne Cape Town
Bombay Calcutta Madras Shanghai
HUMPHREY MILFORD
Publisher to the University
2415
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE 5
PART I.— THE ECONOMICS OF RURAL
INDUSTRIES
CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION 15
The Area and the Industries investigated .... 19
CHAPTER II. CONDITIONS IN RURAL INDUSTRIES . 23
Present Position of Trades 23
Trade Organization and Capitalization ..... 25
Quality of Products 29
Methods of Selling and Markets . . . . . .29
Transport 30
Housing .......... 31
Labour 31
Training and Education . . . . . . .36
CHAPTER III. THE PLACE OF RURAL INDUSTRIES IN RURAL
ECONOMY 40
The Relation of Rural Industries to Agriculture ... 41
The Place of Rural Industries in the National Economy .« . 58
Rural Industries in relation to Social Problems . . .61
CHAPTER IV. CONCLUSION 64
Prospects of Rural Industries ...... 64
Claims for Rural Industries ....... 65
Economic Dangers in Rural Industries ..... 67
Organization of Workers ....... 68
Commercial Organization ... .... 72
The Needs of Rural Industries 72
General Tendencies of Development ..... 76
The Function of Voluntary Associations . . . .77
PART II. REPORTS ON INDUSTRIES
CHAPTER I. THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES ... 79
Growth and Sale of Underwood ... . . 79
Underwood Turnery ........ 88
Barrel Hoop-making and Crate Rods 92
Cooperage .......'••
Besom Industry .......•• 94
A2
521934
4 CONTENTS
THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES (continued)
Hurdle-making ........
Rake-making ........
Chair-leg Turnery .......
Chair Manufacture .......
Other Turnery ........
Other Wood Industries ......
CHAP. II. OSIER CULTIVATION AND BASKET-MAKING
(a) Osier Beds in Berks, and Oxon . .
Description of Beds ......
Foreign Sources .......
Markets ........
Labour ........
Wages
Prices ......:..
Prospects ........
Estimated Cost of Planting new Beds
(6) Basket-making ........
District investigated ......
Trade Organization and Description of local Firms .
Markets and Competition .....
Organization of Employers and Employed
The Demand for Labour .....
Women's Labour .......
Wages . . ...
Material ........
Conclusion ........
CHAP. III. NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
(a) Glove-making .........
Processes of manufacture .....
Local Conditions of Labour .....
Material ........
Organization .......
Trade Competition ......
Conclusion ........
Rabbit- Skin Gloves
(6) Leather Dressing .......
(c) Ready-made Clothing ......
(d) Machine and Hand-knitting .....
(e) Lace Industry ........
(/) Summary and Conclusions ......
Survival of Weaving and Hand-looms ....
INDEX
PREFACE
THE history of rural England during the last two centuries
is closely bound up with the development of the nation as
a whole. When this fact is recognized it is frequently stated
in terms of theory or of policy. It is sometimes said, for
instance, that the towns have developed at the expense of
the villages, or that other industries have been fostered at
the expense of agriculture. Without discussing the general
question as to the importance of conscious direction of the
economic, political, and social development of national life
in the period in which modern England was in the making,
it may be said that persons who are now interested in the
re-population of the countryside are apt to underrate the
importance of causes which brought about results far more
important and far-reaching than those the persons who
originated the causes ever dreamed of. Many who are
interested in the development of country life see their
chief friends and antagonists in persons and their policies,
and pay little attention to natural forces, or to economic
and social forces which have results not consciously sought
by their originators and directors. The fallacy of this view
is never more evident than during a consideration of the
present condition of rural industries. When Hargreaves
patented the spinning- jenny, Arkwright the water -frame,
Crompton the mule, and Watt the steam-engine, they had
no ill-will against the woollen industries in the south-
western counties, nor any particular predilection in favour
of the' northern counties ; yet Ihese inventions changed
the whole economic and social structure of both those areas.
Stephenson was not dominated by a theory that men could
live better lives when congregated in large towns than
scattered over the country when he applied the steam-
engine to railroad traction, yet his work was to a large
extent the cause of the later increases in the mass of urban
population in this country. The Hungarian inventors of
6 PREFACE
the system of milling by steel rollers were not at all con-
cerned about giving the Canadian and American millers any
advantage over English producers, yet their system was the
direct cause of changes in the distribution of the milling
industry in this country The improvers of wood-working
machinery in comparatively recent times were not actuated
by any desire to depress the small wood-working establish-
ments in the woodland areas of this country, though doubt-
less some of them were anxious to improve the market for
imported timbers, yet their machinery deprived many
English woodworkers of their sources of livelihood. The
effects of forces such as these can be limited, or delayed,
extended or facilitated, by political action or business
organization. Sometimes limitation or delay is necessary,
so that social chaos may be avoided, or that worthy persons
or classes may not suffer unnecessarily from the effects of
forces which are beyond their unassisted control. Action
through political channels, and sometimes through business
organization, is too apt to be of a negative character, and
oft-times society as a whole would obtain more benefit and
particular classes suffer less if action were positive and
constructive rather than merely regulative or repressive.
Instead of attempting to limit the action of progressive
forces, and to maintain existing systems and organizations,
for the benefit of individuals or classes, it would be more
beneficial to enable such as are likely to suffer to make
use of the improvements as they become accessible. This
is not at all impossible, for in the case of wood-working, the
very machinery and methods of organization which put
many small village timber-yards out of business have, in
recent years, made it possible to establish others on a very
profitable basis. Indeed, wherever the small industries in
rural areas have maintained their position when methods of
production or commercial organizations were changing, it
was by adapting their own methods to the new general
conditions.
The dominant factor in the industrial development of
England from 1760 to the end of the nineteenth century
PREFACE 7
was the use of steam-power, and the extension of the use
of machinery which this made possible. The transference
of the textile industries from scattered areas to the northern
counties between 1780 and 1830 was largely due to the
existence of water-power in the new centres, but fortunately
for those who established productive enterprises in the
northern counties coal was available in the localities when
the new form of power became of practical use. In recent
years, however, the use of oil-fuel, and the improvement of
the internal combustion engine has to a small extent changed
the conditions of industrial production. This change is
altogether in favour of the small establishment, and in
favour of such establishments as are situated in rural or
semi-rural areas. The tendency towards mass -production
with high -power equipment in general industry has always
been attended to some extent by a tendency to develop
small shops for the making of small accessories, for using
certain by-products, or for repair purposes, and it has
never applied to all lines of production. Moreover, mass-
production has certain evident weaknesses, as, for instance
in regard to workmanship and general finish of products,
often of design, sometimes of durability, and not infre-
quently of the power to arouse a stable demand. These
conditions, again, are in favour of the small shop, and as far
as they are efficiently organized, in favour of the smaller
rural establishments. Here there are no questions of personal
or political predilections, but merely the consideration of
mechanical inventions, and of economic organization, which
may, quite accurately, be called natural forces.
The development of machine and power production was
accompanied by somewhat similar changes in transport,
marketing, and the general distribution of goods. The
result of this on the distributive agencies which existed
in rural districts was quite as disastrous as the effect of the
changes in industrial organization on the productive enter-
prises. The railways gave a strong fillip to long-distance
transport, and the rural industries suffered in exactly the
same way as agriculture from the small bulk of their produce
8 PREFACE
and the comparatively short distances to be covered. Their
competitors were able to supply goods in large bulk for long-
distance transport, and were able to get the advantage of
comparatively low freight rates. The small country enter-
prise which could not use the railways, except at some
disadvantage, did not find improved facilities for local
transport. There is now some prospect of change even
here, for there are indications that motor transport may
bring developments similar to those which the internal
combustion engine for stationary power has already effected,
and which are now extending. The village carriers, in
many cases, are substituting small motors for the old horse
vans, and, as will be seen in the reports on industries,
the motor is being used for the necessary transport con-
nected with small businesses in rural areas. At present
there is much to be done in regard to supply and price of
motors for the purposes of rural transport, and also great
need for organization of traffic — possibly in more than one
form. With changes in the organization of production and
transport, the distributive agencies in rural districts are to
some extent modified. The villages, even the larger ones,
are no longer self -supplying centres to the extent they used
to be. The town has gone to the village and the village to
the town. Even the most typical of the modern distributive
agencies of the town — the multiple shop — has reached the
village. The cycle, the train, in some areas the tram-car,
and, more recently and perhaps most important, the motor-
bus, have carried the villagers to the town. The fleets of
motor-buses which ply between town and town, as in Warwick-
shire and Herefordshire, have changed the whole character of
country trading so far as family requirements are concerned.
They have not yet done much for the commercial side of
production, but the time is not far distant when motor-
lorries connected with fleets of passenger buses will call for
consignments of goods in many of the larger villages, and
carry them to centres where they can be dispatched con-
siderable distances either by train or by other motor services.
The commercial organization in many rural areas is changing
PREFACE
and is turning rather in favour of village enterprise than
against it.
It is yet early to attempt any indication of the influence
which the development of electrical power may have upon
facilities for production or transport in the countryside, but
the probabilities are that any increase in the practical
possibilities of electrical power will only accentuate the
tendencies now shown as a result of the use of the internal
combustion engine both for stationary power and for
transport.
Where it has not already gone beyond recognition the
village as an isolated economic unit is fast disappearing.
The village producer and trader of the future has to take
his place in the great business organization of the nation,
buying in any markets in which materials are to be obtained
or selling wherever products are required.
The essential problems of the development of rural
industries are of a technical and business nature. Questions
of public policy and administration are quite secondary,
and their importance is due only to their connexion with
the technical and business problems. Indeed, as the methods
of public action are to some extent clumsy, cumbersome, and
slow when directed to constructive ends, the wish might be
expressed that personal and associated enterprise would
make it unnecessary for public authorities to play any part
in such development. But, it should be clearly understood,
the present indications are that it is constructive rather than
regulative action which is required at the present time, and
that individuals and voluntary associations must play a
large and vital part if any extension of industries other than
agriculture is to be secured in rural areas. This is not to
say that the State or local authorities cannot take any part
in the organization which will be necessary if industrial
opportunities in rural areas are to be increased, but merely
to emphasize the fact that all the work required is essentially
constructive in character. Common effort and close co-
operation of all the agencies concerned can alone make the
progress which is desired. At present some of the agencies
10 PREFACE
are weak, especially the local ones. But as John Stuart
Mill stated nearly a century ago : ' Works of all sorts are
daily accomplished by civilized nations, not by any greatness
of faculty in the agents, but through the fact that each is
able to rely with certainty on the others for the portion of
the work which they respectively undertake. The peculiar
characteristic of civilized beings is the capacity of co-opera-
tion ; and this tends to improve by practice, and becomes
capable of assuming a constantly wider sphere of action.'
The future of rural industries appears largely to depend
upon the use of local resources and upon supplying the
requirements of a local market, but this does not comprise
the whole of the situation. The household for the house-
hold, the village for the village, the town for the town, are
ideals which go down before invention, which does not even
stop at the nation for the nation. And the dynamic inven-
tion may be one in technical skill, mechanical appliances, or
business organization. Trade is always overflowing political
boundaries and even barriers, and if the trade of the villages
does not flow into the towns that of the towns is certain to
flow into the villages. It may be possible that in the
revolution of economic principles and systems which is now
being made by all sorts and conditions of persons certain
human advantages in rural industries may be set against the
greater production of goods by the larger industrial units
of the towns. In particular, the smaller industrial concern
enables a man to see the whole series of connexions between
the making and the using of an article, and brings his work
into direct relation not only with his own life, but with
that of the community of which he is a member. There is
little or no distinction between producer and consumer and
one of the chief causes of present social conflicts is non-
existent. The worker in the country * sees the nature of
what he is doing ; he is getting products from the land and
making them of use by industry. He sees the whole process,
and the fact is plain that labour and land are for the sake
of himself and others like himself who need the goods. He
sees the grain become flour, the wood from the forest become
PREFACE 11
furniture, the hide become leather, and the leather boots,
and the wool cloth — all beside him, and all of it a plain
process of natural goods made useful by men.' l The men
of the towns, however, have a genius for organization, and
if it were necessary that their businesses should be arranged
so that less specialization were necessary than at present, or
that some of the evil effects of over-specialization were
eliminated they may modify existing systems without
seriously affecting their productivity. The only basis upon
which rural industries can be firmly established is a high
standard of technical knowledge and skill, suitable machinery
and commercial organization.
The study summarized in the following chapters was
undertaken by the Institute for Research in Agricultural
Economics at the suggestion of the Development Com-
missioners, who recommended a small grant for the purpose.
It has been made in a district which lies within a radius of
thirty miles from the city of Oxford. This district was
chosen partly because of convenience of working, but also
because it includes many and varied types of land, with
the consequent variations in utilization, and in economic
and social conditions. The main object of the study was to
ascertain what rural industries existed, the reasons for their
localization, their present position, and prospects of future
development. In addition, however, attempts have been
made to obtain information about industries which have
existed in the district, and the reasons for their subsequent
disappearance. In pursuance of the main object of the
inquiry it became necessary to study the present position of
the industries from several points of view, particularly those
of commercial methods, the relations of employers and
employees, and of general trade organization. In the
sections of the reports dealing with these subjects it will
be seen that rural industries do not present any isolated
problems, rather that all industry, whether it be carried on
in town or country, has many features in common.
1 D. H. Macgregor, The Evolution of Industry, p. 24.
12 PREFACE
The small industries which exist in a district such as that
covered by the inquiry are very varied in character, and no
investigator could be expected to obtain a complete mastery
of all the technical details connected with them. However,
a considerable amount of very useful knowledge has been
accumulated.
The inquiry has been carried out by Miss K. S. Woods, who
had a very keen interest in the subject and much knowledge
of some aspects of it, before starting the work, and for some
time she worked in collaboration with Miss D. C. Biggs.
Miss Woods has been fortunate in securing the confidence of
the persons to whom it was necessary to apply for informa-
tion, and in many cases they have taken much practical
interest in the work, being anxious both to give of their
knowledge and to enable Miss Woods to see actual processes
carried on. The Institute for Research in Agricultural
Economics is very much indebted to the many persons, too
numerous to mention by name, who have given assistance to
Miss Woods, and especially to those who live the busy life
of village craftsman or trader who have given freely of their
valuable time. Both the Institute and Miss Woods wish
to record appreciation of services rendered by Miss Biggs
especially in the villages of South Oxfordshire. During the
early part of the period in which the inquiry was made
Miss Biggs visited many craftsmen, and the detailed and
complete information which she obtained from villages was
evidence of her knowledge of village life, and of the con-
fidence reposed in her by villagers.
The study of rural industries in the neighbourhood of
Oxford could scarcely lead to conclusions applicable to the
whole of the country, because of variations in local conditions,
but there is every reason for believing "that the information
obtained sheds much light upon the general problems
involved in providing opportunities for industrial activities
in the villages of England. The inquiry has not been limited
to what are sometimes, rather unnecessarily, described as
* crafts ' but has covered industries in which the small
workshop or the small factory exists. On the other hand,
PREFACE 13
such industries as blanket-making at Witney or (factory)
chair-making at High Wycombe have been excluded, for
here the general industrial organization does not differ in
any essential feature from that to be found in many similar
factories in large urban centres. The aim was the study of
such industries as have a definite relation to the general
conditions of the locality in which they exist by reason of
the supply of raw materials, the existence of a local demand,
or of some peculiar conditions as to the local supply of labour.
The result of the inquiry is, briefly, that the future prospects
of these industries depends chiefly upon the increase in
technical knowledge of the methods of production of raw
materials, or of processes for the manufacture of raw
materials, and upon improvements in commercial organiza-
tion, and that any healthy development will depend chiefly
upon the efforts of those persons in the local areas who are
directly interested in success or failure. These principles are
common to all industries, but reference must be made to
the summary and to the individual reports upon industries
for information as to the parts which it appears possible for
public authorities to play if industrial development in rural
areas is required for general social purposes. The report
has been prepared in such a form that a general summary
of information and conclusions is available prior to the
presentation of the more detailed reports on separate
industries and their particular problems.
During the preparation of this Report for the press Miss
Woods has been making similar investigations in other
districts. More material has been obtained regarding some
industries, and other points of view have emerged. In
particular, the general trade depression has revealed several
important considerations. This Report, however, shows the
position in this area during the year 1919-20.
A. W. ASHBY.
INSTITUTE FOR RESEARCH IN
AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS,
OXFORD, December, 1920.
PART I
THE ECONOMICS OF RURAL INDUSTRIES
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
RURAL industries have recently attracted a great deal of
attention in connexion with problems of development and
resettlement of rural areas. Arguments are brought forward
both for and against any social attempts at developing them,
and facts can be produced to support every one of these
arguments. This shows the need for close investigation of
the subject and careful sifting of evidence, as only in this
way will it be possible to arrive at the facts concerning the
present position, or to assess the part that small industries
may play in rural development.
On the one side it is urged that a large rural popula-
tion is essential to national vigour, and the closer settle-
ment of our rural districts is one of the means by which
it is hoped to improve the national physique. Rural indus-
tries, it is said, will allow more people to be supported on
the land and more children to grow up in free and healthy
surroundings.
It is also urged that we must produce more food, and that
rural industries will make agricultural labour more attrac-
tive by providing pleasant and lucrative occupations for
the many hours of bad weather and darkness which the
farm workers and their wives spend unprofitably. Small-
holders who could not support themselves entirely from
their holdings will have other strings to their bows, and
out of their earnings from industries they will be able to
save capital and improve their holdings. It is said that few
women can do whole-time work on the land. But in rural
industries there will be other openings at home for the girls
and young women ; village life will be more varied and
interesting ; and the flight to the attractions of the town
will be arrested.
Again, it is said that many articles now imported or made
in the towns could quite well be manufactured in the country,
10 INTRODUCTION
if only people were taught and stimulated to make things
for home and local use. National economy would thus be
served by a decrease in imports and setting free urban labour
for manufacture for export.
It is further argued that as a substantial proportion of
factory employees work in very small workshops or factories,
many of these small-scale industries could, with proper
organization, be as well carried on in rural districts as in
and near the large towns. That a manufacturer who knows
intimately every process carried on in his workshop as well
as the commercial side of his business, who has served a
thorough apprenticeship, and is personally acquainted with
every worker on the premises, is a national asset of great
value ; and that the training which can be given in such
a business should be an essential part of a national education
system. In the country, it is argued, a man is less shackled
by regulations ; he can develop on his own lines, live a happy
and independent life, and give to society the fruits of his
individuality and initiative. By using machinery to lighten
the more laborious tasks, but avoiding that minute sub-
division of processes which kills interest and the sense of
responsibility, the small-scale manufacturer can raise and
uphold the standard of industry.
The handicrafts, we are told, are the basis of all industry,
and a nation whose great industries lose touch with the
manual processes on which they are founded, loses its
vitality. Even in a big woollen mill it is on the hand-loom
that new designs are worked out and experiments tried.
A further argument advanced in support of the develop-
ment of rural industries is that there are many people
capable of good work who cannot stand the noise and hurry
of town and factory. They may need the peace and open-
ness of the country for themselves, or perhaps for their
families, but yet are unfitted to support themselves in
agriculture, at any rate entirely.
Doctors have found in creative work a restorative to
health of body and mind, and some would attribute indus-
trial unrest, not to economic conditions but to the divorce
of manual toil from the exercise of creative faculties. The
cry of the worker for greater control of industry is not, we
are told, merely a cry for better conditions, but for freedom
to use something more than his limbs in the work in which
so many hours of his life must be spent. Finding no scope
in the deadly monotony of processes repeated a thousand
times, he looks to the * democratization of industry ' to give
INTRODUCTION 17
him, in common with his fellows, a field for exercising his
higher faculties. But meanwhile, in the small-scale industry
and little rural community, there is, it is contended, a field
where social and industrial problems can be worked out with
less difficulty and delay.
These are some of the arguments put forward not only
by those who are concerned to see the restoration of the
village craftsman at any sacrifice of economic efficiency,
but also by many who believe that the little business is not
necessarily an industrial anachronism.
On the other side, it is argued that Utopian dreams,
however fair, can only come true if the people can earn
enough without having to toil too wearily for the bare
necessities of life. With regard to increased food production,
it is urged that improved methods of agriculture are what is
needed, and that capital should be sunk in farms and not in
industries which will only add another burden to the agri-
cultural labourer and his family. It is less and not more
work that is needed.1
It is explained that the competition of large-scale industry
which causes a continual process of decline and collapse
among the small-scale industries of similar character, is due
to the superior economies which can be effected in the
former. Economy in transport is effected by concentration
in a good industrial centre, and by dealing with materials
and products in bulk ; economy in manufacture by the
superior equipment which is possible in a large factory with
regard to labour-saving machinery, and by the division of
labour according to varying capacity in the workers ;
economy both in transport and in manufacture by close
proximity to coal, the chief source of power ; economy in
commerce by advertising and by disposing rapidly of large
quantities of produce, and by the facilities for keeping in
touch with the fluctuations of the world market ; economy
in management by having a large amount of business dealt
with by the same organizing staff. The large-scale industry
therefore has the double advantage over the small-scale
industry, of being able to supply the public with an article
at a lower price, and the workers with higher wages for the
same or a smaller amount of work.
Many other arguments are advanced against home
1 The conditions under which home industries are carried on in com-
bination with agricultural work abroad are not encouraging. See Peasant
Industry, Education Pamphlet, No. 26, H.M.S.O. (1912) ; also The Rural
Problem, by A. W. Ashby, Athenaeum Press.
2415 B
18 INTRODUCTION
industries. They are difficult to organize and peculiarly
liable to sweating, and they tend to keep down wages by
providing a subsidiary source of income. Time given to
home industries can ill be spared from the care of home
and children. In some cases they compete unfairly with
other industries because they are done for ' pocket money '.
Industries depend for success on regularity of output and
the utmost economy in organization, and this is not easily
attained in the country. It would be harmful to encourage
home industries while cottages are so deficient, even for
the needs of young families, and it is better at present that
young people should find work away. As for village factories,
if they can be developed economically, private enterprise will
do it, and social organization is unnecessary and wasteful.
Anyhow, we are told, the problem of rural industries only
touches the fringe of the industrial and social problem. The
number of people who can be supported on the land in
England is strictly limited. Therefore, unless it can be
shown that rural industries could assist, or at any rate not
compete with, agriculture and food production, the chief
argument falls to the ground. It is no use returning to
mediaevalism. In the impoverished conditions of to-day,
industry must be carried on with rigorous economy, and if
we are to be a strong and happy nation we must see to it
that our towns and our factories are healthy. The nation
needs the countryside as a place for rest and refreshment.
Give the town workers of all classes better facilities for
country holidays and country dwellings, and do not attempt
to promote industries under unsuitable conditions.
This is the outline of the case for the other side, and the
deep divergence of opinion is a clear indication of the need
for further consideration and research.
By making a careful investigation in a definite area, it is
possible to show what are the actual conditions under which
rural industries are carried on, and what are the opinions
of the people most intimately concerned as to their function,
their possibilities, and their needs. The interest shown by
the various sections of the local population is very striking.
A great deal of thought is being given to the subject, and in
the numerous interviews with people of practical experience,
attention was constantly drawn to the wider aspects of the
question, and it has been possible to study rural industries
in relation not only to agriculture and rural life, but to
urban production and foreign trade, and to consider their
functions in the national economy.
INTRODUCTION 10
In a contemporary survey it is difficult to separate
passing from more lasting influences, and war conditions
made it especially difficult in this investigation. But it
seems that in many cases these influences only accentuated
tendencies which might otherwise have passed unnoticed or
would have been difficult to trace to their causes. There is
certainly a striking resemblance between the conclusions
drawn from this inquiry and those which may be gathered
from studying reports on rural industries in Scotland,
Germany, and other parts of England. Although great
attention is being paid to industrial and social conditions
in towns, literature on the subject of rural industries is
scanty, and yet this is a branch of sociology which ought
not to be neglected. In spite of the limited scope of this
inquiry and the need for further investigation along certain
lines, it is suggested that sufficient facts have been collected
to show the main principles underlying the problems of
rural industries which must be the foundation on which
practical measures should be based.
The Area and the Industries Investigated
The Area. The investigation covered the period March
1919 to March 1920. Taking an area with Oxford as its
centre and a radius of thirty miles, a district was covered
which is fairly typical of agricultural England. Its geo-
graphical variations are considerable. It includes the
sparsely populated uplands of the Cotswolds and the Berk-
shire Downs ; the river valleys of the Thames and Kennet
and their tributary streams ; the woodlands of North
Hampshire, South Berkshire, Wychwood, and the Chiltern
ridge — all differing in character — and the comparatively
timberless regions of North Oxfordshire and Mid-Berkshire.
The size of holdings and systems of farming vary considerably
over the area under investigation, and with them the type
of labour available for agriculture and other occupations.
In spite of the absence of large industrial towns, the urban
elements of Reading, Banbury, Swindon, Wycombe, and
Oxford itself have an important bearing on the rural
districts surrounding them. The smaller market towns are
also important in view of their present and future position as
rural centres. The residential population must also be
taken into consideration in its effect on labour and markets.
The Industries. As far as the individual industries them-
selves are concerned, other districts, in which the same class
of industry is carried on, might have provided more fruitful
B 2
20 AREA AND INDUSTRIES INVESTIGATED
fields for study in particular cases. It is also possible
that other districts of the same size might have given as
much variety, but there is now so little trade isolation that
inquiries made in one locality frequently bring out facts
concerning other parts of the country.
The types of industries which have been found in this
district are :
GROUP I
INDUSTRIES OWING THEIR EXISTENCE MAINLY TO LOCAL MATERIAL
A. Quarrying and Mining, and Brickworks.
B. Food Production and Conservation.
C. The Underwood Industries :
(1) Wood-cutting and sorting, and making of faggots.
Barrel-hoops.
Crate-rods.
Rakes.
Hurdles.
Sheep cribs.
Ladders.
Besoms.
(2) Underwood turnery, including the manufacture of :
Mop-sticks and garden -implement handles.
Brushwood ware.
Chairs, &c.
D. Timber Industries :
(1) The by-industries of saw-mills, including the manufacture of :
Wheels.
Wheelbarrows .
Wooden toys.
Boxes, &c.
(2) Chair manufacture and chair-leg turnery.
(3) Bowl turnery.
E. Osier-growing and Basket-making.
GROUP II
INDUSTRIES OWING THEIR EXISTENCE TO THE NEEDS OF THE
LOCAL MARKET
The Village Repairing and Manufacturing Workshops :
Wheelwrights and carpenters.1
Turners for builders and carpenters.
Smiths, farriers, and agricultural implement makers.
Saddlers.
Tin-smiths.
Wagon -sheet makers and repairers.
Halter makers.
Dressmakers and bespoke tailors.
1 See pp. 45-49. Supplying of Agricultural Needs.
AREA AND INDUSTRIES INVESTIGATED 21
GROUP III
INDUSTRIES WHICH DO NOT DEPEND ON LOCAL MATERIAL OR
MARKET, BUT ON THE LOCAL SUPPLY OF LABOUR
Leather-dressing.
Glove-making.
Ready-made clothing.
Knitting.
Lace-making.
Plush -making.
GROUP IV
INDUSTRIES WHICH DEPEND ON THE SUPPLY OF WATER
Paper mills.
Cloth mills.
Blanket mills.
Carpet manufacture.
Boat-building.
GROUP V
A FEW INDUSTRIES ALMOST EXTINCT AS RURAL INDUSTRIES
Brush-making.
Rope-making.
Cooperage.
GROUP VI
INDUSTRIES REVIVED OR RECENTLY STARTED, SUCH AS
Weaving.
Rabbit-skin glove-making.
Rush basket-making, &c.
The above classification has been made for convenience,
but some industries might more correctly be included in
a different group ; e. g. leather-dressing may depend on
the demand of the local glove factories or other uses of
leather or on a supply of hides from local abattoirs, and
basket-making depends on the local market even more than
on local material.
Detailed investigation has not been attempted in all the
industries. Quarrying, mining, and brickworks have been
omitted as beyond the scope of this investigation, and also
all the industries concerned with food-production and conser-
vation. The bearing, however, of rural industries on food-
production is discussed. Other industries which form an
important part of rural economy are building, the manufac-
ture of agricultural implements, and the work done in village
saddleries, smithies, and joineries ; the organization of village
retail trade is also important. Although no separate reports
have been made on these, a good deal of information has been
22 AREA AND INDUSTRIES INVESTIGATED
collected which is valuable in throwing light on the position
and functions of rural industries and reference will be made
to them where necessary. Investigation of paper mills and
brush-making has been deferred, because these can better
be studied in other rural districts where there are more
examples. Boat-building has also been omitted as having
no particular importance with regard to local material or
rural demand.
Detailed reports are given in Part II of ( 1 ) the underwood
and timber industries ; (2) basket -making ; (3) gloving and
other industries employing mostly women. Leather-dressing
for gloves is also included in this section.
CHAPTER II
CONDITIONS IN RURAL INDUSTRIES
TAKING the investigated area as roughly fifty miles
square, the industries are very few, and except for the
repairing and manufacturing workshops the vast majority
of villages have none at all.
Underwood industries are carried on in the Kennet district,
where material is abundant and railway communication good ;
chair-making close to the beech-woods of the Chilterns ;
hurdle-making distributed over the district ; besoms are
made close to the birch-woods of Tadley and Baughurst ;
barrel-hoops, crate-rods, pill-boxes, rakes, and wooden
bowls by a few craftsmen of the Kennet woods. Gloving has
survived where agricultural wages have been low and there
has been no other industry for women. Ready-made tailor-
ing is done in a few villages near the factories at Oxford
and Abingdon. Plush is still hand- woven in a village near
Banbury ; the Abingdon hand-looms are still in use for
carpets and matting, and * halter-heads ' or head stalls
are woven by hand, the reins being made in the old rope-
walks. Lace-making is done in the east of Oxfordshire, and
hand-machine knitting in several villages and small towns.
Basket-making is done in the small towns, and in a few
remote villages where there are still some derelict osier-beds,
the most extensive osier-beds in the district being in the
Kennet valley. Wooden boxes, toys, wheels, and other
small articles are made in or near a few of the saw-mills.
Present Position of Trades
Of the small woodland crafts, besoms have the best
market, being used in iron-works to brush the iron from the
slag, and also in factories and collieries ; for garden use the
demand is seasonal. Hurdles are being sent to the north
of England and to Scotland. Barrel-hoops are wanted for
sugar and fish barrels, but very few woodmen are making
them ; the trade is a fluctuating one. There is a demand
for rakes, but only two rake-makers were found. The
village pill-box turner has no difficulty in selling all he
can make in spite of competition from factories, where
automatic lathes are used. The bowl-turner was busy
supplying London shops and fulfilling Government orders.
Turnery is expanding, and there is a ready sale for
chairs, toys, and household articles of various kinds. The
24 CONDITIONS IN RURAL INDUSTRIES
demand for the staple products — implement handles and
mop -sticks — is said to be abnormal, and firms are pre-
pared to develop, as the most successful firm has done,
on side lines, in expectation of resumed competition
from Norway and America in the staple trade. There is
a boom in the chair industry and the demand cannot
wholly be met. But the present demand for wooden articles
represents a four or five years' shortage, and cannot be
taken as a criterion for the future when conditions are
normal. The shortage of labour in the underwood industries
is limited by a shortage of material ; while the latter is
acute there is not room for many more workers.
In the needlework industries, the demand for gloves is
keen and material and labour scarce ; the demand for
clothing is also keen, and outworkers are being kept on
and new ones engaged as a temporary expedient. There is
also a keen demand for knitted goods, owing partly to the
great expense and poor quality of woven goods and cloth.
There is a sale for certain classes of lace, but the younger
women will not learn to make it, though in some villages the
rising price given for the cheaper varieties is attracting new
workers.
In the repairing and manufacturing workshops there is
a tendency to dispense with paid labour and to keep the
business in the family, using labour-saving machinery where
possible. It is difficult to get apprentices, and they are
often said to be unsatisfactory. Objections are made to the
high wages or piece-rates fixed by the Trade Unions, seldom
on the grounds that they are too high in themselves, but
frequently on the grounds that the men are not worth the
cost and that fixed hours are inconvenient in a repairing
shop. The shortage of good shoeing smiths was apparent
even before the war. Wheel wrighting and carpentry,
cobbling, cooperage, and farriery, have become to a great
extent merely repairing businesses, owing to the use of
power and the development of machinery which can turn
out ' parts ' in great quantities. This tendency is, however,
to some extent reversed by the use of small engines of
various kinds.
Osier-growing is said to be one of the most profitable
forms of cultivation, and individual basket-makers as well
as basket-making firms in many cases wish to own osier-
beds where there is suitable land. Basket-making pays
well if carried on in close proximity to a market, and every
small town provides a market for a variety of baskets.
PRESENT POSITION OF TRADES 25
In Oxford itself there is said to be a good opening for a
basket -factory.1
Trade Organization and Capitalization
With regard to organization, rural industries are of two
classes, first, the factory type in which there is a definite
division into employers and employed ; secondly, the work-
shop type in which the master craftsman may or may not
have employees, and in which journeymen set up for them-
selves if the opportunity comes. In the first group the workers
sell their labour ; in the second group they sell their wares.
Women's home industries sometimes belong to the first
group, the workers being connected with a factory, as in
gloving and tailoring ; sometimes to the second group,
as in lace-making and knitting.
In the first group, employees in paper-mills, turneries,
the larger basket-works, chair, cloth, and glove factories,
belong to trade unions in most cases ; outworkers for the
clothing factories are also organized, and in the gloving
trade organization of outworkers is increasing.
In the second group, there is little or no organization
except among the farriers. The Master Farriers' Association,
which covers the whole country, is 10,000 strong, and there
are small local associations as well. The employees in this
industry are also organized on a national scale. This shows
that trade-unionism can work in the small shops. But it
does not, in its normal form, quite meet the needs of the
small craftsmen and craftswomen. The fixing of wages and
piece-rates leads to the fixing of prices, as in the basket and
smithing trades. But in industries where the employees are
very few in relation to master workers, or where there are
none, attempts at organization for the purpose of fixing
prices meet with little success. This is partly due to the
character of small craftsmen. There is a remarkable dislike
to raising prices to old customers, and when the customers
are farmers it is difficult to do so. Employers have, or may
be supposed to have, in a time of booming trade, the power
of raising their prices to meet the extra wages bill, and
employees organized in a big union have a mass of support
1 The investigation was carried on during the abnormal conditions
resulting from the war, the scarcity of imports effecting what was
practically a system of protection. To rely upon any definite forecast
with regard to particular industries would be as rash during the present
period of depression as it was during the boom. Manufacturers still
express great uncertainty. — Jan. 1921.
26 CONDITIONS IN RURAL INDUSTRIES
behind them. But independent craftsmen are too scattered
and the expense of organization is too heavy for them to be
in a strong position. The farriers have not alt oget her * suc-
ceeded in meeting these difficulties. Effective organization
would therefore have to be on a wider basis than for each
craft alone, and some form of co-operative organization,
open to all the independent workers in a district,would appear
to be the most practical solution. It is admitted by crafts-
men, trade union organizers, and others of experience that
there is at present no type of organization which quite meets
the needs of this peculiarly unprotected class of workers.
The types of firms investigated can roughly be divided into
two :
(1) Businesses which have been built up from a small
workshop on the turnover, and are under the manage-
ment of a practical craftsman.
(2) Factories or branches which have been transplanted
from elsewhere.
Although in some cases, masters of the former class have
been harsh employers, yet they are frequently men who
show by their enterprise and ability that they could have
made good use of more capital. One of the most notable
cases of expansion was due as much to a sudden windfall
which provided capital as to the qualities of the manufac-
turer. Producers whose businesses have expanded express
the opinion that credit banks would have been useful ;
craftsmen who have to wait a considerable time before
getting a return are sometimes of the same opinion. Family
expenses are greatest just at the time when capital would
be most useful. It may be needed for laying in a stock
of material, opening a shop, setting up machinery, or
acquiring land. In many cases the additional calling of
publican or job -master gives the craftsman extra funds so
that he can buy advantageously. In the Newbury district,
the overtime earnings for harvest, paid in a lump at Michael-
mas, may be spent at the November sales, and thus a
labourer becomes an independent craftsman or a wood
dealer. But the money is often needed for winter clothing
or other family requirements. The custom, however, of
paying only a small deposit at the time of purchase, and the
remainder the following Michaelmas, makes it comparatively
easy for the woodmen of this district to become ' capitalists '.
Craftsmen, on the other hand, who do not contemplate
expansion do not wish for greater credit facilities, and there
is amongst many a dislike of borrowing.
•
ORGANIZATION AND CAPITALIZATION 27
The neglect of markets and the low standard of commercial
ability appear to be intimately connected with lack of
capital. Industries carried on by dispersed workers on a
small scale are of a type in which commercial capitalization
must be heavy. In a large concentrated industry, based on
large sales and quick returns, raw material is passed as
quickly as possible through the mill and the finished article
placed speedily on the market. The margin of profit may be
small, but the wholesale merchant provides the commercial
capital, is responsible for the sales, and takes a profit too. It
has been seen that rural industries can seldom compete with
industries of this class, but must produce articles of a better
or more distinctive quality for a limited market. Generally
speaking, the higher the price, the longer must goods be
held in stock, and the longer is the period between buying
the material and selling the product. If the commercial
side of an industry is in the hands of under-capitalized
dealers or employers, wages are apt to be cut down to a
minimum, to enable them to meet the expenses incurred in
waiting. The lace industry gives examples of this, and also
the small retail shop which buys local products and must
take a high commission if the goods are held. The case of
the underwood dealers may be cited as an example of the
function of middleman being fulfilled by a small capitalist
to the convenience of woodmen, craftsmen, and buyers alike.
In this case the market for underwood is near, and the evil
of the middleman being the only person in touch with the
market is avoided.
Power and Machinery
The development of small portable steam-engines, which
utilize waste wood for fuel, is assisting the revival of wood
industries, in the vicinity of the material, and the use of
small oil, gas, and petrol internal combustion engines is to
some extent helping to reinstate the village carpenter's shop,
smithy, saddlery, and even the bootmaker's shop as a manu-
facturing as well as a repairing business. But the develop-
ment of large-scale machinery which can turn out goods
or parts by the thousand by means of automatic tools, acts
in the opposite direction and the local workshop is likely.
so far as implements are concerned, to be a place where parts
are put together and supplemented, rather than a complete
manufactory. The local bicycle and motor shop gives an
example of a maker who is in reality an agent. Farriers and
implement -makers are in somewhat the same position,
28 CONDITIONS IN RURAL INDUSTRIES
especially when patent machinery is used. The small engine
which can work lathe or saw, or grind corn indiscriminately,
is welcome to the craftsman as making him independent of
labour. Electricity, it is said, will be the saving of the small
industry, and great interest is shown in the possibilities of
development.
Material
Shortage of material is felt in every industry. In some
cases it is attributed to the action of 'combines ' — for instance,
in iron ; in others it is due to neglect in cultivation and the
ignorance of those who could cultivate, and the fact that the
land is not in the hands of the persons chiefly interested in
its cultivation.1
The quality of the material has in many cases an effect
on the amount of labour entailed in making it up ; osiers
and copse-wood, for instance, if well grown, can be worked
with less labour as well as less waste. Transport expenses
can be borne on good material which cannot be borne on
waste. We find, as a consequence, a desire on the part of the
manufacturer in some cases to control the cultivation or
production of his material. We find also that the small
producer can in some cases only succeed if he is independent
of big merchants for his materials. Cases of a manufacturer
who would not join a trade organization being boycotted by
sellers of material through trade union pressure, have been
reported in three industries.
The small manufacturer or single-handed craftsman is
frequently at a disadvantage, owing to his lack of ready
money at times when materials are cheap. It is said that
he can usually obtain credit, but there is more willingness to
sell to a man who will pay at once, and, a man who cannot
do so is frequently the man who cannot afford to take
risks.
The most striking example of waste material which might
be used industrially is found in the saw-mills. Where the
engines have furnaces suitable for consuming the wood
offal, including sawdust, the waste is not so great, but con-
sidering the opening for toys and small articles of furniture,
it is worthy of consideration whether the establishment of
industries which utilize small pieces of wood would enable
a saw-mill or turnery works to pay, in places where it might
not pay otherwise.
1 See post, p. 87.
QUALITY OF PRODUCTS 29
Quality of Products
It is demonstrated in many instances that rural industries
cannot afford the cost of administration in an output of
poor quality and low value. Industries which have attempted
to compete in the same class of goods which can be turned
out in great quantities in big factories have only survived by
sweating the workers, and this has reacted on the quality
of output and debased it. Industries which flourish either
serve their local market well, or some other market which
they have ' captured ' and kept by their reputation for
quality.
Methods of Selling and Markets
The methods by which country craftsmen sell their
goods are primitive and unorganized. The local market is
reached still in some instances by hawking, though the
railway service has largely superseded this method, goods
being sent to shops which used to be visited personally
with a pony-cart or on foot. Occasionally craftsmen take
their wares to local market-places, but it is more usual for
them to sell to a retailer or to have a shop of their own
in the market town or in a fair-sized village. There does
not seem to be much trade with wholesale merchants at a
distance, though there are exceptions where a good trade
is done.
Buyers visit the villages for lace just as egglers or higglers
buy up eggs and fruit. A builder's merchant is in touch with
the smiths and carpenters of a wide area in Berkshire,
doing them a service by putting them in touch with a
market for such small articles as doorplates and latches.
This he can do on a 5 per cent, commission. Lace buyers
were taking 10 per cent., though in one case, where the
buyer was a grocer who had anyhow to travel round these
villages, the percentage was 5 per cent. The commission
made by retailers varies according to the class of goods
and the demand, the general rule being, the longer the goods
are likely to be in stock the higher the commission. It is
found that in some cases better rates can be obtained by
selling to the West End shops, though the commission may
amount to as much as one half the retail price, than at
local shops, where the commission may be 25 to 30 per cent.
There is a deplorable lack of enterprise and of commercial
ability in the villages and small towns, though there are
exceptions which show the possibility of expanding an
30 CONDITIONS IN RURAL INDUSTRIES
industry by serving first the local market and gradually
making connexions farther afield.
It is found that in several instances the man who sells to
farmers only is worse off than the man who sells to other
classes. Racing-hurdles pay better than sheep -hurdles ;
household baskets better than agricultural baskets ; shoeing
hunters pays better than shoeing farm horses. But the local
household market, a promising field for a number of industries,
is served badly by the village shops, and in the small towns
there are few retailers who take advantage of local resources.
The shops are supplied by commercial travellers, and there are
still instances of peddling at farmhouses and cottages and sell-
ing clothing and other goods on credit, payment being made in
instalments. This practice, however, is declining, and more
shopping is done at the nearest town. The most flourishing
basket-makers are those who have a retail shop in which to
display samples. They repair and make to order and
supplement what they cannot profitably make by buying
from wholesale dealers or larger firms with whom they also
deal for material. In other cases retailers employ craftsmen
on the premises ; ironmongers, for instance, occasionally
employ basket-makers or halter-makers ; and wool and
fancy-needlework shopkeepers employ knitters. Amongst
small craftsmen sales are more often made direct to retailers
than to wholesale merchants, the connexion having grown
out of the old custom of driving to market, often over very
long distances, and hawking goods to shops. In cases where
the retailer buys from a local craftsman or craftswoman the
price is apt to be beaten down very low, the shopman
looking for cheapness rather than quality. It must be
remembered, however, that bad debts are often incurred by
the small shopman, which makes his position difficult.
A good retailer, who takes the trouble to find out reliable
craftsmen and to stock good articles, has a good effect on
local industries, and connexions of this kind are kept up
for many years. There is scarcely any co-operative effort in
putting local products on the market.
Transport
The development of long-distance transport and the
neglect of local transport is one of the determining factors of
the concentration of industry in industrial centres. But the
use of bicycles and motors has brought great changes in
rural districts, and increased the importance of the small
town or large village which is within easy reach of the
TRANSPORT 31
surrounding country. If transport -facilities could be
systematically developed according to geographical and
economic conditions, linking up the smaller villages by better
roads and good motor service to the nearest convenient
town, and connecting those local centres with larger centres,
one of the greatest disabilities of rural industries would be
removed. Workers, especially girls, who depend on bicycles
or on walking are apt to keep irregular time, and the shortage
of houses makes lodgings almost prohibitive. Some saw-
mills, for instance, would increase their manufacture of
by-products if the requisite labour could be transported.
The use of motors for passenger traffic tends to increase the
industrial and commercial importance of the towns and
larger villages by collecting factory workers and shoppers ;
their use for collecting and distributing goods acts to some
extent in the reverse direction, stimulating industries which
are dispersed over the villages on their routes. But the town
or large village is in either case the centre for organization.
Housing
In country as in town, the housing shortage is preventing
expansion in many cases. The smallness of the houses is
one of the reasons for trade-union objections to home in-
dustries ; until cottages have a room apart for a workshop
they say it is undesirable. Some firms are buying land for the
purpose of building houses for their employees. In connexion
with housing, building as a rural industry needs special
investigation.
Labour
(a) Earnings. Every one of these trades has been under-
paid in the past, but there is improvement in every industry,
though in certain crafts carried on in unsuitable places
according to old-fashioned methods, or by workers of poor
quality, it is still very low ; for instance, basket-making
in isolated villages, where local osier-beds are derelict ;
turnery on primitive lathes, in the neighbourhood of power-
driven mills turning out similar articles ; or industries
such as knitting done by women and girls with no power
of organizing. The poor payment does not necessarily show
that economic forces are driving the industries to the
towns ; it is partly due to the fact that trade-union organiza-
tion in rural districts is, practically speaking, a new develop-
ment ; therefore, so far as the standard of life depends on
trade-union effort it would be fairer to compare the condition
32 CONDITIONS IN RURAL INDUSTRIES
of the rural worker with that of the town worker of nearly a
century ago than with that of the average worker to-day.
The improvement in earnings is attributable to several
causes :
(1) A better standard of wages for agricultural labour.
With the present high prices, improvement is fre-
quently denied, but there is no doubt that indigence
is less common now than before the war, whatever
the future position may be. The agricultural wage is
constantly taken as a criterion for male workers, and
industries judged according as they afford more or
less earnings than agricultural labour.
(2) Trade- union organization ; in most cases the influence
is indirect, but in the case of gloving it appears to
have created a revolution.
(3) Trade Boards, or the threat of establishing a Trade
Board. A number of trades have been added to the
schedule of trades for which a trade board is to be
established, and they are likely to cover the rural
industries in which workers are distinctly wage-
earners, though there is a danger of evasion by
developing the kind of organization in which the
worker is a seller , not of labour but of products.
(4) A better market ; partly owing to the shortage of
products and cessation of foreign competition during
the war, and to Government contracts which have
stimulated expansion ; partly due to an increased
purchasing power amongst the working class, e. g.
in clothing and in household fittings, a better type
of article is now demanded than the ' cheap and
nasty ' type usually associated with sweating.
Complaints are often made that the payment of high
wages for unskilled work has upset the labour market and
prevented workers entering the skilled trades. No doubt
this is the immediate effect. Biit a local sawyer and wood
merchant who had given much thought to the economic
questions connected with wood industries, raised an interest-
ing point. He said that labour — that is to say, work which
needs physical strength and endurance — had always been
underpaid. f Labourers are needed in every trade, and every
skilled occupation depends on the labourer's strength. But
the result of underpayment is that a labourer cannot afford
to put his son to any other trade, and many of them become
labourers who are not physically fit for the work. These
men might have done well in such occupations as light
LABOUR 33
smiths' work or carpentry, but they had no chance, and
when they ask for employment they say they can do any-
thing, whereas they can do nothing.' This expresses a truth
which is at the bottom of the trade-union pressure for
levelling up the earnings of unskilled workers. It ought
ultimately to work out for the good of industry, for employers
will substitute machinery or skilled workers for expensive
unskilled workers. Already the big wages given in the chair
factories are increasing the demand for the better-made
chair -legs of the turners in the villages round. It is being
discovered that it is bad policy to produce vast quantities
of poor chairs which are so hastily and badly put together
that they will not stand use. Industries of this type are
the result of employing unskilled or low skilled workers at
low rates of payment. The poor quality of the work required
in a large and cheap output is reputed as one of the causes
of labour unrest. Another good result will be that higher
earnings will attract men who excel in physical strength to
the work for which they are specially fitted. The social slur
which attaches to low skilled and deteriorated industries is
intimately connected with underpayment, for great poverty
creates a class which is cut off from other social classes who
have more chance of ' keeping up appearances ', which imply
an accepted standard of cleanliness, decency, and associates.
(6) Organization. The term ' labour organization ' as
implying a division into two camps is not, in a great many
cases, applicable to rural industries. There is no sharp social
differentiation between master-craftsmen and journeymen,
and even between the head of a small factory and the wage-
earners who work beside him. There are understandings
between various organizations connected with a trade which
result in boycotting outsiders. Even if the organization is
not strong enough for the boycotting to be effective, the
movement illustrates the connexion between labour organiza-
tion and trade ' combines ', and there are also committee^
on Whitley Council lines which may consider questions not
only of wages and hours, but any matter of importance to
the trade as a whole.
The Government has played an important part in assist-
ing and stimulating organization through the Trade Boards
and the Reconstruction Committees. Trade Boards are set
up in badly organized trades or in sections of trades to fix
minimum rates for the prevention of ' sweating '. They are
composed of representatives of employers and employed in
the trade, with additional members appointed by the
2415 C
34 CONDTTIONS IN RURAL INDUSTRIES
Ministry of Labour. They consider other matters of in-
dustrial importance if requested by a government depart-
ment to do so, and may delegate certain matters to local
or other committees. During the war, Trade Board activities
were in abeyance, but a large number of workers were
affected by Government orders and after the war by the
Wages (Temporary) Regulation Act. In 1918 the Ministry
of Labour became responsible for the Trade Board Act, and
for the Councils set up under the Whitley scheme. There
was a want of elasticity with regard to learners' rates which
acted hardly in some cases. It appears that Trade Board
rates for learners should be graded more according to
experience and efficiency than to age, so that adult or older
learners may have a better chance of getting employment.
If they reach the adult age before they have become pro-
ficient, employers are likely to discharge them, whereas they
might be induced to keep on paying them at a learner's rate
for a longer period until they were worth the adult rate.
There is a Trade Board in the ready-made clothing trade.
Conditions have greatly improved, trade- union organization
has been stimulated, and there appears to have been little or
no friction between employers and workers. But the rates
will probably have the effect of stopping ready-made clothing
as a rural industry. Under modern conditions, at any rate,
it is not sound as a rural industry, as at present organized,
the reason for its survival being a supply of labour which
until recently was sweated. A number of new Trade Boards
are being set up, and it seems that most badly paid trades
will soon be covered. Dressmaking and rope, twine and
net Trade Boards will affect rural employees, but will not
assist directly those workers who buy their own material
and are not therefore employees. Knitters and lace-makers
need some other form of protection, so do dressmakers who
are not employed.
• Interim Industrial Reconstruction Committees are set up
in industries not yet sufficiently well organized for the
complete form, of Industrial Council founded on the recom-
mendations of the Whitley Report. They consist of equal
numbers of representatives of associations of employers
and of trade unions. Thus representation is by districts
and not for the whole country. ' What form they should
take must depend on the circumstances of each industry.
What functions they should assume, and what they should
leave or delegate to existing organizations or to specially
created bodies, are also questions which must be determined
LABOUR 35
by those concerned. But it is not intended that these
committees, any more than the permanent Joint Standing
Industrial Councils, to which it is hoped they will lead,
should confine themselves to the consideration of subjects
specially referred to them by a Government Department.' 1
A liaison officer from the Ministry of Labour is present at
the meetings of the Reconstruction Committees. There are
Interim Industrial Reconstruction Committees in the gloving,
basket-making, and paper-making trades. These com-
mittees have not been established a year, but employers
and employed speak very favourably of their working.
By giving an opportunity for chosen representatives from
different districts to meet at stated intervals, not only can
troubles be forestalled, but many matters- of interest,
apart from wages and hours, can be discussed. Experience
is gained of other advantages of association, apart from
fighting strength. In the basket -making industry many
of the masters have small workshops in rural districts.
Their interests are not identical with those of the larger
firms, but by belonging to the masters' association for their
own district they have a chance of getting rural interests
brought under discussion by the Interim Industrial Recon-
struction Committee. It is most important that they should
join the organization, for regulations which are necessary
in town factories do not always apply to the country, yet
lack of regulations is a danger to the standard of the trade.2
These committees have been criticized as being too
centralized.3 They have not the triple organization of
works council, district council, and national council, recom-
mended in the Whitley Report, because they are set up in
trades where organization is considered too backward for
the local councils. It is too early yet to judge of their
efficiency. Their decisions, unlike those of Trade Boards,
have not the sanction of the law, and if there are large
sections of the trade unorganized there is a loophole for
sweating. But experience in the two industries investigated
gives great reason for hope. If state-aided or state-stimu-
lated organization is satisfactory in these cases, it might
also be satisfactory in a type devised to fit the small crafts
1 From the Directory of Joint Standing Industrial Councils, Interim
Industrial Reconstruction Committees, and Trade Boards, issued by the
Ministry of Labour.
2 See pp. 145 and 126, post.
3 It is regrettable that from some districts the workers, being un-
organized, do not send representatives to ths I. I. R. C. so that it is, for
that district, an Employers' Association merely.
C 2
36 CONDITIONS IN RURAL INDUSTRIES
and industries of a district. It will be all to the good if
this can be effected without a preliminary gathering of the
hosts into hostile camps. Centralization could be avoided
by making the village or a small group of villages the unit
for organization, combining them in a district organization
of convenient size.
Training and Education
There is evidence to support the belief of many persons
of practical experience with regard to rural industries that
they are suffering from a lack of facilities both for general
education and for technical training, and there appears to
be both demand and necessity not only for better technical
instruction but for general education as distinct from this.
Sir Daniel Hall has expressed the general need in relation to
the farmers : ' What the ordinary farmer needs above all
things is better education ; and by this we mean not so
much additional knowledge of a technical sort, but the
more flexible habit of mind that comes with reading, the
susceptibility to ideas that is acquired from acquaintance
with a different atmosphere than the one in which he
ordinarily lives.' There is exactly the same need in the case
of the people who control the rural industries. Problems of
rural education cannot here be discussed in detail. It is only
possible to indicate how far provisions for technical training
are made, and in what way they fall short of what is needed.
Apprenticeship is declining, the period is being shortened,
and learners are being taken instead of apprentices, for the
following reasons :
1. Parents cannot afford apprenticeship. They seldom
pay premiums,1 and the youths are unwilling to
forgo the earnings during the period of apprentice-
ship.
2. The big earnings in unskilled occupations are attractive
to juveniles and their parents.
3. There is an unwillingness amongst juveniles to commit
themselves to a vocation in the uncertainty and rest-
lessness of to-day.
4. Rural life is considered too dull and its openings
too few.
5. There is an unwillingness on the part of the crafts-
men to teach the trade to many new workers for
fear of an over-supply of labour lowering the prices.
1 There are local charities or endowments which provide funds for
apprenticing both boys and girls.
TRAINING AND EDUCATION 37
This is specially so in the case of the hurdle-making
and basket -making trades. In the basket trade,
however, restrictions imposed by the unions have
been recently relaxed through the influence of the
Interim Reconstruction Committee. The farmers'
complaints of the scarcity of good hurdle-makers can
be traced to the small earnings in the trade and the
consequent disinclination to teach it.
6. There is in some cases a lack of the capacity to teach
apprentices.
Learners are employees who for a limited period are
working under supervision at lower rates than proficient
employees. They may be juveniles or adults. Where there
is a Trade Board or other form of trade organization,
learners' rates are fixed according to age or period of
experience. There are cases, notably in the dressmaking
trade, in which the period allowed for older or adult learners
is not long enough for them to acquire sufficient skill for
employment at the adult minimum rate. This makes it
difficult for girls who have been doing unskilled work, and
at the age of sixteen or more wish to learn a trade, to get
firms to employ them. They are at a far less teachable age
than younger girls who come straight from school ; but
it is highly desirable that they should learn a skilled trade
and they need special consideration. Not the least important
function of the day continuation schools will be to keep
boys and girls who have entered blind-alley occupations in
a teachable frame of mind. The fear of lowering the standard
of production by too easy entrance to the trade — a survival
of gild spirit — is still strong, and the belief in a long period
of apprenticeship as the only means of attaining proficiency
is prevalent among craftsmen. But apprenticeship may be
a wasteful method of exploiting cheap labour. The belief
amongst some of the less educated smiths that a boy
must be expected to lame a few horses before he becomes
proficient, illustrates the folly of trusting to apprentice-
ship, without previous training, or some assurance that
the master is also a teacher. Apprenticeship at its best
means a practical and theoretical insight into the trade as
a whole and not mere acquisition of technical skill in a
single process. Apart from this all-round experience, skill
can often be acquired by a person of general intelligence
in a far shorter period than used to be considered necessary.
Dexterity depends partly on a steady practice of a particular
process, but also very largely on the lissomness of hand and
38 CONDITIONS IN RURAL INDUSTRIES
interest in the use of tools which should be acquired in
childhood. There is a constant danger in spending too long
a time over learning a skilled process, namely that the
particular process may be superseded by machinery or by
a change in the demand. This point may be illustrated in
the case of hurdles ; if a farmer sees little use in general
education which has apparently deprived him of good
hurdle-makers and thatchers, parents do not see the use
of training boys to make hurdles if wire is likely to be used
instead.
There is little provision for technical training or instruction
under the education authorities. Evening classes in wood-
work are popular and useful, and the work of the County
Instructor in Farriery was much appreciated by the farriers
and smiths. It is significant that the President of the Farriers'
Association lays stress on education as the first need of this
industry. Unfortunately, the instruction which prepared
men for registration in farriery was dropped during the war,
and has not yet been resumed. A scheme for instruction
in saddlery, carpentry, and farriery, recently failed to win
the support of the Oxfordshire Farmers' Union as being
too costly, and possibly not effectual, and apprenticeship
in village workshops was recommended instead. It has
been seen, however, that youths will not go as apprentices
to the village workshops, and it is evident that public funds
must be forthcoming if good training is to be given in skilled
occupations.
Training in the workshop alone is impracticable and
unsatisfactory. But to dispense entirely with apprenticeship
would appear to be unwise, partly because it would meet
with disapproval in the labour organizations. The tradi-
tional skill and intimate knowledge of the local craftsmen
and their business experience ought not to be wasted. If
they are not suited to give direct instruction to youths,
then it is all the more important that the teachers respon-
sible for technical instruction should not only make them-
selves acquainted with local practices and local resources
but direct the pupils' attention to the study of them,
thus applying science and wider knowledge to what comes
within their practical experience. The best method would be
technical instruction provided by the education authorities
to precede and supplement periods of apprenticeship in
suitable workshops. Therefore co-operation between the
education authorities and the trade organizations in the
matter of training of juveniles is a matter of great urgency.
TRAINING AND EDUCATION 39
The existence of Whitley Councils and Industrial Recon-
struction Committees, and even of Trade Boards, should be
of the greatest assistance in devising schemes which will
correlate school or class instruction with apprenticeship and
practice in the workshops, so as to combine the merits of
both systems and to economize time spent in learning and
money spent in providing instruction.
There is a danger in teaching children crafts while they
are young lest their labour should be exploited. This is
not an adequate reason for not supplying training in dexterity
at an age when they can learn so well, but it is a strong
reason for safeguarding them against the shortsightedness
of their parents. Special legislation may be necessary to
stop exploitation of child labour, for children who sell their
wares may evade regulations concerning employment out
of school hours. Examples of this danger are seen in the
lace industry. A lady who had taken great trouble in
improving the position of the lace-makers in her village,
opened a lace school, but had to close it because she found
the mothers kept their girls at the pillow for the sake of
their earnings, when they ought to have been playing.
The danger is not so acute where adult wages are good.
But it must be remembered that knitting, sewing, and lace-
making, the occupations which are most frequently taught
to school children, afterwards become the means of sweating.
This shows the need, on the one hand, to improve the teaching
and to follow it up so that a class of work may be done
which can command good value, and, on the other hand, to
regulate prices. Women's Institutes can do much educational
work on these lines, and the chance of selling through the
Institutes ought to prevent selling at sweated rates, though
it need not prevent selling advantageously through other
channels.
CHAPTER III
THE PLACE OF RURAL INDUSTRIES
IN RURAL ECONOMY
THERE is an intimate connexion between rural industries
and the agricultural and social life which forms their setting,
and their prosperity must depend on the special functions
that they fulfil, both in direct relation to agriculture, and in
the national economy. And even apart from their economic
function, there are social and educational considerations
which make it important to study their effect on rural
society and on the welfare of the nation as a whole. It is
not possible always to distinguish between economic and
other social influences ; but the distinction must be clearly
borne in mind to avoid confusion between the economic
* laws ' which depend on natural facts practically beyond
the control of man, and those conditions which are remotely
or otherwise alterable at will. To the first category belong
not only such facts as the climate, the distribution of
minerals, and the earth's contour, but such characteristics
of human nature as the capacity for organization in huge
bodies for the purpose of self-preservation. To the second
category belong those natural forces, such as the flow of
water or the power of heat, which man can harness to his
service, and also the laws of the country and the habits of
the people, which can be altered by combination and educa-
tion provided there is sufficient united will power and clear-
ness of vision to effect the change. At present arguments
are often based on premises which are ceasing to hold good.
For instance, when it is stated that small-holders or inde-
pendent craftsmen are incapable of reaching the degree of
education necessary for co-operation, it is forgotten that
their incapability is due partly to alterable causes. The
causes which obliged countrymen to leave school at eleven
or thirteen and to live a life of hard work with little oppor-
tunity for social intercourse unless at the public-house, to
follow old-fashioned methods because they understood no
others and could afford no risky experiments, have already
begun to disappear, though their influence will still be felt
AGRICULTURE 41
for many years. There is in England to-day no criterion
of the capabilities of a rural population provided with social
and educational opportunities suited to their needs.
The Relation of Rural Industries to Agriculture
Rural industries may assist agriculture under varying
circumstances in the following ways :
Directly
(1) By utilizing land and material unsuitable for agri-
culture.
(2) By utilizing machinery and transport in conjunction
with agriculture.
(3) By providing for agricultural needs.
(4) By introducing a population which creates a market
for farm produce, or, alternatively,
(5) By utilizing labour not occupied, or only partly
occupied, in agriculture.
Indirectly
(1) By increasing the population of rural areas and hence
zation, education and training, and social and
material amenities.
(2) By introducing into rural life a different element
which makes life more interesting and people more
intelligent, alert, and progressive.
On the other hand, rural industries may burden agriculture
(1) By subsidizing low wages and keeping down the
standard of life and of work in rural districts.
(2) By competing with outdoor occupations and absorbing
time, energy, and capital which are needed in the
home or on the garden or the farm.
(3) By failure, through inability to adapt themselves to
changing industrial and commercial methods.
The Utilization of Land and Material for Industries
There are in many districts certain tracts or small pieces
of land which, though unsuitable for agricultural purposes,
may yet be a source of profit to the agricultural population.
Local quarries may provide the farmer with building
material for walls, cottages and farm buildings, and
local woods with material for fencing, repairs, and fuel.
42 RURAL ECONOMY
In Sussex the sale of underwood for hop-poles provided
a valuable addition to the farmer's income, but the de-
cline of the market for these caused what was once a
source of profit to become a nuisance to him ; he had
the choice of cutting his coppice at a loss, or of allowing
it to grow to the detriment of the land which it enclosed.
In such cases the establishment of woodland industries
would assist the farmer by providing a market for an
otherwise unsaleable product. In Berkshire the gullies
which grow the best turnery poles are too steep for
agriculture. Not only does the gully wood fetch a good
price, but it helps to drain the land by absorbing the
moisture which finds its way to the gullies from the neigh-
bouring fields. Osiers can be grown with profit on land
which is too wet and heavy for tillage or pasture. Hazel
will grow on clay, birch and fir on sand, willow and alder on
marshy ground where only very poor returns are possible in
agriculture. It appears, however, that in cases where the
value of the timber or copse wood is negligible, agricultural
cultivation might be worth while, provided the initial
expenses could be met. On the other hand, the establish-
ment of saw-mills or turneries in the near locality, given
transport facilities, would alter the position by increasing
the value of the wood.
There are few examples in the area investigated of the
use of waste or by-products of agriculture for industries.
Straw is used for thatching and by gipsies for bee-hives,
but not in this district for hats or for cardboard. In
Bedfordshire foreign material has largely superseded the
local straw for plaiting. Rushes are again being made up
into ' workmen's flag ' and other kinds of baskets, by
Women's Institutes and land girls, and there appears to be
considerable room for development. Rushes have to be
cleared from the river-beds in any case, and if properly
harvested at the right time, rural industries make them
saleable. The rush-matting industry of the Abingdon
carpet factory depends on the local rushes ; they are also
used for seating chairs, and large quantities used to be sold
to coopers for barrels. Another example of the use of
material which has otherwise a very small market value is
found in the rabbit -skin glove industry which has been
promoted through Women's Institutes. Although these
two industries have little direct connexion with agriculture,
they do create a value for materials which would otherwise
be almost useless. As for wool, the cloth and blanket mills
RELATION TO AGRICULTURE 43
do not now depend on the local supplies in this district,
neither do the leather workers and glove makers depend on
local skins to any great extent. The carriage of wool and
leather is a comparatively small item in the cost of production
and it is not clear that a local weaving industry would have
much effect on the value of wool to the farmers. Investiga-
tion in other counties, where more weaving is done, may
throw more light on this question. It is possible that a
local cloth-mill or hand-weaving industry might be beneficial
to such families as the Bucklebury commoners whose grazing
rights enable them to make a living mostly by rearing a few
sheep on the common.
Economy in the use of Power and Transport
Examples have been found of the same engine being used
at one time for agricultural purposes and at other times for
some form of wood work. A steam engine, for example,
was used for threshing and for sawing timber, and a small
oil engine for grinding corn and for sawing and turning wood
for chairs. The increasing use of power and machinery is
one of the features of large scale farming. Small farmers
would be less at a disadvantage in this respect if machinery,
engines, and motors, which they would only require at
certain seasons on the farm, could be turned to account
for some form of manufacture at other times.1 The use of
portable engines in the woods points to considerable develop-
ment. There is also the question of power for lighting
purposes. In cases where it would not pay to light a village
or a farm by electricity, because of the few hours in the
day during which the power would be used, the use of surplus
power for driving small machinery for an industry might be
a practical solution.
Agriculture, especially the production of perishable
food-stuffs, depends to a great extent on the facilities for
quick transport. Industries are important as giving employ-
ment to a larger population than agriculture alone can
support, and making it possible to develop facilities for
goods and passenger traffic where they could not otherwise
pay their way. The same applies to other public services ;
in a sparsely populated district the money available from
the rates is small in proportion to the expenses of adminis-
tration.
1 Investigation and experiment in the use of power would throw light
on the problem of electric power stations with regard to rural economy.
Further investigation into power is needed.
44 RURAL ECONOMY
The Supplying of Agricultural Needs: Village Workshops
An examination of the figures given in the Census of
Occupation, 1911, reveals the fact that a very considerable
proportion of the rural population is engaged in supplying
the wants of agricultural families. Taking together the
aggregate of rural districts of Berkshire and Oxfordshire,
agriculture accounts for 29,485 males out of a total male
population of 94,312 (over 10 years). The numbers engaged
in production for external markets other than agriculture
were small in proportion to those engaged in meeting local
requirements. For example, the number of carpenters and
joiners in the rural districts for the two counties was given
as 2,229, whereas * workers in wood and bark ', .which
included turners and other wood machinists and basket-
makers, were only 564, and even these were not producing
only for an external market. Carpenters are put in the
building section ; no figures are given to show the number
of wheelwrights or wagon builders. Again, in the rural
districts of Oxfordshire, where there are glove factories,
blanket mills, and a cloth mill, the total number of women
employed in producing cloth, blankets, ready-made clothing,
and gloves, was slightly less than the number of dressmakers
and women tailors. In the rural districts of Oxfordshire
and Berkshire domestic service, including laundry, accounted
for 17,672 women and 10,357 men. Of saddlers there were
167 in the rural districts out of 308 in the whole administra-
tive counties ; of smiths 1,025 out of a total of 1,423 were
in the rural districts.1
It is clear that numerically the people engaged in repairs
and making to order for an agricultural population are by
far the most important section of those engaged in rural
industries. They are also of the most direct importance to
agriculture. It is desirable therefore to study in some detail
the position of the people who work in village manufacturing
and repairing workshops in order to judge how far their
service to agriculture is efficient.
Saddlery is carried on to a large extent in the country
towns, where a saddler has better facilities for getting material
and can make and deal in a variety of leather goods when not
engaged in repairs, thus building a good business on side
lines. The village saddlers appear to be an unenterprising
class. They are isolated from their fellows, find little
demand for work other than repairs, and are unorganized
and uneducated. There is a trade journal, but few of them
1 See Census of England and Wales, 1911, vol. x, Part II, pp. 32-4,
467-9.
AGRICULTURAL NEEDS. WHEELWRIGHTS 45
take it in. The scarcity and costliness of leather during and
since the war has hit them very hard.
The village wheelwright's work consists mainly of repairs,
the manufacture of wheels and other parts being carried
on in large quantities at big works. Machinery has taken
wagon building to a great extent out of the hands of the
local wheelwrights. Wheel wrighting work is also in many
instances concentrated in bigger local shops, where* the
necessary smithing can also be done. In Berkshire, on lines
of good railway service, local wheelwrighting has greatly
declined. In the remoter parts of Oxfordshire there are
still very small shops ; they are at the present time busy
and labour is short. The concentration is partly owing to
t»he development of steam saw-mills and the consequent
disappearance of local saw-pits. Wheelwrighting is heavy
work and hand-sawing has been the hardest part of it ;
carpenters therefore tend to go into the building trade where
work is lighter and payment better. Builders are organized
whereas wheelwrights are not.1 Wheelwrights can get good
terms for repairs, but there is a strong feeling amongst them
that a man who can repair is also competent to under-
take wagon building. This has been to some extent
corroborated from other sources. Local carpenters cannot
afford to advertise like the big firms who send their agents
to the markets, and they do not win, in their own country,
the reputation many of them deserve. It is said that the
purchase of carts from big works at Bristol and other western
towns is largely a matter of fashion ; that orders for carts
are placed with these firms at the last moment, whereas
a local man, had he had the order in good time to fit in the
work between repairs, could have made a much better cart
at no greater expense. Examples are reported of carts from
big firms being built of wood unfit for the purpose. A cover-
ing of paint does not hide deficiencies from the man who
undertakes repairs. The different parts of carts are built
of different kinds of wood ; iron is also used in the construc-
tion. If certain parts were sent from the big works un-
painted, to be put together by local cart -builders, farmers
would probably get better articles. More manufacturing
work in local shops would have the advantage of attracting
a better type of man to the trade. At the present time
repairs are in arrears and carpenters are short-handed. The
development of the work of small engines in the shops, and
the use of portable steam saws in the woods, does something
to counteract the competition of the large works, but for
1 Associations of Master Wheelwrights and Implement Makers do exist,
but no trace of organization was found in the district.
46 RURAL ECONOMY
manufacturing work the shops would have to be organized
on a sufficiently large scale for economic use of machinery.
The position of the farriers is somewhat different. The
shoeing of horses and the repairing of machinery are matters
of urgency, especially at harvest time, and smithies must
be within easy reach of the farms ; therefore this work
cannot be concentrated. As for the manufacture of imple-
ments, the smiths, like the wheelwrights, have been affected
by the competition of big works, where patents are brought
out and improvements readily made. But oil engines which
can work lathes have also assisted the smiths, and here and
there is found a mechanic of great ability. Local smiths
take up agencies for the big agricultural firms, to whom
they must apply for ' parts ' which are patented, or which
they cannot copy. A difficulty sometimes arises through
the firms being unwilling to have more than one agent in
a given area, and firms will refuse to supply other smiths
direct with a * part '. This causes unnecessary cost and
partly accounts for difficulty in executing repairs. It would
be useless to attempt to discuss the position of the country
farriers as manufacturers of implements without much more
investigation. In any case, smiths, as well as wheelwrights
and saddlers, would do better as manufacturers if they were
in a good centre or at least on an important highway with
railway communication. Therefore the smiths in outlying
villages must depend on shoeing and repairs for their chief
custom.
In spite of the excellent work of the Master Farriers'
Association the present position with regard to shoeing-
smiths is serious.1 Before the war it was difficult for
a farrier to get a good journeyman or an apprentice who
would stay, and it is very rare in this district for a farmer
to employ a smith as is the custom in some districts. The
scarcity was attributed to the poor payment, isolation, and
lack of openings in villages, to the risk of liability for laming
a horse, and to the hard work involved. There are no attrac-
tions to induce youths to forgo the better immediate earn-
ings in unskilled occupations, and if they wish to become
skilled workers there are better conditions in other branches
of metal work. In spite of the great advances in the price of
shoeing, the farriers do not live so well now as they did before
the war. The bad conditions have kept down the quality
of the work, and the type of person attracted to the trade
is such that many of the masters and journeymen are not
1 Because of the scarcity of young entrants to the trade. The use of
machinery and tractors has made the village smith a more, and not a less,
important person than when he did little besides shoeing.
SMITHS 47
worth the rates now asked. ' Shoeing is skilled work ;
a smith is dealing with live flesh and ought to be educated.
But he is not looked upon as a skilled workman and is not
paid for his skill.' It is alleged that millions of pounds' worth
of horse flesh is lost to the country through incompetent
shoeing, that a very large number of horses — otherwise
perfectly sound — break down in the legs through bad shoeing
and through not being shod frequently enough. Country
smiths, however, are said to be better workmen than those
of the towns. Often the type of lad who enters a smithy is
not fit for the work and receives no adequate instruction.
After a year or so of odd jobs he will be allowed to pull off
a horseshoe and will put his lever against the part where
the horn is thinnest, thus causing bleeding and possibly
inflicting life-long injury merely through the failure of his
master to explain to him even the rudiments of anatomy.
Smiths will cut away parts of the hoof and pad which are
the natural protection against concussion. This shows the
great importance to agriculture of the educational work
which is being undertaken by the Farriers' Association.
The qualification of a registered shoeing smith is given
under the auspices of the Worshipful Company of Farriers,
an old London Livery Company, one of whose members is
the President of the Farriers' Association. There is also
a higher qualification, that of Associate of the London
Company of Farriers, for smiths who wish to undertake
special anatomical shoeing under the direction of veterinary
surgeons. The results are most promising. A large number
of smiths enter the examinations and attend the competitions
at agricultural shows for the sake of instruction. ' Give
a man education and he at once gains self-respect.' There
is great pride taken in the letters R.S.S. which a registered
smith is entitled to put after his name. There is a very
strong feeling amongst farriers that no smith ought to be
allowed to practise shoeing unless he has the R.S.S. quali-
fication. The examination includes practical work and
a certain amount of the theory of anatomy. The Farriers'
Association also does useful work in giving legal assistance
in the case of a smith being sued for damages to a horse
through alleged negligence. In some instances a man may
be ruined through an injury to a horse which he did not
inflict, but in others the man is culpable. The subscription
to the Farriers' Association covers insurance against ac-
cident to horses occurring in the course of shoeing. In the
district investigated, the journeymen farriers are now asking
for Is. 6d. an hour ; in the north of England they are asking
48 RURAL ECONOMY
for 2s. The farriers cannot put up the price of shoeing suffi-
ciently to attract good men to the trade unless the standard
of work is raised. Therefore better facilities for technical
instruction are urgently needed. Although the Farriers'
Association now has over 10,000 members in the country,
there are still a considerable number of unorganized smiths
in the Oxford district. This makes the position of the local
secretaries of the association difficult. The ' blacklegs '
are apt to set their prices just below those fixed by the
M.F.A., thus under-cutting them and at the same time
reaping the advantage of the organization without having
to pay the 3s. a month subscription. These funds are badly
needed, for organization depends on travelling to meetings,
and hard-working farriers cannot afford out-of-pocket
expenses. The courage, perseverance, and devotion, which
local secretaries of this association and of trade unions
generally in rural districts put into the work of organization,
speaks of the urgency of their cause. Especially in the
initial stages, the work is apt to be thankless and difficult.
But the chief difficulty is with the older men ; the young
ones for the most part realize the necessity of combination.
In view of the difficulties of organization over scattered
districts, it would appear that the craftsmen of a neighbour-
hood should be organized together. Woodworkers, except
for builders' carpenters and ' wood machinists ', are un-
organized. Saddlers, blacksmiths, and wheelwrights deal
with the same customers ; therefore, as far as selling goes,
it appears that some form of combined action might be
possible. As repairers only, this would be difficult ; it,
therefore, seems worth while to consider on these grounds
alone, and further to investigate, the chances of more
manufacture being carried on in rural workshops.
In repairing shops there are always periods of extra
pressure, and consequently, if the staff is sufficient, there
are periods of slackness. A man cannot leave a repairing
shop unattended in case of an emergency call. It is for
this reason advisable that he should not be single-handed.
There might be : (1) manufacture of the staple products
of these and other workmen, for example, boots, saddles,
whips, carts, implements of various kinds ; (2) assembling
and supplementing parts ; (3) manufacture of by-products
and development on side-lines. It is often pointed out that
the village craftsman can make a variety of articles for
household use which demand artistic talent and good work-
manship. The scarcity of horseshoes is so great that smiths
CRAFTS IN REPAIRING SHOPS 49
have at the present time more than enough to do replenishing
their stocks. Wheelwrights are still busy with the pressure
of repairs. But the tools are there, scraps of material are
inhere, skill is there, and in many cases an engine also is
there. It should be possible, without diverting labour from
the important business of the shop, to produce many of the
articles needed in the household, from latches to toys, and
there is little doubt that organization of the market would
bring a sale for good work of this class. The standard
demanded in fittings is rising, and the qualities of durability,
suitability, and good workmanship are growing in favour.
The production of such articles would give lucrative employ-
ment to persons not fitted for heavy work or needing
intervals of light work. Disabled and old men and youths
would benefit by employment. Able-bodied craftsmen,
even if they took no direct part in the work, would benefit
indirectly by utilization of waste, and in some cases of power
and by the interest aroused in the sale of these articles in
the local town or elsewhere. The industry would benefit
by youths being brought into the shop and trained in the
use of tools while still too young for heavy work. Economies
could be effected by a certain increase in the size of the
shops, especially in fairly good centres. The organization
which would be desirable for co-operative selling would give
opportunities for the craftsmen to meet together for standard-
izing prices, not only of those by-products, but of their
staple work. Although the economic importance of sub-
sidiary workshop crafts might not be very great, yet it is
from small workshops that larger industries have sprung ;
and the manufacturing and repairing craftsmen have, in
their function with regard to agriculture, perhaps a stronger
claim for assistance than any others engaged in the rural
industry.
The position of the dressmakers is somewhat similar to
that of these craftsmen, and their work also could be assisted
and developed by the stimulation of production of certain
classes of clothing. They too urgently need organization.
The matter is further discussed in the conclusion to reports
on the clothing industries.
The danger is that men and women may be tempted to
evade trade union and State regulation by setting up for
themselves without adequate equipment of capital and
skill, and may do harm to themselves and to their neighbours.
There are, for instance, two to six dressmakers in most
villages. If they are capable of the very important work of
2415 r>
50 RURAL ECONOMY
clothing the village economically, relieving the mothers
who are too busy to do all the family needlework and of
saving the expense of going to a distance for fitting, they
are most certainly worthy of their hire. But they may be
working for themselves because another dressmaker cannot
afford to employ them at Trade Board rates, either on account
of her prices being too low or because they are incompetent.
Village dressmakers are apt to be overworked because their
charges are low ; they will work far too long hours rather
than lose custom by refusing orders.
Employment of Spare Labour
The need for providing occupation for spare labour arises
from two facts : first, that agriculture is essentially a seasonal
industry, needing more labour during the various harvests,
and secondly, that there are attached to agricultural families
a certain number of people who need openings other than
working on the land.
The classes of the rural population who require rural
industries are :
(1) Men and women who are employed seasonally or part-
time on the land or in their homes, and need a second
means of earning.
(a) Small-holders whose holdings are not big enough
to occupy them or support them all the year round.
(6) Casual or seasonal agricultural workers, such as
woodmen, who work on the farms in summer.
(c) Women who help on the family holding, or are
• employed occasionally on a farm.
(2) Those who live in the country and are unsuited to
agricultural work,
(a) Young people receiving part-time education who
are not within easy reach of a town.
(6) Unmarried women related to agricultural workers.
(c) Others with ties to a village, who prefer indoor
occupation and have aptitude for, or are accustomed
to, a particular craft.
(d) Men and women who are by age or disability past
outdoor work and yet are capable of earning and
need to do so.
(3) People of any age or class who like to make a hobby of
some manual occupation.
EMPLOYMENT OF SPARE LABOUR 51
Part-time and Seasonal Workers
Farmers need more labour at certain seasons than at
others. Before the adoption of harvesting machinery there
was much more seasonal work on the farms for the labourers'
families than there is now. On small holdings where little
machinery, is used, the need for extra work at busy seasons
is more urgent than on large farms. Small farmers who do
not own harvesting machinery are sometimes in danger of
losing their crops owing to the delay. They cannot have
the use of the machines until the bigger crops are harvested.
Farmers can procure extra labour either by employing their
workers overtime, or by employing a greater number of
regular workers, than the farm will occupy all the year
round, or by employing extra labour which may be found
in the locality or introduced from elsewhere, such as the
hoppers' and fruit -pickers who pour into Kent and Worcester-
shire, or the Irishmen who come for the hay, corn, and
potato harvests to Lancashire, Yorkshire, and Lincolnshire.
If local labour is employed to any great extent, some
occupation is needed at other times which can be carried
on so as not to clash with the busiest times on the land.
Small-holdings which yield the same products as the larger
farms will require extra attention at the same time,1 there-
fore small-holding cultivation cannot conveniently be com-
bined with piecework agriculture by the same men.
The following examples show the way in which extra
seasonal labour is found in the area investigated. Seasonal
work is done in the Kennet district by men who are in the
woods in the winter and on the farm in summer. They
usually have a little land, and in many cases common rights
as well. Many of them are squatters who own their cottages
and have some kind of shed or workshop where they make
up the wood into small articles. Where the farm workers
have no land and no workshops, woodwork cannot thus be
combined with seasonal farm work.
Women and girls employed in glove -making are let off
for turnip-hoeing, haymaking, fruit picking, or potato
lifting, as the case may be, in districts where there are
small-holdings. With the exception of the gloving industry
no cases have been found of women or girls being employed
1 Probably the reason why farm fruit-gardens and orchards are so
badly neglected that the fruit does not always pay for the picking, is that
the fruit harvest is liable to clash with the hay and corn harvest. Thus
the crop is sometimes bought on the trees by dealers who make themselves
responsible for protecting, picking, and taking to market.
D 2
52 RURAL ECONOMY
seasonally or for part-time as a regular system in mills.
Home work, however, is sometimes taken at odd times when
other work is slack.
Basket-making, hurdle-making, and other woodwork is
eometimes done as a seasonal or part-time occupation, com-
bined with some form of work on the land, but the second
occupation of a craftsman is often keeping a public -house.
Gardens and allotments provide the commonest form of
seasonal work for agricultural labourers.
People living in the Country who are not engaged in Agricul-
tural Work
Agricultural prosperity depends not only on the con-
ditions of the people actually engaged in the work, but on
the condition of the whole population. Therefore it is
advisable to consider in this section people who are not
agricultural workers, though their homes are in the country.
There are, in addition to the craftsmen of the manufacturing
and repairing workshops, who have already been considered,
boys and girls receiving part-time education, unmarried
women and others who are related to agricultural families,
and disabled, delicate or old people unfit for agricultural work.
With the application of the new Education Act seasonal
or part-time work will be a necessity for young people of
both sexes. Some of them will be employed on the land
in summer, and their education will probably be fitted in
to the seasons when agricultural work is slack. There will
still be time for other occupations, and the question of
earnings as well as training will be urgent.
One of the causes of migration from remote country
districts is the lack of openings for unmarried women and
other members of agricultural families who do not wish to
work on the land. Where there are no industries, domestic
service, as the only resident occupation, is the sole opening
for girls. There are villages where almost all the girls,
and many of the lads, desert the village soon after they
leave school. The census gives the number of female
domestic servants in the rural districts of Oxfordshire and
Berkshire as 14,915. Though parents are often glad enough
to let their daughters go if they have a connexion with good
houses where they will be well taught, they do not always
wish to spare them ; yet it may be impossible to keep them
at home with no means of earning. Domestic service, like
other occupations, for which training has been inadequate,
will be more likely to attract a good type of worker if girls
EMPLOYMENT OF SPARE LABOUR 53
are trained to be skilled workers and regarded as such. In any
case, few households are suitable for taking girls as young as
fourteen ; the house is apt to be understaffed and the work
"boo hard, and often neither employers nor the other servants
have the time or capacity to teach the girls properly. There-
fore domestic service cannot be considered satisfactory as
the only opening for very young country girls.1
Other openings for women in the area investigated, apart
from land work and domestic service, are dressmaking and
work in mills, shops, or small factories in the comparatively
few cases where they are within reach. Gloving employs
the largest number of any organized industry. Women and
girls are also employed in chair-caning and rushing, box
and toy-making, and bench sawing in sawmills where light
goods are made. But the openings are inadequate, and
more work will be needed for young people attending con-
tinuation schools. In most industries there appears to be
a tendency to concentration in the market towns or in
villages where there is a railway. Therefore development
entails motor transport facilities, either for passengers or
for goods between these centres and the more remote
villages. This will also be necessary for education.
Letting lodgings is another means by which country
women augment the family earnings. By taking visitors in
the summer, a family is enabled to pay the rent of a more
expensive house, thus having more comfortable quarters in
the winter when more time must be spent indoors. But the
shortage and the bad condition of houses makes this impos-
sible in many villages where otherwise town people would
be glad to come. Summer visitors make a market for eggs,
fruit, and vegetables, besides being a source of income to
a family where there is some one with time for the work.
Another class whose opportunities for work may affect
agriculture consists of men or women suffering from physical
1 Considering the housing difficulty which becomes specially acute
where some industry is being rapidly developed, a solution might be found
by opening hostels with a competent staff of domestic workers assisted by
a number of young trainees or probationers. With a first-rate teaching
and organizing staff, an excellent all-round training in housewifery,
including needlework, fruit preserving, and other alternative courses to
suit various tastes could be given which would lead to good positions,
not only in private houses, but in hotels, schools, dressmaking and other
establishments. Obviously the work of private households will have to
be regulated or organized if it is to attract skilled workers who are worth
high wages, and in view of the universal need for cooking and cleaning,
the sooner the status of domestic work is raised by recognized and efficient
training the better.
54 RURAL ECONOMY
or mental disability, which makes them unfit for the battles
of the labour market. The war has made this problem
extremely acute for the present generation, and in view of
schemes for settling ex-service men on the land, it is well to
consider briefly the relation of their work to agriculture.
They must, for their own and the community's sake, be
put in the way of independence, so far as it is possible to
do so ; otherwise they may, through their misfortune, drag
down the standard of the trade in which they are engaged.
Probably the reason why certain sedentary occupations, such
as saddlery, tailoring, and basket -making, have been despised
as somewhat lowering in the social scale, is that they are to
some extent recruited by the 'unfit', who are sometimes
unable to earn a sufficient wage. But these and similar occu-
pations, such as dressmaking, as well as other crafts which are
suitable for delicate or disabled persons, render very sub-
stantial services to the agricultural workers and their families,
if the work is efficient. Not only on humanitarian grounds,
but in the interest of economy, it is a matter of urgency that
all disabled persons should receive special consideration with
regard to making them efficient. They need training, and
in many cases ' after care ', such as St. Dunstan's gives to
the blind. They also may need pensions in proportion to
their disability, and special medical attention. It would be
far better to incur the expense of organizing suitable work
for subnormal people, and to supplement their earnings
where necessary, than to allow them to undercut their more
fortunate neighbours or to drift to the workhouse. It has
been suggested, with regard to needlework and other
occupations for women, that various philanthropic bodies
could be enlisted in this cause.1 There ought to be in every
district a permanent work pensions committee to whom
persons dealing with cases of disability could apply for
advice and assistance. The principle which is now being
recognized in the case of the blind applies to other sub-
normal workers as well. Far from pauperizing them, assist-
ance ought to give them every chance of self-support.
People who desire some Manual Occupation as a Hobby
There is a section of the agricultural population who would
profit by better training and better organization for rural
industries, though they are not actually in direct need of
the earnings which might accrue. Though industries carried
on by these people would not be of great economic import-
1 fcseo pp. 154-60, pout.
EMPLOYMENT OF SPARE LABOUR 55
ance, yet a variety of occupations which relieve dullness are
helpful in combating depopulation. There are married
women and others who have talent and a certain amount of
leisure which need an outlet. Not every one who lives in
the country can be equally interested in the farmyard or
garden. Hobbies are perhaps more needed in the country
than in the town. And the natural desire for pocket-money,
which is felt by women who are not paid definite sums for
. their work, can be met through the earnings of a part-
time industry. For instance, a number of women who
received separation allowances during the war took home
work to pass the time and to earn money for sending parcels
to the front. But it is of great importance that pocket-
money wages should not undercut earnings which are
needed for livelihood. It is important too that leisure and
talent should not be frittered away on poor or unnecessary
work when they might be turned to better account. There-
fore the standard of pay and the standard of work done" by
leisured people for sale should be kept at least to the level
of work done for a living. Otherwise money and time spent
in providing material and organizing sales for poor work
may be wasted. It appears from answers to an inquiry sent
to a number of Women's Institutes that the industries are
wanted rather for the interest they arouse in home -craft
than for the actual earnings, though there are sufficient
cases to indicate a very real need of earnings here and there.
The reluctance which is found amongst members of Women's
Institutes and amongst disabled soldiers to part with their
best specimens of work shows the educational value of the
crafts as hobbies. To teach discrimination and to raise the
standard of taste in the homes is to render a great service
to industry, for a great deal of the wasteful and dishonest
production often associated with cheap factory production
is due to the want of education in the public which does
not discriminate between bad work and good. The actual
practice of a craft is the best way of developing taste and
judgement in buying. Institutes and arts and crafts
societies, by encouraging good workmanship and suitable
design, can do much to raise the standard of demand.
It will be well to consider carefully the harm which
might come from developing industries unwisely, and to
realize how much depends on the circumstances of a par-
ticular neighbourhood, and, therefore, how important it is
to get the people who have intimate knowledge of their
own neighbourhood to think out their own policy.
56 RURAL ECONOMY
The Subsidizing of Agricultural Wages
First, rural industries may subsidize agricultural wages.
There does not seem to be much direct danger of their
doing this by providing employment for the relations of
well-to-do workers. The real danger lies in the possibility
of sweating in cases of real want. One has only to remember
the insecurity of many families whose chief wage-earner
may be cut off from work through sudden misfortune,
whether by his own fault or not, to realize how vivid the
fear of the wolf at the door may become, and what a tempta-
tion there is to accept work at sweated rates. There is no
doubt that past conditions in the gloving industry were
intimately connected with the conditions of distress. In
fact, the employment of women in home industries not
connected with agriculture is usually connected with a time
of stress and poverty, and implies that the man's wages
have been insufficient. The argument that home industries
ought to be promoted to eke out low agricultural wages is
not sound for agriculture, as skilled work is incompatible
with a low standard in the home. The evils are cumulative,
and poor wages, poor work, and poor homes form a vicious
circle from which it may take generations to escape. There
are cases in which paid employment for married women is
necessary and desirable on other grounds, but not for the
purpose of subsidizing agricultural wages. Perhaps there
is no section of the population which suffers more patiently
and more unselfishly from constant overwork than the
mothers of growing families. They sacrifice leisure, comfort,
and even food, to husband and children. Consequently,
there are many, even in families not considered needy, who
do not know what it is to feel well. To add to the mother's
burden by creating a system which gives her more work in
these strenuous years would be to do a great disservice to
this and the following generations. Fortunately, the whole
weight of the agricultural trade unions would be put in the
scale against such a system.
Encroachment upon necessary Hours of Leisure
Industry may quite possibly be arranged so as to alternate
with agriculture ; but whether the work be done on a holding
or on another man's farm, it ought to be possible for the
family to live on the earnings of a reasonable working day.
The length of this day will vary with different persons, and
it is often found that men will work far longer hours on their
EVILS TO GUARD AGAINST 57
own account and at their own will than for others. In fact,
one reason for the desire often found amongst craftsmen
to set up for themselves, either in their own craft or on
s, holding, is because they do not want regulated hours of
work. In the case of the small-holders and village crafts-
men these long hours may be detrimental in spite of the
doctrine of those lovers of handicraft who are fortunate
enough to have leisure and means to follow their own
natural bent. It is true that work done in the garden or
workshop may be a delight to the worker, but the element
of delight is apt to be evanescent when the necessaries of
life are in the balance, or even when the little extras
which make life pleasant depend upon the greatest possible
output. Parents need leisure for the enjoyment of social
and family life, and children need the leisure of their
elders. Iri the best interests of home and village life, work
for a living ought not to encroach upon the hours of recrea-
tion. Much of the difficulty in organizing village clubs
and institutes arises from the fact that people are too busy.
Every movement which tends to promote healthy recrea-
tion and social interest in the country is valuable ; clubs,
flower shows, institutes, games, dancing, art, and the handi-
crafts appear in the programme of many of the organizations
which set out to reform the villages. The opportunities of
good work for all the bodies which promote recreation and
education are enormously increased by the work of those
other organizations which are fighting for the principle of
a living wage. The standard of life may be in greater-
danger when the after -war boom of trade is over.
Danger of possible Failure of Rural Industries
There are other ways in which rural industries might be
harmful to a neighbourhood. They might create depres-
sion by failure. There is always a danger of competition
by more highly organized production of a large factory.
Slight improvements in machinery are constantly being
made and small firms cannot always afford to adopt them.
Again, in the crafts, good production will have the effect of
raising the standard of machine production, thus provoking
competition in quality. Although cases of actual distress
through failure or decline of rural industries are not common
now, yet there is evidence of considerable hardship where
an industry has been superseded by the use of machinery
or where the demand has ceased. This danger would be
present if small-holdings were established depending on
58 RURAL ECONOMY
crafts or industries to occupy the holders and their families
in winter, unless they were able to move with the times.
Rural industries have been applied to districts where the
agricultural yield was small in proportion to the population
it supported. In Scotland, schemes have been carried out
from time to time to help the distressed families of crofters ;
in Ireland, to provide occupation in congested districts ;
in Germany, in poor and mountainous regions where agri-
culture alone does not yield a sufficient income to support
the population in comfort. At the present time, trade is so
uncertain and speculative that ambitious schemes for
starting rural industries would be risky. It is undesirable
from every point of view to produce for a luxury market,
though a quality market is usually essential for rural
industries. Articles of good quality which would not in
a time of plenty and security be considered luxuries may be
so in times of national poverty. There is nothing more
pathetic than the type of begging which is covered by the
attempt to sell what is not really wanted, and to encourage
this type of work is not charity. It would be a great mistake
to divert capital, brains, and labour into unproductive
channels which might otherwise find their way into pro-
ductive ones. In the case of long periods of training this
would be disastrous. Therefore it is important that ' voca-
tional training ' should in the first place be really educational,
developing the qualities of resourcefulness, application, and
reliability as well as the utmost physical health, rather than
turning out skilled manual specialists.
The Place of Rural Industries in the National Economy
There is another aspect of the relation of rural industries
to agriculture which is concerned with questions of agri-
cultural policy. Their first claim for a place in the national
economy will rest on their use in promoting the rural
industry of first importance, namely the production of
food and of raw materials for other industries from the
land. It would be beyond the scope of this report to discuss
the question whether English farming as a whole, or in the
particular districts investigated, should aim mainly at pro-
ducing those perishable necessities which deteriorate with long
carriage, and therefore cannot well be imported. But it is
alleged that many families are not getting enough milk,
and the supply of clean, fresh milk, eggs, fruit, and vege-
tables at prices which are not prohibitive is of great import-
NATIONAL ECONOMY 59
ance to national health. This depends on the utmost
economy in production and transport. Not only must the
dairy, poultry, and fruit farmers be able to send their daily
supplies cheaply and speedily to the districts where these
articles are not produced in sufficient quantity ; but if they
are to put cheap regular supplies on the market, they must
be able to deal profitably with the seasonal surplus. There-
fore cheese, milk-drying and jam factories, fruit pulping
and bottling stations are necessary. The question then
arises whether the plant and labour required for these
could not be utilized at other times in the year for rural
industries. And. whether the factories are established
locally or in larger centres, whether raw materials or finished
products have to be moved, efficient transport is essential.
A development which would make it worth while to run
the necessary lorries and trains for goods traffic, and to
transport labour where needed would be of special assistance
to the type of cultivation which produces fresh goods for
a daily market. And the problem of rural industries or,
rather, of the development of industry in rural areas, is
of greater importance in connexion with dairy farming and
market -gardening than with arable farming. The type of
organization set up both in Ireland and England by the
respective agricultural organization societies for marketing
farm products has so much in common with what appears
to be needed for many rural industries, that considerable
economies might be effected by co-ordinating the organiza-
tion necessary for both. This applies not only to small local
schemes for lorries and depots, but to the development of
traffic and other commercial facilities on a larger scale.
Another claim for rural industries to a place in the national
economy rests on the belief that they tend to encourage
qualities, both in the products and in the workers, which
are of value to the nation. It has already been suggested
that the presence in rural society of people with other
interests than those connected with agriculture is beneficial
to rural neighbourhoods ; it remains to consider the direct
services which rural manufacturers and craftsmen can
render to the public, and the value of rural industries as
giving scope to personal characteristics which it is in the
national interest to develop.
The services to agriculture have already been discussed.
As for services to the public at large, it is evident that the
comparative freedom of a small workshop, the fact that the
work is less subdivided and more directly under the control
60 RURAL ECONOMY
of the master, originator or designer, and the environment
of the countryside do tend to give to work and products
a distinctive character which is of great value. And since
adaptability is an essential requirement in rural producers,
it will be a gain to national industry if a certain proportion
of industrial production is carried on successfully in rural
workshops, especially in goods which are made for personal
and individual requirements. In many instances the good
quality of country work and country workers was pointed
out, and although instances of poor rural work are quite as
striking, yet the fact that certain rural industries owe their
survival partly to the quality of the work, shows that they
meet a real need. The distinctive qualities due to con-
ditions of manufacture may, however, even with the best
possible commercial organization, be too costly for a public
which must buy cheaply. Therefore the sphere of rural
industries is likely to be narrow.
But some industries owe their survival in rural neighbour-
hoods to a cheap supply of labour. The danger of subsidizing
agricultural wages, and lowering the standards of rural work
and life has already been pointed out. Any possible gain to
the public in obtaining certain products at low prices is
counterbalanced by these evils, and it is not in the national
interest that English rural workers should compete in the
world market of cheap labour. It is far better that cheap
products should be imported if they cannot be turned out
economically at home under good conditions.
As for personal qualities of country craftsmen, it is
difficult to judge how far these are due to their actual
calling and how far to the fact that their industry gives
them opportunities, which the agricultural labourers lack,
of coming into contact in the course of business with a variety
of people. The independent craftsman has greater responsi-
bility and more scope for initiative than the wage-earner.
And his work tends to develop these qualities of imagina-
tion and foresight by which he first conceives what he
must make and then carries out his conception in concrete
form. It is this, even more than exercise in manual dexterity,
which gives to craftsmanship its great educational value,
and it is for this reason that experience of the work and
organization of a small manufacturing business should play
an important part in the equipment of craftsmen and
mechanics. The absence of rural workshops would diminish
the opportunities for such training. In spite of the evident
iiccd for better education, the country craftsmen and
NATIONAL ECONOMY 61
practical working manufacturers interviewed in the course
of inquiry have in a great many instances given the impres-
sion, not only of keen intelligence, wide interest and valu-
able knowledge in matters relating to their own trade, but
of genuine concern for its prosperity and for the welfare of
all those who are engaged in it, combined in some cases
with remarkable public spirit. This seems to show that
industries and crafts do call forth some of the characteristics
which it is hoped may be developed by education. The
inquiry met with universal interest and willingness to help
with information, and the practical suggestions given by
rural managers and craftsmen, as well as their lucid state-
ments of economic theories which the student finds in difficult
language in text-books, showed that much thought is being
given to possibilities of development.
Another reason in favour of developing rural industries,
provided the conditions are healthy, is the overcrowding in
and near the towns. If, by means of rural industries,
a greater number of those people who wish to live in the
country and are yet unsuited to agricultural life, could
earn a living in the environment which suits them, if more
children could be brought up in the country and more
families live away from what will probably be for several
generations at least crowded, dingy, and sordid city surround-
ings, there is no doubt that national health and happiness
would be increased. But the conditions will not necessarily
be healthy because they are rural, and every argument
which can be brought forward in favour of rural industries
depends primarily upon the possibility of efficient organiza-
tion, both of production and of commerce, so that their
development may be economically sound.
Rural Industries in relation to Social Problems
Agricultural prosperity does not depend only on economic
considerations. In fact, the study of rural industries in
relation to agriculture leads one to think that, although
they depend for their existence on economic factors, their
chief importance is rather social and educational than
strictly economic. Therefore it will be well to conclude
this section with a brief consideration of their social value
for the rural community.
It is as undesirable that the rural population should be
composed entirely of farmers and farm labourers, or that
the affairs of the villages should be governed entirely accord-
ing to the farmers' interests as that the towns should be
62 RURAL ECONOMY
entirely commercial or residential and governed by the
interests of the tradespeople. Local government in town
and country is deplorably bad. One cause is probably the
predominance in each case of one particular set of interests
in the governing bodies. We find in the country the
following results. Education is deplorably backward ; the
young people are apt to be looked upon as prospective
plough-boys or maid-servants, and are not even made
proficient for that ; roads and transport are neglected ;
rates are regarded as a burden rather than as an invest-
ment ; and the means of developing the neighbourhood
for greater all-round prosperity are neglected. The second
cause is the fact that county boundaries do not represent
an economic area with any kind of centre for the whole.
This has an important bearing on the problem, for no
satisfactory economic development can take place without
reference to geographical facts.
The tendency for social and educational interests to
centre in a town which can be reached by bicycle, motor-
bus, or train, without much expense, is a growing one, and
will increase with the administration of the Education Act
of 1918. This fact ought to be borne in mind, and the
economic possibilities of the market town in relation to the
surrounding villages will give the solution to the problem
of rural industries. Whether industries are actually carried
on in this town or in the villages themselves, it will be the
convenient centre for administration. The great difficulties
are transport, housing, capitalization, and lack of market
facilities. Unless education is to be a farce, good schools
must be established in centres within reach of the villages,
at any rate for the older children. Boys and girls receiving
part-time general education will also need :
1. Either the means of earning something towards main-
tenance, or maintenance grants, which would be heavy on
the rates.
2. Technical instruction to fit them for their vocations as
adults. Even if industries are not entirely self-supporting,
so far as the juvenile employees are concerned, it will be
necessary to establish industries in which juveniles can earn
and learn.
At present a boy or girl going to the neighbouring town l
to learn finds little to interest him or her in rural subjects,
1 Unfortunately this is also true of many village schools. A ' rural
bias ' in the curriculum does not make amends if the teacher lacks interest
in rural life.
SOCIAL PROBLEMS 63
and attention becomes focussed, not on the local surround-
ings, but on some town where there is ' life '. But it is the
people who make the life, and one way in which we can
make our market towns alive with interest is to develop
them, so far as they are capable of being developed, as
economic centres of the locality. This can be done (1) by
establishing where possible such industries as will supply
local needs or utilize local material, and (2) by developing
the market by co-operative effort in collecting local produce
of all kinds and in procuring goods and materials of better
value. Commerce needs to be raised to a higher level in
intelligence and integrity.
CHAPTER TV
CONCLUSION
THE following brief summary will show, as far as can be
seen from the district investigated, the economic prospects
of rural industries, the grounds upon which the claims for
assisting rural industries area based, the dangers to be
guarded against, and the principal needs to be met. The
case for social action will next be dealt with, and in con-
clusion certain suggestions will be made as to the form of
organization which appears to be necessary for develop-
ment. It is possible that inquiry in other localities by other
investigators may lead to different conclusions ; but in any
case the best method of organization can only be found by
practical experiment, and an experiment started without
undue delay, on the lines suggested below, would probably
be valuable as a help towards discovering the best method
of organization for more comprehensive schemes.
Prospects of Rural Industries
With regard to the decay or growth of rural industries, it
cannot generally be said that this or that industry has
declined or expanded and is therefore unsuitable or suitable
to rural conditions. Instances both of success and failure
are found in most industries and often in the same district.
Success or failure depends largely on the way in which the
separate businesses are organized and the quality of their
products. But the decline or expansion of rural industries
can in a great many cases be traced to the following general
causes. They have in many cases declined because they
have had to meet, even in their own market, competition
with large-scale production in many parts of the world.
Long-distance transport has been developed and is cheap
owing to the large scale on which it is organized, whereas
local transport is inadequate, badly organized, wasteful,
and costly. Rural industries have also been at a disadvan-
tage through the lack of facilities for obtaining the in-
formation, education, and training necessary for a type of
production which must, to hold its own on the market, be
adaptable and able to produce articles of good quality.
PROSPECTS 65
And where the workers have had the necessary charac-
teristics they have too often been at the mercy either of
employers or of dealers who took advantage of their ignor-
ance of markets and market values, and of their urgent
need, to keep down the prices. Depression re-acts upon
quality, and thus the distinctive character which makes
the rural product marketable is lost.
On the other hand, rural industries have survived in cases
where some special facilities exist with regard to proximity
of material or market, or to a convenient supply of labour,
which enable them to meet the competition of large-scale
production. Or their survival is due to some special quality
in the product by which it meets a special demand. In the
case of repairs, the cause of survival is the necessity of
having the work done on the spot ; in the case of manu-
facture it is often the reputation which the individual firm
or craftsman has built up. Where facilities for economy in
production and transport are combined with the capacity
for turning out goods of distinctive quality for a special
market, the best results may be expected. But rural
industries are limited, on the one hand, by the demand for
the particular class of product which is very largely a local
demand, and, on the other, by the amount of material and
labour available. Not only is the demand limited, but it is
apt to be unstable, and one of the greatest difficulties with
regard to rural industries is to render them adaptable to
the changing needs of the market. Although a steady
rather than a temporarily good market should be aimed at,
yet the quality of adaptability, both in plant and personnel,
is essential. The use of rural labour and plant in various
forms of war production shows that the quality of adapta-
bility is not entirely absent. At the present time of un-
certainty with regard to trade prospects, methods of
production, and development of transport and power, any
rigid organization for rural industries would be more than
usually unwise.
Claims for Rural Industries
The value of rural industries to the nation turns upon
the relation of small-scale to large-scale production. There
exists amongst a certain type of worker a predilection for
small-scale production in a rural environment, where there
is more scope than in great industrial centres for unregulated
effort and personal initiative. In the domain of art, which
may extend more or less over all objects in which personal
66 CONCLUSION
•
taste is of account, the element of environment is specialty
important. But. the function of the artist as inspiring large-
scale production is probably of greater importance in
industry to-day than his function as actually working out,
or supervising the working out of, designs. This is a fact
of the present time which must be accepted, whatever the
future may bring forth. Copyright does not give much
protection to design. The sphere of the artist-craftsman must
at present be a small one, and his work must be directed to the
comparatively small class of people who can and will afford to
pay for his taste and originality. If large-scale producers adopt
his ideas, so much the better for the general public, who must
of necessity content themselves mainly with copies turned
out cheaply in larger quantities. The same principle applies
to other work than ' craftsmanship '. Small-scale industries
can and do fulfil special functions in the national economy,
in providing articles which are not needed in vast quantities,
and in giving scope for people who wish to make new
departures on independent lines.
The economic value of rural industries in relation to
agriculture depends on their supplying cheaply and efficiently
some of the needs of the agricultural population, or on
their making a profitable use of local resources in land,
material, or time not required for agriculture, or on their
making it possible to organize transport or other public
services which would be impracticable in a district where
there were no industries other than agriculture. It is
important that local repairing should be efficient, and more
rural manufacture would probably raise the standard of
work in the rural workshops. But apart from repairs, it
matters little to the agricultural population as purchasers,
whether they are supplied by local manufacturers or not,
so long as they can get what they want and get it cheaply.
Where local resources are available, it is desirable that
industries should be developed. And even where there are
no special opportunities, it is desirable, in view of the
extreme importance of good transport facilities, especially
for dairy farmers and fruit and market gardeners, to consider
the possibilities of any industrial development which might
make the provision of motor or railway transport profitable.
Better transport is necessary not only for directly economic
purposes, but also to facilitate education and to give more
opportunities for social life. Better education is itself one
of the first needs of agriculture, and the problem of con-
veying young people to places where they can be effectively
CLAIMS <>7
trained will have to be solved with reference to economic
development. Equally important is the provision of occupa-
tion for the boys and girls who are receiving part-time
education, and their future efficiency will depend very
largely on the way in which they are employed during the
years of adolescence. It is necessary in most cases that this
employment should be lucrative, but it is still more important
that it should be conducive to healthy physical, mental, and
moral growth.
It is clear therefore that rural industries do not present
an isolated problem which concerns the occupation of a few
people scattered over the countryside. The problem is
a part of the great problems of national education and
progress, and the claim for special consideration of rural
industries rests on the fact that they are a vital part of
rural and national life. But none of these claims are valid
unless it is found that rural industries can be carried on
under healthy conditions. As with British industry in
general, so with rural industries, the crux of the problem
is the raising of standards all round. Organized labour has
learned that its fortunes are bound up with those of the
lower grade of workers, and is demanding higher wages
throughout its ranks. The corrolary of this demand is
a raising of the standard of production in all grades, for
industry can only afford to pay high wages for work of
high value.
Economic Dangers in Rural Industries
Is it possible to develop rural industries without per-
petuating the evils with which they have so often been
connected ? Are they compatible with good agricultural
conditions, or can they only exist in an underpaid com-
munity ? It must be remembered that in almost every
rural industry conditions have been deplorable, and that in
many cases the low economic position of the agricultural
labourers and their families were the chief reason for their
survival, the extra shillings or pence which they afforded
being preferred to poor relief and dependence on charity.
The survival in these cases certainly had its good side where
it kept alive family pride by avoiding pauperism. But no
one would wish men or women to toil all the week at the
lathe and then walk six or seven miles to market with
a bundle of chair-legs on their backs, only, if luck were bad,
to return with them unsold. Nor would they wish little
girls of five years old to be taken to market to sell their first
E 2
68 CONCLUSION
piece of lace with the promise of a whipping if it were not
good enough. Yet these are experiences actually recorded by
the old people. Although there is now more respect for
childhood and for workers generally, the fact that an
industry is carried on under healthy conditions in one
district does not prove that abuses do not exist elsewhere.
Rural industries may still be a refuge for inefficiency and
a source of danger to rural standards of work and life.
They may escape the regulations which secure the necessary
standards, or, on the other hand, the force of regulation
may drive them from the countryside altogether. As rural
industries have, within certain limits, a value on economic,
and still more on social grounds, it is important to guard
against the special dangers to which they are liable. This
can only be done (1) by bringing rural workers within some
form of organization which shall safeguard their earnings
without imposing restrictions which are inapplicable to rural
conditions, and (2) by the utmost efficiency in production
and economy in commerce, so that the industries may be
able to provide an adequate return to the workers.
Organization of Workers
The study of the organization of the workers leads to the
conclusion that it does tend to industrial efficiency. First,
because low standards of work are, generally speaking, the
inevitable result of low standards of pay. Secondly, because
organization amongst employees leads to organization
amongst employers, and this is necessary for commercial
economy. Thirdly, because organization gives great educa-
tional opportunities. It is not easy, however, to see how
far trade unionism in its normal form is applicable to rural
industries. It does not meet the whole case, because the
workers engaged in rural industries are not all employees,
the relation of employer to employed is very different from
that in a large factory, and rural industries are usually of
a type that cannot easily be regulated without some loss
of the freedom which should be their special strength.
Where it does apply, special difficulties arise, partly because
rural workers in any one industry or craft are scattered in
small numbers, and partly because trade-union pressure
comes largely from the towns and may not be in accordance
with rural interests. In the matter of wages, for instance,
an industry might be killed by such a sudden increase as
allowed little or no time for the adjustment of the type of
production or for the improvement of organization. And
ORGANIZATION OF WORKERS 69
in the matter of hours, especially in repairing shops, too
stringent regulation with regard to overtime would be
a serious obstacle to employing trade-union labour. There
is much to be said for the dislike of the small master of
official interference from a distance, and the tendency for
a family to dispense with journeymen, by using labour-saving
machinery, is the result of trade-union regulation.1 This is
not, however, a reason why trade unionism should be dis-
couraged in rural industries. On the contrary, it is to be
advocated wherever it is applicable as the most effective
method of raising standards of work and life. But it does
indicate that the claims of rural workers and rural firms
should be considered on their merits, and not merely in
the light of urban conditions. Rural problems and diffi-
culties need to be emphasized, and, for this, organization
in rural areas must be strong and comprehensive. The
growth of the agricultural unions will help, and the fact that
female employees are to some extent organized in the general
labour unions ought to be favourable to breadth of policy.
And, fortunately, the type of organization which has evolved
for Industrial Councils, and for the Interim Reconstruction
Committees which it is hoped will eventually be Industrial
Councils, does, by its system of district representation, give
an opportunity for the proper consideration of local pro-
blems* Whether advantage will be taken of it will depend
on the strength of the local organizations and the wisdom
of their representatives. These councils and committees
meet periodically for the discussion of any points which may
be brought forward concerning any aspects of the trade in
question, and not merely when there is some special griev-
ance to adjust. These established means of conference
amongst representatives of employers and employed give
scope for the ventilation and discussion which is so necessary.
Excellent machinery is in existence ; it rests with employers
and employed to make use of it, and to modify and develop
it to suit their needs. Further, the channel which this
machinery provides between individual industries and the
government gives a chance for national policy with regard
to training, transport, and other problems, to be developed
in the light of local requirements. But the best machinery
1 There seems to be no reason why regulations should be so stringent
as to do away with goodwill and the opportunity to oblige a neighbour
in an emergency. Rural work, depending so directly on the weather,
and consisting so largely of personal attention to live things, ought not to
suffer the tyranny of the clock.
70 CONCLUSION
depends for its usefulness upon the education, imagination,
judgement, and will-power of the people it is intended to
serve. Otherwise it may be useless, obstructive, or
tyrannical.
In sweated industries, where trade -union organization is
backward or not yet practicable, Trade Boards are being
established to fix minimum rates of payment. Their
rulings, unlike those of an industrial council, can be enforced
by law. They are therefore to be preferred in trades in which
only a small proportion of the firms or of the employers are
members of their respective organizations. The existence of
a Trade Board encourages organization, and does give oppor-
tunities for discussion between employers and employed.
The position with regard to organization of rural wage-
earners is hopeful, but organization in rural districts needs
to be extended and strengthened if it is not to be swamped
by urban elements.
But rural industries afford employment to a large number
of persons who do not come under the heading of wage-
earners or of employers. These are the independent small
craftsmen, such as hurdle-makers and other wood-workers,
and home workers who sell lace, knitted goods, or other
articles. The regulation of conditions of employment
appears to be increasing the number of these independent
workers, and there are grounds for fear amongst trade
unionists that this type of worker may still undercut prices,
and thus lower rates of wages. There is a grave danger that
minimum rates may be evaded, and considerable numbers
of home workers continue to be overworked and under-
paid by firms or dealers who will buy their goods without
technically employing them. Where lace-makers or knitters,
for example, have no link with the outer world except
dealers who sell them their material and buy their product,
there is special danger of sweating. Any effort, therefore,
which is made to develop the work of independent crafts-
men and craftswomen without ensuring standard rates of
pay, is bound to arouse the strong opposition of organized
labour, and to do this would be to court disaster. If, how-
ever, the support of the trade unions can be enlisted for
development of rural industries in such a way that standards
are safeguarded without undue restrictions being placed on
individual effort, the movement might react very favourably
on industry as a whole, by giving scope to persons whose
best work requires the greatest freedom from regulation.
The best means of setting a standard is to educate public
ORGANIZATION OF WORKERS 71
opinion, which is still far too indifferent to bad conditions.
Women's Institutes and other organizations which promote
industries should insist on fair prices wherever the sale of
work is encouraged. They should also do everything in
their power to raise the standard of work so that it may
command good prices. It will be advisable to base prices
on the trade -union rates obtaining in the district for work
of a similar character, special arrangements being made for
sub -normal workers.
The principle of working at lower rates during leisure
hours is thoroughly unsound, since it tends to debase
standards, and the criterion of an industry should be
whether it will pay if fair wages are given for good work.
The case of the sub-normal worker can be met by enlisting
the support of the various philanthropic bodies already
engaged in promoting industries for invalids, or by pensions ;
there is no reason why they should not be assisted to earn
what they can without prejudicing the position of other
workers by lowering the standard of payment. In the case
of lace-makers, knitters, and certain other workers not
using local material, it might be best for them to become
employees of a society or a firm which would supply them
with material and take all commercial responsibility. Even
if it did not cover a large proportion of the workers in an
industry, an association would be extremely useful in setting
a standard with which dealers and employers would have to
comply in order to secure workers. It would also be useful
as a means of associating in one body people engaged in
different crafts. The rural craftsmen deal for the most
part with the same set of customers. If they were associated
together in some co-operative enterprise for putting their
manufacture on the market, their position and the standard
of their work might be considerably improved. Marketing
schemes could be devised which would give an opening for
a variety of producers, and all classes of rural producers
could be assisted. Such an enterprise would be of great
educational value. If trade unionism were supplemented
by co-operative associations amongst all the craftsmen and
small rural firms in a district, many difficulties arising from
sectional interests might be overcome, and rural industries
would be in a better position to hold their own. A co-
operative organization for the independent craftsmen in
a number of industries, together with trade unions and
industrial councils in the separate industries, appears to be
the best plan for rural organization.
72 CONCLUSION
Commercial Organization
The need for the utmost economy in commerce also
demands co-operative organization, both for buying where
the material is not produced on the spot, and for selling
where the manufacturer is not in direct touch with the
customer. But co-operative societies need not necessarily
dispense with the services of a private dealer. Middlemen
there must be between producer and customer, whether
these are the servants of a co-operative society or inde-
pendent merchants, but there must not be too many of
them, and they must render efficient service both to pro-
ducer and to consumer. With most products it is probably
better to reach a wide market by distributing them through
the ordinary channels of the trade, but certain products
could best be sold from special depots to a select public.
The details of trade organization will vary according to
circumstances, and there should be much elasticity. What
is important for commerce as for production, is that there
should be a sufficient supply of capital. One reason why
trade through dealers is apt to be fluctuating is that they
have not sufficient capital to * hold ' goods, and must there-
fore sell them quickly while there is a rush. Prices are apt to
be cut very low because the merchants through lack of capital
cannot deal with the better kinds of products which are, on
other grounds, the most suitable for rural industries. A well-
capitalized co-operative society would therefore be useful.
The needs of Rural Industries
These are briefly : for labour — higher standards of work
and pay ; for production — cultivation of material, improve-
ment in plant and personnel ; for commerce — a better and
more flexible organization, with facilities for obtaining trade
information and for placing products in the right market ;
general adaptability, higher capitalization, and more and
better houses. Running through all these needs is the need
for education and the need for good communication. Much
can be done to expedite and direct enterprise in the develop-
ment of both ; little or nothing can be done in advance of
this development. Therefore progress will necessarily be
slow and will depend on the policy, and the method of
carrying out the policy, with regard to education and
transport. Private enterprise is essential ; in fact it is
largely for the stimulation of the spirit of enterprise that
NEEDS 73
! education is so badly needed. It may be thought that
private enterprise will bring about such development as is
desirable, that little good can be done by public effort, and
that artificial stimulation might divert energy into wasteful
channels. But it is clear that few of the needs of rural
industries can be met by individual effort alone. Therefore
wherever the development of rural industries is desirable
there is a strong case for social action.
(a) Education. For progress in rural industries, as in
other work, a liberal education is needed to develop the
physical and mental faculties ; to encourage resourceful-
ness and application, and to strengthen will-power and dis-
cipline. This provides also the possibility of a richer social
life in which every individual will take a place. But it
must be supplemented by the best possible training and
instruction for the career which each person is likely to
follow.
Definite vocational training should not be allowed to
encroach upon general education, and the two hundred and
eighty hours a year during which attendance at a continua-
tion school will be compulsory for adolescents not being
educated in other schools, are none too long for general
education. But technical training is also of great import-
ance for the temporary and still more for the future efficiency
of the boys and girls in industry, and there should be some
definite co-ordination between the ' vocational ' work done
in school or at technical classes and the industries in which
the pupils are engaged. The jealousy with which any power
of the employer qua employer over the education of young
employees is regarded by people interested in labour con-
ditions may put difficulties in the way of industrial training.
Much might be done to forestall or overcome these diffi-
culties by co-operation between the representatives of the
schools, both teachers and administrators, and representa-
tives of employers, parents and young employees themselves,
on bodies whose business it will be to work out the elastic pro-
visions of the recent Education Act. It would be possible for
a representative committee to devise a system of supervised
apprenticeship — the supervision to consist at least of some
method of selection of firms or workshops where there are
skilled persons fit to teach, and of seeing that the boys and
girls sent as apprentices have already acquired some know-
ledge which would guard against damage to tools and
material. This training would be supplementary to work
in school ; it would make the juvenile employees more
74 CONCLUSION
useful in their present vocation without the work being
detrimental to them in after life.
There are a great many agencies in existence which share
the responsibilities of education. If each is to fulfil the
function for which it is best adapted, a wise correlation will
be necessary between them all.
First, there are the State schools — primary, secondary,
technical, evening classes, day continuation schools ; there
are also special county instructors, and theoretically there
are means for individuals with special talents to go to
colleges or the universities. There are also training schemes
for demobilized soldiers and war workers, under the Ministry
of Labour, arranged locally by pensions' committees, employ-
ment bureaux, and education committees. The central
departments concerned are the Board of Education, Ministry
of Agriculture, and Ministry of Labour. There is, in fact,
ample opportunity for schemes to slip between many stools.
Secondly, there are the provisions made within the
industries for apprentices and learners, and even where no
special provision is made, the atmosphere of the workroom
or factory where young people spend the hours in which
they are, rather than in the schools, in touch with the
realities of life, is potent for good or evil. Work done by
boys or girls for money need not be obstructive to educa-
tion ; on the contrary, the power of application then
acquired may be extremely valuable, and it is important
for every one to learn that no good work can be done
without some drudgery, either one's own or some one else's.
The training of young people is far too important to be left
entirely to employers ; but the existence of industrial
councils gives opportunities for policy with regard to train-
ing to be considered from the industrial point of view,
and these bodies should be consulted in the matter of
educational schemes. Workshops and factories which
were also training schools, or training schools which were
partly self-supporting workshops, would be useful as
supplementary to the general education given in ordinary
schools.
Thirdly, there are the societies for promoting adult
education and various clubs and institutes which provide
excellent opportunities for acquiring experience in co-
operative effort in various directions. These, too, have
local and central organizations with power to influence
rural education, and their services should be enlisted in
educational schemes.
NEEDS 75
Lastly, there is the home, a factor in education, not only
in childhood but afterwards, too often ignored. Its in-
fluence may be negative or even obstructive ; on the other
hand, the home may give the environment most favourable
to the growth of individuality and resourcefulness needed
for rural industry. The general home conditions are involved
in the wages problem and the housing problem, and obviously
have a great influence on rural industries. One great need
of many rural families is more garden and workshop space
and greater security at home.
(b) Transport. All these agencies should be taken account
of in schemes for educational development. Before suggest-
ing how this can be done it will be necessary to consider
another great problem, that of transport, in relation to rural
development. Until the national policy with regard to
transport has been more clearly formulated, until local possi-
bilities with regard to conveyance of goods and passengers
have been studied more systematically, little can be known
of the possibilities of rural industries. In respect of transport,
individual producers are dependent very largely on social
action, although the development of motors has increased
individual resources to some extent.
The economic and social forces now at work point to the
development of rural industries in and around rural towns
rather than a wide dissemination of industry over scattered
villages and homesteads. The advent of motors and bicycles
has enabled a larger amount of rural labour to be con-
centrated, and has increased the importance of the country
town as a social and economic centre. New educational
developments will increase this tendency. Even for the
people who cannot go to the neighbouring town to work, it
will still be the centre of organization and distribution.
Therefore success or failure of rural industries will depend
largely on the way in which transport is developed, both
between the country towns and the surrounding villages
and from one town to another.
General Tendencies of Development
Where industrial expansion is probable, schemes for
housing as well as for transport ought to be thought out in
relation to such expansion. But it is as commercial centres
that the rural towns are of most direct importance to rural
industries, and if marketing facilities were developed, as
76 CONCLUSION
they could be, with more co-operative enterprise, the market
town in the better fulfilment of its economic functions, would
become the centre of many-sided activities, to the great
benefit of the districts in which it is situated. Thus rural
industries which might be regarded as of minor importance
in view of great agricultural problems, assume greater
importance owing to the opportunities which their economic
development affords — if the problem is wisety handled —
for assisting those tendencies which make for a more vigorous
corporate life in rural districts.
Every possible use should be made of existing associa-
tions whose objects include the development of rural
industries or the creation of conditions which would favour
their growth. Among such associations are the Design
and Industries Association, the Women's Institutes and
their federations, the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society,
the Home Arts and Industries Association and the various
lace associations. There is also the newly founded Institute
of Industrial Art, set up by the Board of Education and
the Board of Trade, which has already bureaux of in-
formation both on commercial and on technical matters
connected with production and sale, and should be of
great service to organizations dealing with rural industries.
The educational work of all these societies in inducing
producers and consumers to consider the essentials of
true economy in the making and using of goods is not
the least important of their functions, and their influence
can be traced in the increasing consideration given on the
part both of manufacturers and of purchasers, to two great
principles which govern art as well as economy — fitness to
a purpose and excellence of workmanship. If greater funds
were available this work could be extended with good
economic and social results for the community as a whole.
It is of considerable importance that the accumulated
experience of such societies should not be wasted, especially
as the agricultural committees now being established can
include only a minority of members whose interests are not
almost entirely agricultural.1
1 The Design and Industries Association, with special facilities for
rural work, could do great service to rural industries, since it makes
a point of working in co-operation with local trade and educational
organizations. For suggestions applied to organizing needlework industries
see pp. 164-173, post.
VOLUNTARY ASSOCIATIONS 77
The Functions of Voluntary Associations
It would be an advantage if the central or national
societies which are interested in rural industries could form
a central advisory committee to deal with problems of
production in their peculiar circumstances and with the
commercial distribution of the products of these industries.
Such a committee might form a medium for the collection
and dissemination of information on technical methods, and
on trade needs and possibilities. Much useful information,
both on methods of production and on trade conditions, of
which little advantage is now taken, might be made available
to those who need it through a committee of this character.
Similarly, within a county, or within an area covering
several counties, local advisory committees might be formed
for similar purposes within the area. Such local committees
would both provide information for the national committee
and obtain from them such information as was locally
required.1 The work of the voluntary associations in con-
nexion with rural industries is still urgently needed, and
there is much that they can do more cheaply and efficiently
than any statutory authority. As the statutory committees
are charged with the responsibility of taking steps for the
development of rural industries, however, the work of these
voluntary associations, so far as the local authorities are
concerned, must be purely of an advisory character unless
certain duties were expressly delegated to them by the
statutory authority. Any advice which may be tendered
would be much more reliable and would have more effect
if it emanated from the general body of persons who have
been especially interested in or concerned with industries,
than if tendered by one society whose interests and experi-
ence are necessarily limited.
So far as the results obtained through this survey provide
any reliable guidance, there is nothing in the recent history
of rural industries which should lead to a hopeless view as
to possibilities of future development, and so far as future
conditions can be foreseen they do not give grounds for the
confident enthusiasm sometimes evident in the advocates
of the return to the craft systems and to work and residence
in a rural environment. The future of the industries them-
selves largely depends upon the close study of local possi-
bilities of the supply of raw material or of markets for
produce, and upon the capacity of those in control of the
1 A register of good craftsmen and craftswomen should be kept in each
district, and copies supplied to various selling organizations.
78 CONCLUSION
industries to use technical knowledge, to organize pro-
duction economically, and by some form of mutual action
to organize the commercial system necessary to deal with
the supplies of raw material and with the marketing of
their finished products. It is no use expecting rapid progress,
for schemes will be of little value unless they are flexible
and capable of growth with the growth of education and
public spirit. Even small schemes for co-operative effort
will be useful, as will private enterprise directed to social
service, and every movement which helps people to realize
their common interest and common responsibility is valu-
able. The way of healthy growth is for the local people to
think out practical solutions of their own problems.
PART II
REPORTS ON INDUSTRIES
CHAPTER I
THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
Growth and Sale of Underwood
THE underwood industries owe their existence to the
local plantations of copsewood, and are derived from the
varied occupations of the woodcutter and handyman who
turned his wet days to account in making various articles
according to the needs of the neighbourhood and the material
at his disposal. It used to be the custom for a farmer to
rent a copse, sometimes at a considerable distance from his
farm, and employ a handyman to make hurdles, repair
fences, and so on ; this man was also a thatcher. As soon,
however, as a handyman was able to earn enough to buy
a copse at the November sales, he did so, the custom being
for 5s. in the pound to be paid on purchase and the remainder
at the end of a year when the products had been sold. He
would spend the winter cutting and sorting the wood,
disposing of the waste for firewood and peasticks, selling
the larger poles to the turners — unless he were a turner
himself — and making hurdles and other small articles at
his leisure during the year. He would also work at busy
times on the farms until his trade had increased sufficiently
for him to gain a livelihood from his craft and his holding.
Then he would probably employ other woodmen to help him
in the winter, or he might become an underwood dealer, em-
ploying craftsmen as well to make brooms or other articles
out of the suitable material and selling the rest. Now it is
usually the underwood dealers who employ the woodmen,
the turners and broom-makers buying the particular kind
of wood they need and having no waste to dispose of. Some-
times the owner of a turnery mill has to buy uncut copse
and employ woodmen and hauliers, but it is not worth
his while as a rule to carry on a retail trade and sell what
he cannot use himself, and he prefers to buy from the
dealers. Some underwood dealers are also timber merchants
and work a saw-mill. It is interesting to see in the evolution
80 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
of these small industries the separation of function (which,
however, is not complete), by which the dealer who owns
capital in the form of horses, and who has the means of
buying wood and paying wages for cutting, carting, and
making up his material, supplies the craftsmen with work
and the underwood mills with material.
The woodland crafts still keep their primitive character
to a great extent, and, as will be seen, are in many cases
carried on by woodmen. But machinery has been intro-
duced into the turneries, and although the old pole and
treadle lathes are still in use in some parts, the bulk of the
turnery industry is concentrated in the power-driven under-
wood mills of Newbury and Thatcham. The underwood
industries, therefore, can be divided into two distinct
groups : (1) the manufacture in or near the woods of small
articles, from bundles of faggots to rakes and hurdles ;
and (2) the turnery of Thatcham and Newbury in small
factories worked by power.
It is proposed in this report to go fairly fully into the
various industries, to show the possibilities of development
where such exist, and to examine their bearing upon agri-
culture. But first it is necessary to deal with the growth
and sale of underwood itself and to give some account of
the labour in the woods.
The Kennet river, as it leaves the Marlborough hills,
flows through a beautiful narrow valley bordered by sloping
meadows, fields, and woods, which rise to the Lambourne
Downs on the north and to the long ridge from Inkpen
Beacon to within a few miles of Basingstoke on the south.
On the north the ground which rises sharply is cut by steep
gullies which carry the moisture down to the river. These
gullies are the natural home of the alder and, being unfit
for agriculture owing to their steep sides and clay bottoms,
they are thickly planted with this and other soft woods of
quick growth. These woods, cut down to the stools every
ninth year, form the material for the turners of the neigh-
bourhood. On the south of the Kennet the thick woodlands
of North Hampshire are planted with copsewood under
the forest trees. Gullies also occur in the midst of these
woods. In some places the timber has grown too thick
for underwood to grow well, except birch which, growing
thick and bushy, is made into besoms. Hazel, growing in
the gullies and, here and there where the clay comes to
the surface, on the hills, is made into wattle or ' flake '
hurdles and sheep cribs, but there is more wattle -work
GROWTH AND SALE 81
farther south where hazel is more abundant. The poles
of the pollard willow are used here as in Oxfordshire for
farmers' gate-hurdles, while racing-hurdles are made of ash.
The forest underwood which used to be cut for hop-poles is
made into broom-sticks, rakes, barrel-hoops, and crate rods,
or sold if big enough to the turners for mop-sticks, and other
kinds of implement handles and as brushwood.
In the case of the wood grown in the gullies very little
care is needed. Resetting and clearing is only required
after the nine-yearly cutting, and a week's work at this
time makes all the difference. The absorption of the moisture
by the underwood as it grows is sufficient to drain the
gullies so that they are fit for the men and horses at the next
cutting. The result of choked ditches and scanty plantation
is that the ground becomes so miry that the copsewood
cannot be cleared until -late in the season, and also it is
inferior in quality and more difficult to work. In the words
of an old woodman and hurdle-maker who has known the
woods all his life : ' If the underwood is cleared of brambles
and properly drained and reset so as to grow thick enough,
it grows straight and kind ; otherwise it is knotty and
crooked and this means more work all round. The horses
cannot get down into the woods until summer nearly, there
is more labour attached to cutting badly grown stuff, and
there is more labour in making hurdles and more expense.'
Some figures have been obtained which show the differ-
ence in value of well-kept and ill-kept coppices, of which
the following may serve as illustrations :
Thirty years ago a gully of 4J acres fetched £26. Little
care was bestowed upon it and nine years later the price
had fallen to £4 1 5s. an acre. After clearing and resetting
it fetched £10 an acre. If it had not been reset it would
have deteriorated still further.1
On another estate, where the underwood had been allowed
to deteriorate, the prices were as follows : in 1889 the
average price was £5 an acre ; in 1893 the price ranged from
£1 Is. 6d. to £9, but the wood was not so good and much of it
was unsaleable. In 1 908 the average price had fallen to £1 1 5s.
an acre and then only four out of thirteen lots were sold.
For a copse of poles only, in 1 904 one and a half acres sold for
£18 5«s., but in 1911, after neglect, it only fetched £3 an acre.
1 All these figures relate to a period during which there was a decline
in demand. This rise in value owing to proper care is therefore remarkable,
and shows the wisdom of producing poles fit for turnery. If, however,
all the coppice had been looked after, this rise might not have occurred.
82 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
The price of underwood was falling and a decline of the
trade in underwood industries was steadily taking place for
quite twenty years prior to the war. During and since the
war conditions have altered ; foreign imports ceased ; an
abnormal demand for mop-sticks for the Navy stimulated
the turneries and sent up the prices of underwood, and there
is now a big demand for wood products to make up for
four or five years' shortage. How far the change is likely
to be a permanent one must be a chief consideration in the
whole question of the development of these rural industries.
In this connexion, therefore, it is useful to trace the causes
of the decline and to see whether they are still applicable
to-day.
It is difficult to disentangle the causes of the slump, for
in some cases they have reacted on one another. But the
primary cause was no doubt the falling off of the demand
for certain products, owing (1) to the substitution of big
posts and wire for hop-poles and of iron for wooden barrel
hoops ; (2) to the need for wattle -hurdles having declined
with the decline of sheep-farming in Berks and the change
in the breed of the sheep from those penned in hurdles to
1 grass ' sheep ; and (3) to a period of very cheap foreign
imports. Brush factories, for instance, which used to depend
on local turners for the wooden parts, moved to the ports,
where bristles and ready-made turned handles, &c., could
be obtained in large quantities and where large scale pro-
duction could be carried on with improved machinery.
The competition of foreign turnery has been attributed
by the turners to the fact that the Norwegians and Germans
made an art of growing underwood and the English do not,
but the factor of close proximity to the raw material is at
least as important in America and on the Continent as it
is in Berkshire and Hampshire.1
1 The woodlands on the south bank of the Kennet are similar in character
to the wooded districts of Sussex, and an account of the decline of wood-
craft in Sussex may be applied to this district, where, however, the survival
and industrial development of turnery has, until recently, been an incentive
to the cutting and care of the coppice. See W. S. Ingram's article on
Agriculture in the Victoria County History of Sussex, vol. ii.
' The grubbing up of a very large tract of hops and the use of creosote
for preserving poles together with the use of wire has led to the hop-poles
being a drug on the market. Cooper's work has declined, as has also the
sale of toy-wood, i. e. backs of brushes, &c., as these are now largely
imported from Germany. The design of the farm-house and cottage ovens,
the use of coal in the cottages, the use of foreign firewood for fire-lighting
has made the faggots almost unsaleable, with the result that the underwood
and its products have fallen in price ; this has made what once used to
GROWTH AND SALE 83
A second factor has been lack of transport facilities.
On estates far from the railway prices of underwood have
fallen considerably. For instance, on an estate well looked
after but too far from the railway, underwood in 1893
fetched from 10s. to £3 Is. 6d. an acre. In 1903 it fetched
from £1 to £8 an acre. But in 1904 the average was £4 105.
and it was unsaleable in outlying positions. In addition
to the difficulty of selling underwood grown at a distance
from a railway station, there is also the difficulty of obtaining
the necessary labour, though more labour is involved where
it has not been considered worth while to attend to the
woods.
Game preservation by large landowners has also sent
down the price of underwood. Young shoots are eaten off
by rabbits, &c., and in many cases whole estates have been
overrun with game, causing rapid deterioration of the under-
wood. If only two shoots survive to grow from a stool
where there should be nine or ten, the wood is poor, knotty,
and crooked.
With regard to these causes and present-day conditions :
wooden barrel hoops are now very much in demand again,
but this is possibly only temporary. Probably the falling
off of the demand for hoops, crate rods, and wattle hurdles
was inevitable and the cultivation under timber of the
pliable and easily split woods for these would not pay unless
suitable turnery poles could also be grown and sold. The
small industries absorb the thinner wood which is cut with
the poles ; it was as by-industries to the cutting of hop-
poles that they flourished. As to foreign imports of turned
goods, an underwood and timber merchant near Reading
does not think that these will ever be so cheap again, even
although the possibility of swift and cheap transport across
the Atlantic is borne in mind. The opening of the proposed
railway line from Newbury to Basingstoke would increase
the value of the outlying woods and stimulate cultivation.
But it has to be remembered that a demand for building
land might again alter the situation both here and between
be a source of profit to be almost a source of annoyance to the farmer. The
result has also been that the labourers have almost lost the art of wood-
cutting, and on large woodland estates it is difficult, not only to sell the
underwood, but even to get the wood out at all. Formerly cut at from
ten to fifteen years, one may see in the woods underwood of twenty or more
years' growth running to waste.'
The information collected along the Kennet district before reading this
article shows the same causes to have been at work, the turneries and
the besom-making being the only survivals of importance.
F 2
84 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
Newbury and Reading. It is reported that a paper mill
near Thatcham which now employs about 300 hands is
about to be enlarged to accommodate 1,000. Here, as
everywhere, especially where any industrial expansion is
contemplated, the shortage of houses is especially acute,
but it is thought that Thatcham will grow quickly and
become more important industrially than Newbury. As for
game, preservation will probably be too costly for estates
to be devastated as they were before the war. The argument
of a bailiff that game used to provide a quantity of cheap
food is hardly relevant to-day and, since game is preserved
at a loss, the competition of game with industry is not an
economic one in the same sense as competition between
one industry and another, when both are run for profit.
One way in which gamekeeping has added to the expense
of woodwork is that landowners are not always willing for
the wood to be stacked even at the edge of the woods for
fear of its not being removed in good time before the breeding
season, and this means carrying it farther for stacking or
moving it twice. Sometimes they prefer to sacrifice the extra
profit they might make by putting it up to auction, selling
it direct to a man whom they can trust not to trample the
covert. If landowners could be induced to reserve for covert
only those woods which are at a distance from the railway
and to cultivate or allow to be cultivated the best and most
conveniently situated coppices, it would probably pay them.
But in the case of old or neglected wood, the preliminary
cutting and clearing might have to be done at a loss. That
it would be in the interests of the locality to do so is certainly
the opinion of those connected with the underwood
industries.
We shall see in examining the conditions of labour in the
woods that the situation is certainly improving and would
be further improved by the better care of the woods. That
proper attention to underwood in the best localities would
pay is apparent from the increased activity in turnery, but
unfortunately the question whether a landowner would
consider it worth his while to make it pay is an entirely
different one. For instance, an estate agent contributed
a preference on the part of the landowners for timber rather
than underwood to the fact that timber bears a saleable
value in the case of an emergency such as the payment of
death duties. It would be worth considering whether
certain coppices could not be rented for a term of ,(nine
years or more by people interested in their cultivation.
GROWTH AND SALE 85
The neglect of the underwoods has undoubtedly had
a serious effect on labour, for it is only in well-grown coppice
that a man can earn enough for the work to prove attractive.
The work in the woods is skilled work and lasts from Novem-
ber to May, but wet days are wasted, and in a wet season
the work will be delayed and spun out until the wood is
dry and no longer ' kind ', i. e. sappy and easy to cut.
The sooner cutting begins after the sales the better, while
the sap is still in. This explains the importance of draining,
so that early access may be possible.
General depression, lack of openings, hard work, and the
loneliness of a woodman's life are all quoted as the causes
which have driven the skilled men to the towns. ' A man
does not expect to colonize in England.' Even in the
palmier days which the old men remember before the
slump, there is no reason to think that the woodman's life
was not a hard and precarious one. In any case the attrac-
tion of the towns has drawn away a great number of the
younger men. But under the high rates paid for government
contracts the men are coming back and the labour difficulty
has been exaggerated. One forester said that under
government contracts not yet finished (July 1919) wood-
men were well paid and that the rates would never fall so
low as they had been. There is practically no organization
of labour though attempts in this direction are being made
by some of the younger men, and the work is paid by piece
rates. The problem of payment is difficult, for not only is
there very great variation in pace and skill between one
man and another, but the work varies from day to day
and from one piece of ground to another. One man said
that men earned £4 and £5 a week in the woods during
the war while the others were away in the army. Asked
whether this was true or not a hurdle-maker said, * No ;
some men are not earning £2 10s. even now.' He meant at
that season (July) for he went on to explain that now the
wood had got so dry a man could only cut one piece in the
time in which he could have cut three a few months ago.
To illustrate the uncertainty in a day's earnings he said that
one man may be able, in the course of doing other work,
to throw aside fifteen or sixteen bundles of good straight
stakes which only need tying up, whereas another man
might find only two bundles.
Piece rates are sometimes supplemented by regular cash
payments where the result of the week's work is scanty.
One firm, for instance, was paying £2 a week until the work
86 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
should be finished and would pay up the remainder on
piece rates per bundle at the end. A dealer gave the follow-
ing information with regard to supplementing the rates :
a day's work on gully wood might be worth about £2 or
305., whereas on firewood it would not pay the men's wages.
So the dealer puts an extra price on the poles. ' You can't
charge on firewood.' This again illustrates the importance
of looking after the gullies.
It is evident that on a good piece of ground and in a favour-
able season men do earn £4 and £5 a week on piece rates,
but that the average earnings are very much lower and
that it depends on a private bargain between the particular
woodman and his employer whether he is compensated for
his loss of time and bad material. The solution found by
paying a weekly sum and making up the rest at the end
points to the desirability of a minimum time rate to meet
the cases where piece rates for the week would be insuffi-
cient. There is a similar custom in paying wages for the
harvest, overtime being paid up at Michaelmas. The lump
sum received at this time of year is particularly useful,
either in buying winter clothing, &c., or for investing in
coppice wood at the November sales, or for any other form
of stock.
The scanty pay and the openings elsewhere for mechanical
skill have undoubtedly been the main causes of the labour
difficulty. The manager of the principal turnery works said
that with the good pay for government contracts more wood
came in during the winter of 1918-19 than he would have
thought possible. Before this he would have felt the shortage
of material acutely had not fifty of his men been taken for
the war.
Woodmen, dealers, auctioneers, and manufacturers, all
agree as to the neglect of the coppices and gullies.
A dealer said with regard to the present situation, that
there was as much underwood in this district as there was
labour to deal with it. But we have seen that the piece
rates on poor woods do not yield attractive earnings. We
have also seen that the cutting of remote and too old coppice
does not pay for the labour, for it is then only fit for fire-
wood, and what is lost on firewood has to be made up on
the price of the poles. Much turns, therefore, on the question
of cultivation. New turneries are being started which may
be expected to absorb more well-grown poles ; their
prosperity obviously depends on good cultivation as also
does the prosperity of the other industries. The importance
GROWTH AND SALE 87
of attention to the coppices is borne out by the evidence
of the turners who can give a far better price for well-grown
stuff, the material being only a small item in the whole
expense. On every hand the admonition is to ' look after
the gullies '. Whether it is also worth while to look after
the forest underwood is not so clear since (1) there is more
labour needed than in the case of gully wood ; (2) young
shoots are apt to be eaten off by rabbits who will not
touch the alder of the gullies and valleys, unless driven
into it, and wire-netting would be prohibitive ; and (3) the
return on the smaller underwood is less than on the poles
used for turnery.
The difficulty of finding a remedy for slovenly cultivation
of the raw material arises from the fact that the responsi-
bility for the care of the underwoods is not in the hands of
the people chiefly interested in underwood manufactures.
In the case of osier beds, it is worth the osier merchant's
or the basket-maker's while to rent the beds, for the return
on osier beds is an annual one and, as with underwood,
to buy them standing means to buy poor stuff from neglected
beds and to spend more on their preparation. Turners,
underwood dealers, and small craftsmen, on the other
hand, will not rent and look after a cqppice for the sake
of the return nine years hence, especially as the trade in
underwood is such a fluctuating one. Farmers used to
do so and perhaps when good handymen are once more
available, they will do so again. It would probably pay
to give good wages to a skilled handyman, for in the
neighbourhood the surplus underwood could be sold to
advantage. Landowners do not as a rule realize the value
of the gullies and the few old woodmen who are left,
who know every coppice and have watched the sales for
a lifetime, who know as none else knows what is required
for cultivation and where it would pay to spend money on
clearing and setting, are powerless unless a particular
landowner will take their advice. For instance, a gully was
quoted by one of these experts in underwood and wood-
craft where with an expenditure of about £5 for resetting
after the periodical cutting, the value of the gully rose in
nine years from £20 5s. to £45. If the coppice had not
already fallen into neglect the cost of resetting would have
been still less. ' Wha,t is required ', said this woodman,
' is for a man to go round the coppices after every cutting
to see to the clearing of the ditches and brambles and the
planting of the right variety, e. g. of ' long-top ' willow in
88 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
place of dead stools. He quoted another instance where
a change of ownership had meant a cessation of all interest
in the underwood and consequent deterioration.
Underwood Turnery
It used to be the custom for mop-stick handles, chair-
legs, &c., to be made up in the woods where the poles had
been cut or the felled trees lopped. These were made on
pole lathes, and one of these lathes was shown in the work-
shop of a chair-maker at Aldbourne who had just resumed
chair manufacture. He is now using an oil engine for his
saw and his lathe, and keeps the pole lathe as a curiosity.
He said that these pole lathes used to be fixed up in the
Wycombe woods by the chair -leg turners.1 But the only pole
lathe Avhich has actually been found in use is that of the elm
bowl turner of Bucklebury Common, near Newbury, mention
of whom will be found later.2 The mop -stick turners of
Crookham Common use a treadle lathe with a fly-wheel,
and work at home in an outhouse where there is a tank
for steaming the poles so that they can be straightened.
The shavings are used to heat the water for the tank.
Forty or fifty years ago, when Thatcham Broadway used
to be filled with cart -loads of rakes and broom and mop
handles, there were numbers of mop-stick turners at work.
A Crookham turner used to employ a dozen or more workers
to help him. But the use of machinery in the Thatcham
turneries brought competition, and the market was captured
and turners absorbed in these factories. One of the Crook-
ham turners was visited. This old man, at the time unwell
and unable to work, said he used to turn 100 mop-sticks
in a day, but only got 3s. 9d. for them. Later he got 4s. 6d.
to 5s. It had always been poorly paid, worse than agri-
cultural labour, but he had done well and put by. ' It is the
competition of machinery, they say. Young men won't
learn the craft.' Two other turners, however, had worked
on Crookham Common up to the war. These were of army
age, had been away, and had not yet returned. A rake-
maker who also has a lathe said it did not pay him to do
turnery, though he sometimes did a little to oblige. Asked
whether it would be worth while to work these small lathes
by power, e. g. by means of an oil engine such as carpenters
use, he thought not. In order to make an engine pay, it
has to be kept working, and he evidently did not consider
that the trade in mop-sticks would be large enough. Obvi-
1 See p. 102. 2 Seo p. 112.
TURNERY 89
ously a cottage turner would have little chance in the
close neighbourhood of factories making the same class
of goods.
About five miles farther south, in the heart of the wood-
land country, there is a pill-box maker who sells by the
dozen gross to wholesale chemists in London or anywhere
where he can get an order. He gives an estimate, and
though sometimes his price is too high, he is not in the
least afraid of competition, though there is some. He has
two lathes, one worked by a treadle and the other by an oil
engine. He is going to train his son of fourteen, who was
helping him by ' finishing ' on the treadle lathe, to this
trade. He spoke with regret of the lack of scope for an
intelligent lad in the village schools, and thought that this
was one of the causes of incompetency in rural districts.
He does not expand because he has no capital. He buys
the underwood which is best for his purpose before it is
disposed of elsewhere. He said there was not another
turner of this kind between here and London. A resident
spoke of his great skill and accuracy, and said he ought to
be turning billiard balls or articles for which great precision
was needed. Pill-boxes are as a rule made in great quantities
on automatic lathes.
Of the three brushwood factories in this district, one is
worked by an oil engine, another by a water wheel supple-
mented by a steam engine when the river is low, and the
largest by steam power only. The staple trade is in broom
and mop-stick handles, brush heads, &c., and while
the firms have been at work on Government orders old
customers have been neglected. Their normal trade will
have to be worked up again, and the manufacturers are
considering development on side lines in case of a slump
should foreign imports be resumed. The largest factory,
which employs eighty hands, does not turn out more of
the staple products than the other firms, but a large quantity
of nursery chairs are sent to Birmingham and certain western
towns. The handles, japanned brush heads, &c., go to the
brush works in London, Oldham, Ireland, and all over the
country. The present owner of this factory took over an
existing one in 1889 and greatly increased it. His success
is attributed not only to the fact of a fortune having been
left him which put capital at his disposal, but to the hard
work and high reputation and old standing of this family
which has been in the trade for generations. He believes
that there is a promising future for household goods and
DO THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
toys, and was ready to push certain new lines, but shortage
of labour made it at present impossible.
With regard to expansion, however, he said that the
business was limited : (1) by material, which is nearly all
local though he does sometimes buy from Somerset and
Dorset ; (2) by labour, which is what the neighbourhood
can supply ; (3) by demand. Though he could push and
increase the scale largely he would have to cut profits to
a minimum, for the more costly labour and material would
increase the cost of production. He could get the same
profits on larger returns, but it was not worth his while,
and he believed that this method ' put down labour ' and
prefers to leave a little to everybody. He does not do more
in the mop-stick line than the others. Skipping-ropes, and
small rush-seated chairs with stained woodwork, were
amongst the articles he could turn out. Another firm had
tried wooden spades, but the price offered by a Reading
firm was too low though he said the retail price was
high.
The foreman at this works stated that much good material
was wasted which farther west would be used for bobbins.
Ordinary furniture cannot be made of soft underwood as it
will not take a polish. Japanning is done, the articles after
painting being put in a furnace for which shavings supply
the fuel. The steam engines are worked by coke furnaces.
The shortage of good material has already been mentioned.
One turner was seriously thinking of moving farther south
where the underwood had not recently been cut. It was
reported that three new turneries are being started in the-
district, one of these being already opened, close to the
biggest turnery ; of the others there was no trace, unless
one referred to was the revived chair-making industry at
Aldbourne above Hungerford. These chairs are similar to
the staple product of Wycombe ; Windsor chairs of beech
and elm. There is also a furniture and toy works at
Newbury which is expanding and employing a considerable
number of girls. Underwood is brought from farther up
the river by traction engine. Regret was expressed at
the neglect of the canal and the obstruction caused by
weeds which have not been cleared. It was thought that
more use would soon be made of the canal.
The labour difficulty was obviously due very largely to
the war. At the biggest turnery about eighty men are
employed and a few women for japanning ; at the smaller
one there were thirty, and at another only three boys and
TURNERY 91
.two men at that time. As many as fifty woodmen have at
times been employed in the woods in winter by this firm,
which also deals in firewood, &c. The oil engine is too small,
and the employer would welcome cheaper electricity but
does not believe it will come for many years ; at present
electricity from the town would be too expensive. The
head of the larger firm said that electricity would be the
saving of the small industries.
The workers are organized in the Amalgamated Society
of Woodworking Machinists. Hours had been reduced from
59 pre-war to 54J a week, and earnings had risen about
125 per cent. The workers appear to be on good terms with
their employers though they are always asking for more.
The industry is still in the stage where the employer is
personally acquainted with all his workers. There is, so far
as a visitor can judge, more community life and enterprise
in this village than in any other large village investigated.
This employer and his family take a leading part in local
activities. The women are mostly employed in the paper-
bag-making depaitment of the paper mills, and the expan-
sion of this factory will absorb many more. A few are
employed making halters and wagon sheets and sacks, but
the piece rates in this industry do not appear attractive.
In this village there is industrial work for both sexes ; it
may be contrasted with Woodstock, where a scheme for
training women in gloving fell through owing to the lack
of openings for men and the consequent necessity of taking
the women from Oxford. Owing to the housing shortage
the Thatcham employeis are faced with the expense of
bringing their labour from a distance ; at present they
employ men and women from their own and surrounding
villages.
Some of the turnery is done on automatic lathes which
do not turn out quite such good work and cannot be used
for tapering poles. The earnings on these lathes, the use
of which is quite unskilled, are about the same as on the
hand lathes ; piece rates are lower but the work is quicker.
In America, however, automatic lathes are used for tapering
wood in making furniture, &c., in huge quantities. The tools
in automatic or ' copying ' lathes are sooner blunted than in
the hand work. Near Inkpen, girls have been employed on
automatic lathes, but they have not been found of much
use on tools which require more intelligence. There is
a prejudice against women being employed as turners.
Although turnery is not considered an unhealthy occupation
92 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
it is unsuitable for people with weak chests owing to the
chaff which flies from the lathes.
As for the prospects, granted a plentiful supply of well-
grown poles from the surrounding coppices, there is a good
opening for kitchen and nursery requisites of good quality,
toys, small chairs, and so on. In the very cheap lines there
is little chance of competing with the large-scale production
of America, but manufacturers agree that a good market
will be found in the better working-class homes. Asked
whether he thought of ' art goods ' the biggest manufacturer
replied : ' All our goods are " art goods ",' meaning that
even in dustpan brushes he depended on quality and appear-
ance for his reputation.
Barrel Hoop -making and Crate Rods
The decline of hoop-making and cooperage in Sussex is
described by Mr. L. F. Saltzmann in his article on Industries
in the Victoria County History of Sussex. He gives the
number of coopers for this county as 368 in 1871 and 284
in 1901. By 1908 there were only twelve coopers and ten
firms of hoop-makers at work. In 1798, he tells us, barrel
hoops were sent to the West Indies for sugar casks,
the London sugar merchants supplying the market for
them.
A similar decline has taken place during the same period
in the district between the Kennet and Basingstoke, and
the industry has almost ceased to exist. Information was
given by a local underwood dealer to the following effect :
' It (underwood) is a fluctuating trade. Take, for instance,
barrel hoops. I used to sell thousands to London merchants,
who in turn sent them to the West Indies, for sugar barrels.
I remember selling as many as 1,600 bundles at one time.
Then the trade declined. Seven or eight years ago I sent
a quantity to Midgham station and lost \d. a bundle,
i. e. on the labour, not counting the price of wood. Now
I sell none.' Yet at the moment the demand for wooden
hoops has revived and a good price is being given for
them.
A timber merchant in the same district also spoke of the
trade with London merchants in sugar-barrel hoops for
the West Indies. Then iron hoops had been used, the
demand slackened, and gradually the industry died out. He
explained that barrel hoop- making takes about a month to
BARREL HOOP-MAKING, COOPERAGE 93
learn, and though it would be worth while at the moment
(to make them, no one will do so. Only one old man was
discovered at making the hoops in the woods.
The process of hoop-making is as follows : underwood of
a flexible nature, for example, willow, is split with a tool
similar to that used by basket-makers to split osier wands,
and by means of a simple measuring apparatus, consisting
of stakes driven into the ground at correct intervals, the
wands are cut to varying lengths, each size having a tradi-
tional name, still in use. They are then bound in bundles
and sent away to be bent round the barrels. The bending
used to be done near Newbury. New wooden hoops are put
on the ' empties ' from an imported cargo before using
them again. These hoops are used for grocery and fruit
barrels, and also for fish barrels, but not for beer casks.
Wooden bands are noticeable at the present time on
many barrels, but the opinion of the merchants as to the
future of the trade is not known. When trade in barrel
hoops is slack, orders for crate rods for potteries have
been taken, these being cut in a similar manner but not
so fine.
Cooperage
Coopering has practically ceased to be a rural industry
owing : (1) to the employment of coopers at breweries
where barrels are made ; and (2) to the concentration of
the industry where iron and foreign timber are easily
obtainable. A cooper at Banbury was interviewed, and he
explained that local cooperages were now merely repairing
shops. The existence of his firm at Banbury was, he said,
due to an old established connexion ; he gets his iron from
Rotherham, his wood from Germany and Russia, while his
customers are at Portsmouth and elsewhere in the south.
He could take on forty skilled men and four or six apprentices
at once, but has difficulty in getting them. This is due to
the fact that a great many coopers have been killed and
that those who are left prefer to work in the breweries.
This man sends out his repairing to local coopers, as it does
not pay his men to be taken off their work to do it, and as
a skilled cooper is needed to repair badly damaged barrels,
it would appear that there is a certain amount of work in
repairs for a cooper in a country town.
1 Although of little importance it is interesting to note the other
uses to which wands of willow and other pliable and easily split woods,
such as Spanish chestnut, are put. They are split into fine bands for
94 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
The Besom Industry
Besom -making is carried on largely by the inhabitants
of the adjoining parishes of Baughurst and Tadley. In
North Hampshire birch wood grows on the sandy soil of the
commons which stretch from Baughurst to Silchester and
Mortimer, and also in the enclosed woods of pine and oak.
In 1911 the two parishes together had a population of
1,835, but the houses are scattered over a wide area, and
even the largest group can hardly be described as a village.
Like hurdle-makers, broom-makers are usually men of
mixed occupation. For instance, of the seven broom-makers
mentioned in the directory, one is a coal merchant and
one a coppice dealer respectively, employing labour for
besom brooms and used for baskets by the gipsies. At Ban bury an old
gipsy and his wife, both eighty years of age, split up the stakes of pollard
willow and plait them with remarkable speed and dexterity into baskets,
which are used chiefly for packing Banbury cakes. They have done it all
their life, but none of their eleven children still living (out of a family of
sixteen) can do it as they do, ' because they would not let them out of
school to learn.' This couple, who never went to school, had a varied
career — harvesting, thatching, hop-picking, &c., but settled down thirty
years ago in a cottage in Banbury. Like pillow-lace, this form of basket-
making is a case of handicraft for which ' lissomeness ' of fingers must
be acquired in childhood. Although no one would wish to keep children
in school for very long hours at a particular kind of handicraft, yet it
seems probable that the neglect of handwork in the schools has been one
cause of the disinclination and incompetence for handicraft in later years.
Round about Warwick there are still a few gipsies who make these chip
baskets.
In order to split the strips to the required width, a tool is used which is
made of watch springs set in a wooden handle like the teeth of a comb
through which the bands are rapidly drawn. At Aldbourne, seven miles
from Hungerford, the old people remember the time when in almost every
cottage there was a hand-loom on which willow, split with a watch-spring
comb set much finer than for the baskets, into threads like coarse horse
hair, was woven into hat squares, bags, &c. The material was called
' wass ' or ' wace '. There was an attempt to revive it a few years ago,
but all the looms are believed to have been broken up for firewood. An
interesting revival has taken place, however, in the chair industry where,
owing to the expense of cane during the war, many chairs have been
caned with an imitation made of fibre ' or any rubbish ' varnished to look
like cane, to the early dissappointment of purchasers of these so-called
cane-seated chairs, ' Wass ' used also to be dyed and sold to fill empty
grates. But fashion has changed and probably the wass industry is a thing
of the past. It would, however, be an instructive and exceedingly pleasant
occupation for school children to learn to split and comb pollard willow,
to dye and plait it into baskets and weave it into shopping bags, and,
considering the expensive apparatus often used for children's occupations
and toys, it would be useful to teachers to know the possibilities of old
watches and the ' lop ' of pollard willows for the school workshop and toy
cupboard.
BESOM INDUSTRY 95
broom, hurdle, and barrel hoop-making. Nearly all the
inhabitants of the two parishes have a little land and many
of them own ponies.
Not many years ago broom-makers used to travel as far as
Oxford, Banbury, and Leighton Buzzard with cartloads of
besoms. Now the chief demand for besoms comes from the
iron works of the Midlands and South Wales, whither they are
dispatched by rail, and where they are used for brushing the
slag from the pig-iron, the heat of the metal burning the
twigs to the right length. A constant supply is needed for
this purpose, and it is expected that there will always be
a demand. Wire brooms have been tried, but have proved
less satisfactory. Collieries and factories of various kinds
absorb large quantities. A Monmouth firm of coopers
has also bought large numbers of Baughurst besoms for
thirty or forty years. Sometimes they are sold direct
to ironmongers and old connexions are kept up. A
broom-maker on the edge of Sherwood Forest in Notting-
ham spoke of a great scarcity of besoms and said that,
owing to the fumes from the collieries the forests had
deteriorated, and the number of woodmen and 'broom-
squires ' had greatly decreased. Seed merchants are also
short of good besoms.
The broom-makers all work on separate orders and
drive with their own brooms to the station, three or four
miles away. There is no attempt at co-operative selling,
and the isolation and independence of the scattered inhabi-
tants makes it doubtful whether they could as yet be
induced to co-operate as they might, for instance, in making
joint contracts with the iron works. At present sales are
brisk, but the trade in besoms for domestic and garden use
has seasonal fluctuations, and organizations which would
secure a steady demand and supply would be useful.
The work consists of sorting the twigs according to length,
taking a bundle of them and binding it with a band of
withy ; a stake is then driven in which has first been peeled
and pointed with a two-handled knife curved somewhat-
like a sickle. The broom-maker sits on a ' broom horse '
which has a grip to hold one end of the band while binding
the twigs ; this is afterwards tucked in with a box-wood
tool called a ' hundred putter ', which is polished like ivory
by constant use. Skill is required in gathering quickly
a bundle of right length, and in drawing the band tightly.
' It 's old-fashioned ; you can't make besoms by steam.'
In Nottinghamshire a treadle clamp was used which ex-
00 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
pedited the gathering into bundles, and helped to secure
uniformity ; also a slight improvement in the shape of the
tool like the * hundred putter ' increased the strength and
speed of the binding. Here cane was used instead of withy
for the bands. Spanish chestnut was also used in Berkshire
with good results.
The sorting is done by women and girls and provides
them with an occasional day's work in the summer. It is
poorly paid and it is difficult now to get them to do it,
work ir the saw-mills and elsewhere having raised their
standard of wage. They can make 2s. or possibly 3s. a day
sorting at the present rates. The men say it would not pay
them to do it themselves as there is much wood work of
other kinds for them to do. This is probably true, and
sorting is not hard work. But it would pay them to pay
the women better. Male labour is also paid by piece rates,
and these have risen 300 per cent, on pre-war rates, the
maker now getting Is. 6d. for a dozen brooms. Piece workers
can earn £3 a week on the present rates. Broom-makers
have been approached as to training disabled soldiers, but
they appear anxious to keep the industry for their own
families, and there was some hesitation in giving information.
Retail prices have risen enormously. At the present time
they could sell many more brooms than they can make ;
one maker had enough material for two years stacked out-
side his house and was waiting for his son to be demobilized.
The twigs require seasoning, and are better for being kept.
The reluctance to increase the number of broom-makers
does not appear to be justified, but it was natural during
a time of booming trade when the men were waiting for
their sons to be discharged from the army. Reluctance to
employ labour is very general among small producers, the
reason given being sometimes the high wages and some-
times the difficulty of managing the men.
This industry is an interesting example of a part-time
occupation lucrative to the countryman who combines
wooding with agricultural labour and allotment culture.
There is ample local material on the one hand, and the
likelihood of a steady demand for industrial purposes on the
other. There is a keen demand for small holdings, but not
much land suitable and rents have risen. Doubt is expressed
whether the best use is made of the land. One instance
with regard to the commons is that heather, which is also
used for besoms, though it is inferior to birch, and heather
besoms are much less in demand, is constantly burnt by
HURDLE-MAKING 97
mischievous boys before it grows tall enough for use. Under-
wood, too, on the commons, is taken before it is mature for
use. It is felt that some of the waste land might with
advantage be brought under cultivation.
Hurdle-making.
Hurdle-making used to be and still is in some cases an
itinerant trade, the hurdle-maker going from farm to farm
and working up the farmer's material. It is not always
a specialized occupation ; several carpenters are to be
found who make ladders, hurdles, and sheep-cribs to order.
The material used for gate hurdles is ash and willow, and
occasionally chestnut. Ash is used for race-course hurdles
a,nd these fetch a better price than others. The larger willow
poles are also used for ladders, ash being used for the rungs.
But poles for long ladders are imported from Norway, the
English ones being usually too crooked and easily bent.
English fir is also used where it is available.
Wattle hurdles are made of hazel withies twisted back-
wards and forwards over stakes, and are preferred by
some shepherds as giving more shelter. They have to be
made early in the year, while the wood is flexible, whereas
gate hurdles can be made at any time. Wattle work is very
hard work and is best done in dry weather, for if the bark
is wet the hands are apt to slip and be hurt. A great number
of wattles used to be sent down the river to London for
gangways and platforms for barges.
Hurdle-making has almost died out in Berkshire, there
being little local demand owing to the change in the breed of
sheep. There the usual custom is for the hurdle-makers
'to be employed by wood-dealers. In this way they get
good material, as they can discard for other purposes what
•is not suitable.
In Oxfordshire hurdle-making is a more settled, independ-
ent craft than in the Kennet district where there are alterna-
tive woodcrafts and a good deal of mixed and seasonal
work. The trade here runs in families ; it was discovered,
'for instance, that the five sons of a hurdle-maker had all
^set up independently in different parts of the country.
The practice is for hurdle-makers to buy willow and ash poles
and make them up at home. The poles are usually bought
^growing and have to be cut and carted at the hurdle-maker's
expense, so that a man who keeps a horse and cart is at an
^advantage. Hurdle-makers who cannot buy and carry under
2415
98 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
favourable conditions have a hard struggle. To buy poles
from the farmers, carry them home, and sell hurdles to the
farmer again is not an economical arrangement and for
a man with no other resources it appears to be more satis-
factory to be employed by the farmers for hurdle-making,
repairing fences, &c., on the premises, as is done in Berkshire.
But work in a yard at home is preferred to work in remote
fields, and in bad weather time would be lost without some
alternative occupation. It was found that several hurdle-
makers keep public-houses, and evidently the additional
source of income is valuable in providing sufficient capital
for buying up material at favourable seasons.
The opinion as to hurdle-making being very hard work
is unanimous, and it appears that the hours of work have
been very long. One hurdle-maker stated that machinery
had been tried, but without success. Farmers complain of
the scarcity of good hurdle-makers. A Berkshire maker
thought that the shortage of labour was partly due to the
unwillingness to teach the younger men for fear there should
be too many and that the prices would fall. It is a practice
here for the purchaser of underwood to employ labour in
the woods, but to keep hurdle-making in his own hands.
As with other woodcraft, the speed of the work depends
largely on the way the material is grown ; if not regularly
cut, poles and withies grow crooked and knotty and are not
easily split into suitable pieces. The quality of the nails
is y also important. Since the war, not only have they
greatly increased in price, but there have been fewer to the
pound and these have been clumsy and easily bent and
broken. The nails used before the war were said to have
been German, the inferior ones now in use come from
Bristol.
As to prices and piece rates, there is a good deal of varia-
tion. The hurdles themselves vary in size and form, some
having six bars and others only five. The estimates as to
the number of hurdles which can be made in a day also vary
considerably, and the men differ in speed and skill. The
following examples of rates and prices were given :
Berkshire
A dealer's selling price of gate hurdles had risen from 11s.
a dozen pre-war to 32s. (August 1919). He had latterly been
paying 15s. a dozen for making and said a good workman
could make 10 or 12 a day with good wood. One hurdle-
HURDLE-MAKING on
maker said 7 a day, another said 8 or 9, but with the picked
wood from the dealer the work would be more rapid. An
auctioneer said that prices of hurdles had risen from Is.
to 30^. per dozen in the wood, and from 8s. Qd. to 325.
delivered.
A hurdle-maker quoted the price of ash hurdles as 455.
and 50«s. a dozen (July 1919). He was selling at 455. on his
premises to trainers of racehorses. It would not pay him
to make the cheaper sort because of carting the willow. He
was selling wattle hurdles at 305. a dozen, and sheep cribs,
which he said would last seven or eight years, at 25. 6d.
each. Farmers, he said, prefer to waste half their hay,
allowing it to be trodden in, rather than afford the cribs.
This man is a highly skilled craftsman. With good wood
he could sometimes make fifteen wattle hurdles in a day.
' Some wood grows so much kinder than others.' A black-
smith in this district said that wattle-hurdles had risen from
Qd. to 35. 9d. each, and were not worth the present price.
Few of the hurdle -makers can make them properly now.
Oxfordshire
For willow-hurdles pre-war prices were quoted as 115.
and 125. a dozen ; prices in the summer of 1919 as 245.,
255., 265., 275. 6^., the highest price quoted being 305. by
a man who said his son was charging more because he had
seven children. The latter hurdles, however, may have
been made of ash, this man being also -a ladder-maker.
Another hurdle-maker was selling ash hurdles at 355.
This was in the Cotswold district where the hurdles are
larger.
As for wages, a hurdle-maker employing four men includ-
ing his own son was paying them 355. a week in February 1919,
the district agricultural wage being about 305. The hurdles
he said were nearly double (at 25. each), the wages nearly
double and haulage double.
Another man was in July charging 125. a dozen for
making, supplying the nails himself. The nails at the present
price of 5%d. a Ib. would cost him nearly 25. for a dozen
hurdles. He can make eight or nine hurdles on a good day
working from 5 or 6 a.m. to 6 or 7 p.m. He has no regular
meal-times ; in summer he works twelve hours a day on
an average. He knows he has not put up his prices enough,
and would prefer regular work with stated hours. On his
own evidence he could not have been making more than
G 2
100 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
65. Sd. or 75. 6d. even on a good day, that is, when he fell
well. Obviously the hours were far too long.
The costs depend largely on the proximity of the material
and are difficult to estimate. Willow poles are usually
bought by the head or ' top ' of a pollard, the price being
about double the pre-war price. One man was paying 105,
a day for cutting and hauling, and employing another man
for loading. The uncut poles cost about 25. a head. Another
man had bought cut poles from a farmer at 145. a score ;
these might make fifteen or possibly twenty hurdles, but
the haulage would be an additional expense. One man had
to pay as much for haulage as the price of the poles, and
another did not find it paid him to make willow hurdles on
account of there being no pollard willows quite near. The
complaint was made that the farmers had not cut their
willow, which was probably owing to the shortage of labour
during the war.
We see that in spite of the small demand for hurdles in
Berkshire the rates are higher than in Oxfordshire. A young
hurdle-maker in Berkshire had been trying to get hurdle-
makers to combine for fixing prices and rates, but finds that
they will not keep to the arrangements made. A hurdle-
maker who admitted that his prices were too low was a
Workers' Union secretary. In other cases we find the price
varying according to the needs of the craftsman's family.
Hurdle-makers who are employed by farmers get the help
of their Trade Unions in settling piece rates. But the amount
of work involved in hedging, fencing, and hurdle-making,
varies according to the material, the season, and the distance
to be walked, so that a sufficient wage in one case would be
quite inadequate in another. This shows that the system
of employing casual labour for these jobs on piece rates is
not very satisfactory.
As for demand, it seems that there has been a ready sale
for hurdles, but it is difficult to foretell the future position,
for the present demand is abnormal owing to four years'
shortage. The market is not only local ; hurdles are sent
to the north of England and to Scotland from these counties.
Owing to the present shortage of labour, orders have to be
refused. In neither county was it thought that wooden
hurdles would be replaced by iron ones or wire.
To be a skilled hurdle-maker it does not seem necessary
as in the case of basket-making, to follow the trade as a
whole-time occupation. It was said that part-time basket-
RAKE-MAKING : £ • 101
makers could not maintain the necessary speed to make the
work pay, but hurdle-making is harder and more monotonous
work, and this, with the long hours and poor returns, has
made it unpopular. The less fortunate hurdle- makers are
not putting their sons to the trade. This no doubt is partly
due to the attraction of the high price given for boy labour
during the war, and the problem of ' earning ' versus ' learning '
for young people is one of urgency in all skilled trades.
Rake-making
Thatcham was at one time an important centre of the
rake-making industry, but times have changed and on
inquiry only two rake-makers were discovered where doubt-
less there used to be dozens. In fact it was reported that
ironmongers had experienced difficulty in getting rakes
this summer, and the rake-maker who was visited, and who
had just returned from the Army, expected to prosper.
He and his father worked together and employed one old
man. He said that a good man could earn on piece rates
30s. to 35s. (Probably since then the rates have increased.)
He and his father naturally made more as they shared the
profits. He explained his method of working. He cuts
ten dozen at one time, the next day he planes them, then
he sets them (with teeth) and lastly puts them together.
For these, which represent about four days' work for three
men, he gets 120s. The father has no desire to try new
methods, but the son is contemplating the use of machinery
in his work. He does a little turnery in addition to rake-
making, but an engine would not pay for this alone. He is
trying to invent a machine which would work the tool which
smooths the surface round and round the rake handles. These
are longer than, and not so straight as mop-sticks and are,
therefore, unsuitable for turning in a lathe. This man is
doing very well and is anxious to expand ; he is very much
interested in the question of electricity.
The increase in the use of hay-making and other machinery
was mentioned in this district as a cause of the decline in
agricultural earnings from those of an earlier generation,
having led to less employment at piece-rates during the
harvest and less employment of women in the fields. Probably
the use of hay-making machinery caused the decline in the
Thatcham rake-making industry, but there is still a con-
siderable demand to be met and the industry is suitable to
an underwood district.
It)::; THi] WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
Conclusion to the Underwood Industries
It is clear that the prosperity of the Kennet Valley wood-
land industries depends on increasing and improving the
supply of underwood in the most favourably situated copses,
for on good material labour is saved and a better price
commanded, while haulage of wood in its raw state, even
over a few miles, adds seriously to the expense of working
it up. Expert attention to the woods is therefore of great
importance. Woodcraft is often said to be dying out with
the older woodmen. But this need not be. Skilful men,
if rare, can still be sought out and their intimate knowledge
of the locality can be handed on, and supplemented by the
knowledge of others with a wider outlook.
Chair-leg. Turnery and Chair-making
Timber industries fall into a different category from the
underwood industries, for the two materials are rarely
dealt with at the same works or by the same dealers. Timber
industries of the district include the making of chair -legs
and chairs, an example of wooden bowl-making, turnery for
carpenters, cabinet makers and builders, a few industries
carried on at saw-mills, and wheelwrighting and carpentry
which are considered separately in Chapter III, Part I.
Chair-leg Turnery. The beech woods of the Chilterns
provide the material for an industry which has much in
common with the underwood turnery of the Kennet valley.
Chair manufactories can be seen in various stages of industrial
development — from the primitive workshop of the woods to
the large factories at Wycombe. These factories are supplied
with a considerable proportion of their chair -legs by turners
in the surrounding villages, but they also obtain both parts
and material from abroad. In some instances not only
chair-leg turnery, but the making of whole chairs, is carried
on in village workshops ; parts, such as seats, being in
some instances supplied from a factory. But most village
turners or ' chair bodgers ' confine themselves to the making
of legs which they sell to the factories, mainly at Wycombe.
In the manufacture of chair-legs, primitive pole lathes are
still in use, and in the Wendover neighbourhood these are
still set up here and there out in the woods, the turner
building himself a warm shelter of chips and shavings with
a roof of poles and straw. As a rule, however, the turners
work in a shed at home. Young beech trees, or the thinner
CHAIR-LEG TURNERY 103
branches of larger trees which have been felled for timber,
are used for chair -legs. A double-handed saw is used for
sawing them into logs of the correct length, and the logs
are then split or ' cleft ' 1 with an axe into three or four
pieces which have to be shaped and trimmed ready for the
lathe. The lathe is home-made, being entirely of wood,
except for the iron spikes which hold the chair -leg in place,
and the nails. The string is fastened to the unfixed end of
a flexible pole above, passed several times round the chair-
leg which is fixed horizontally at a convenient height for
the cutting tool in the turner's hand, and fastened below
to a treadle, the revolutions of the chair-leg being caused
by the pressing down of the treadle and in the reverse
direction by the spring of the pole when pressure on the
treadle is released. The cutting is done only during the
downward pressure of the treadle. The lathe works on the
same principle as that of the bowl -turner on Turners Green 2
but is considerably lighter and can easily be moved and
fitted up where required. The pole is fifteen feet long, its
thick end being fixed, generally near the floor, to a structure
of timber sunk in the ground.
Beech chair-legs are used for Windsor and other in-
expensive chairs which are made in and near Wycombe.
Although the pole lathe, except for the extreme simplicity
and ease of its construction, has no apparent advantage
over a more elaborate machine, the chair -legs made in the
villages are much sought after for their superior quality,
no less than for their comparative cheapness. This supe-
riority is due to the hand-cleaving, which ensures that the
legs follow the grain of the wood. It is the practice in the
factories to saw the logs lengthways into pieces for the
lathes, and in consequence the logs are frequently cross-
grained and apt to split diagonally, or to break off at a knot
which the bench-saw goes through, whereas the axe would
have detected it and the faulty leg would have been dis-
carded.3 Unfortunately, owing to the practice of covering
woodwork with stain and varnish which hides not only the
grain of the wood but many a flaw, the public cannot tell
the difference between a faulty cross-grained leg and a
straight one, and therefore the manufacturers do not offer
1 Of. the word « cliff ' for the tool which splits osier rods into * skein '.
2 See Bowl-turning, pp. 112-114.
3 The same applies to fencing, which, now that wood is sawn at the
mills, is not nearly so strong and durable as when wood was rent or cleft
104 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
a better price for the hand-cleft legs in spite of acknowledg-
ing their superiority. Turners are in some cases installing
a small engine which can work both a saw and a lathe. It
was said that the hand-cleaving was so slow a process
compared with the turning on a power lathe that it would
not be worth while for a single-handed man to introduce
power, since his engine would be idle for a large part of his
working hours. But where two or three men are working,
engines are being put in and there is a tendency for the
turners to become chair -manufacturers on a small scale.
It would be a pity if the hand-cleaving were given up, for
the turners have had, until the recent boom, to meet
competition of large consignments of chair-legs from abroad,
and consequently the demand for their work depends
partly on its superior quality. The demand fluctuates and
they have often had no choice but to sell at the manu-
facturer's price or return home with their load unsold.
A better way would be for the firms which they supply to
advertise a stronger and better type of chair, with legs
guaranteed as hand*-cleft, which if well designed should
command a better price because of superior quality.
The necessity for organization amongst the turners is
admitted by manufacturers. A Stokenchurch manufacturer
described pre-war conditions as ' slavery ', and when this
investigation was begun during the War, the few old men
still at work said that there were then only about a sixth
of the number formerly engaged in the trade, that young
men would not learn it and no young man would come
back to it. Their prophecy has not altogether been fulfilled.
It is true that the young men usually prefer to bicycle to
work in factories where they are within easy reach, and
where the earnings, it is said, often amount to £4 a week,
but there are a certain number who have returned from
the war to home workshops and are at present doing
well.
Turners vary greatly in efficiency, and in considering the
earnings the great difference of skill must be borne in mind.
Low weekly earnings mean in some cases that the worker is
after being cross-sawn in the saw-pits. A further disadvantage of the
modern method of hauling timber from the woods is the damage caused
by great ruts, which did not occur when the timber was worked up into
comparatively light articles in the woods. There is said to be a dislike
now of allowing turners to work in the woods, owing to their propensity
for having a share of the shooting. They are reputed less honest, or
bolder, than their fathers.
CHAIR-LEG TURNERY 105
unsuitable and not that the piece-rates are too low. A boy
is often set to pick up his father's trade, not because of any
special aptitude, but becaifse the father wants assistance.
Proficiency and swiftness in turnery depend largely on
a knack in handling the tools in such a way that they do
not get blunted too quickly, and in sharpening them properly
as required. It was said in Wycombe, however, that some
of the best workers came from the adjacent villages where
earnings have been deplorably low.
The following facts are given to illustrate conditions in
a village before the War. One man used to employ four
workers turning chair-legs at 5s. a gross, and it took a man
from seven in the morning to seven at night and a half -day
on Saturday to make three gross in the week. A former
employee in this shop stated that for 21 years he never
brought home more than 12s. a week, though he worked
longer hours than farm labourers. In addition, the turners
had to find their own tools. Another turner remembered
whole families working at it and said that no young man,
i.e. who had to support a family, could live on the earnings
of the trade. Chair-legs, which used to be sold for 9s. and
10s. a gross, are now sold for 25s. By 1919 piece-rates had
risen to 13s. a gross and in 1920 14s. a gross was given ; that
is to say a man making three gross a week would earn
£1 19s. Od. or £2 2s. Od. The following figures were given
by an employer visited in 1920 :
EXPENDITURE.
£ a. d.
25 feet small beech bought by auction 1 15 0
Carting . .100
Making 4 gross legs at 14s. . . . . . . . 2 16 0
Carriage of legs at Is. Qd. a gross ...... 60
5 17 0
RECEIPTS.
£ s. d.
To 4 gross chair-legs at 34s. . ... 6 16 0
It is seldom that as many as four gross of legs can be got
out of a ' load ', i. e. 25 feet of beech. The cost of felling
is not included, and this is sometimes borne wholly by the
purchaser, sometimes half is paid by the vendor. The price
of beech before decontrol was £2 Is. 3d. per load.
A * gross ' may mean a gross of legs and half a gross of
106 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
spars or ' stretchers ' or a gross of legs and £ of a gross of
stretchers, according to the type of chair. Some have
only the front legs turned and the others cut by the bench
saw ; others have all turned and three stretchers.
In the districts visited, chair-leg turnery was usually
a whole-time industry, but this is not always the case, and
it seems that it used to alternate with seasonal work on
the farms. In some fruit districts turners go ' fruiting ' and
carry on their trade at other times.
Prospects. Even now, the earnings of chair -leg turners
are small compared with earnings in the factories, and
unless these turners can be enabled to find a better market
on the strength of the superiority of hand-cleft legs and can
get favourable terms for material owing to very close
proximity to the woods where young trees are thinned out
or older ones felled, there does not seem much chance of
survival. But there are several examples of small chair
factories being developed in villages, and it would be worth
while to encourage these enterprising craftsmen to turn out
articles of better and distinctive design and to help them
to place their products in the right market. And considering
the great difference in the cost of conveying timber even
a short distance, the haulage being often half as much as
the price of the material, and of carrying compact bundles
of chair -legs, it would be well to consider the erection of
sheds right in the woods.1
As with other wood industries there is a quantity of waste
in a turner's shop which could quite well be worked up on
his lathe for toys or for spars of cots and nursery furniture,
as is sometimes done in a factory. Assistance both in
design and in getting in touch with a market would be
necessary for this.
Chair manufacture at Stokenchurch
The chair manufacture of Stokenchurch is of interest in
an inquiry into rural industries in giving an example of
remarkable industrial development in a village with no
particular facilities except its situation in the heart of the
woods which supply the material. Owing to the excessive
felling of timber during the War, this village now has to
carry some of its timber a considerable distance, but the
small manufacturers have made the most of the boom in
1 Probably where this is done, the turners purchase the uncut timber
as it stands.
CHAIR MANUFACTURE AT STOKENCHURCH 107
trade, and also taken advantage of the labour troubles at
Wycombe to build up a connexion while the Wy combe works
were idle.
Stokenchurch is situated on the high plateau of the
South Chilterns, seven miles west of High Wycombe, three
miles up a steep hill from a branch railway line and away
from a good water-supply. The industry here is said to
be older than at Wycombe, manufacturers evidently having
moved to where coal was obtainable. Possibly owing to
the difference of climate, which is striking, there is far more
energy and enterprise here than in the low-lying villages of
the Thame valley below. Work is said to be more skilled
and earnings of turners higher. There are six chair-turners
who send legs into Wycombe as the turners in other villages
do. There are also about a dozen workshops where ' chair
stuff ' or parts of chairs are made, and a good deal of this
is sent direct to towns in the north of England. There are
seven chair factories and five saw-mills. Only one tractor
is in use for haulage, and this is inadequate. In the factories
steam-driven lathes and other machines have replaced the
hand appliances almost entirely. The number of employees
is about 250 men and 12 women, and there are about 50
women outworkers engaged in caning and rushing. The
employers have for the most part risen from the ranks of
the workers, and several workshops are run by separate
families, the women as well as the men sharing in the work.
As these are often under -capitalized the system leads to
serious undercutting of prices, for it often happens that the
stock must be sold at any price to provide for the family's
needs. There is a South Bucks Timber Merchants' Associa-
tion, but employees are slow to co-operate. It is said,
however, that circumstances will soon force them to do so,
the strongest factor being the organization of the workers
which is being instigated from Wycombe. The workers
benefit by the organization at Wycombe, for they work
under the conditions now in force there. They, have a 48-
hour week and no Saturday work.
There is a market for parts and for chairs in the north of
England. Chair factories in Lancashire are offshoots of the
Wycombe industry. It was found better to make up the chairs
near the market and to send parts by rail, the finished
articles being liable to serious damage in transit. Chair -legs
and parts are also made in Wales.
The question of time versus piece rates is a vexed one
108 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
owing to the great variation in the capacity of the workers.
The following time rates prevail (June 1920) :
Circular and band sawyers . . * Is. Id., Is. 8d., Is. 9d. per hour
Sawyer's mates . . . . Is. 2d., Is. 4d. „ „
Yardmen Is. 2d., Is. 3d. „ „
Chair framers . . . . .Is. Id., Is. Sd. „ „
The weekly earnings of piece-workers vary greatly, but £3
may be taken as a minimum. Many of the ' chair stuff '
makers work by time and are paid from Is. 4d. to 2s. an
hour. Women usually work at home, caning and ' matting '
i. e. rushing chair seats. The cane seats are mostly the same
size and the workers are paid 6d. per seat as compared with
2d. in pre-war days. Rushing, which is more difficult and
dirty work, varies from 9d. to Is. a seat as compared with
3%d. to Qd. before the War. It takes a quick worker rather
more than an hour to cane a chair, and not many years
ago Id. a chair was given. A few chair-caners are still to
be found in other villages. They supply their own cane,
and the cane now obtainable is poor in quality and almost
prohibitive in price. This industry is no exception to other
rural industries in the low earnings of the women as com-
pared with the increased rates now obtainable by men.
Women, however, are accepted in the same union (Furnish-
ing Trades) with men and there is no reason why conditions
should not improve. There was at the time of investigation
no Industrial Council or Interim Reconstruction Committee
in the Furnishing Trades.
With regard to the material, the following quotation is
taken from the letter of a resident who supplied most of
the foregoing information : ' As far as I can learn there is
no science applied in the growing of beech locally. The
timber merchants object to using planted beech for some
.reason, so that the beech nuts are allowed to germinate
naturally.' Some planting, however, has been done recently.
' The woodmen cut ivy if it grows on the trees, and often
cut down trees infected with " white disease ", leaving
them in the wood as they fall, which is not a very drastic
remedy. It is very surprising to find so little attention given
to the culture of beech in a district whose very existence
depends on marketable timber. Felling of course goes on
in the autumn and winter. Trees are marked in lots and
sold by auction per lot. A load is 25 cubic feet (a one-horse
load) but the number of loads per lot varies considerably,
CHAIR MANUFACTURE AT STOKENCHURCH 109
and a great deal depends on the condition of the timber
in a given area. I believe it is usual to thin out saleable
timber in rotation once in seven years. The time of growth
varies because of aspect, and some timber merchants use
stuff fairly small. There is a danger lest in thinning the
woods and felling timber, other trees should be injured at
the top and branch out. This causes knots to occur. Injury
is almost inevitable where trees of all ages are together.
The small trees when thinned out are bought by the chair-
leg turners. They do not have to pay the whole sum at
once ; in some cases they fetch the timber as they want it
and pay as they fetch it.'
The Chiltern woods are riot felled and replanted, but are
thinned out in rotation usually every seven years, to allow
light and air to reach the growing trees. Free growth is
important, and used to be greatly assisted by grubbing up
old stumps. This helped to cultivate the soil for the beech
mast, and got rid of the harbourage which rotting wood
affords to pests. It is said that woodmen will not do it
now. It is hard work, and machinery such as the ' jack '
used for lifting osier stools would be too heavy to be
practical.
The wood is usually sold by auction, sometimes by
tender. Difficulty was found many years ago in getting
the money from buyers, therefore the bulk of the business
was put into the hands of auctioneers. It is not realized
by the turners, for whom the price of wood has doubled,
how heavy the landlord's expenses have become, in taxation
as well as in labour.
The woodlands give employment to a number of wood-
men who have generally been paid the agricultural wage
with a cottage rent free and firewood, and piece rates for
felling. The average rate per load of 25 cubic feet was
Is. in 1914 and has risen to 2s. 6d. or 3s. Sometimes wood-
men are also keepers, or they are employed on the estate
in thatching, repairing fences, and odd jobs, and in harvest-
ing according to the season. They are also employed in
tying up ' fagots ', the local name for loose heaps of ' tops J,
being twigs and pieces too small for turnery. There is at
the present time great difficulty in disposing of these for
firewood, because the woodmen are asking piece rates for
tying up bundles which will bring them earnings equivalent
to what they can get for felling, although it is not hard work.
Thus, in spite of the need for fuel, prices are prohibitive. It
110 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
would seem worth while to employ women or girls for this.
The value of the fagots, or heaps of tops, is included in the
estimate on which the timber is put up to auction.1 This
is made by a woodman on the estate ; after sale, the lots
are valued and payment made accordingly.
Prospects. There was much criticism both in Wy combe
and in Stokenchurch of the system of rapid massed pro-
duction of a very poor quality which is carried on in many of
the factories. It is considered uneconomic, and it was thought
that the boom was already beyond its height. The discon-
tent prevalent in Wycombe is attributed to many of the
workers being engaged on scamped and hurried work in
which they can find no satisfaction, and that this kind of
production is demoralizing. No thorough investigation
was made in Wycombe, but the class of work varies greatly,
and this criticism does not apply throughout, some of
the work being of high reputation. In Stokenchurch
the chief products are the cheaper sorts of Windsor and
bedroom chairs. Some employers realize the urgency of
improving the quality of the production, yet little attention
is given to design. It was noticed in many instances that
manufacturers are intent upon copying each other's models
and grabbing one another's market, or reproducing old
styles, and that it seldom occurs to them to attempt to
forestall the public demand by producing something original
related to a real need. For instance, many workers in
Wycombe are engaged on elaborate processes of staining
and French polishing for * Jacobean ' reproduction. Good
solid chairs could be produced with a great reduction in the
labour and sold at a reasonable price if more attention were
paid to the need for strength and comfort and less to un-
necessary decoration. If some of the firms which now turn
out quantities of flimsy kitchen and bedroom chairs were
to concentrate on good quality in material and workman-
ship, there would be a far better chance for steady develop-
ment. It seemed that the market for the staple products
was likely to be glutted before long.
The chief needs in Stokenchurch itself are for transport
and for a water -supply. A scheme for the latter is now being
considered, and the question of a light railway has long been
1 Local dealers are said to have made large profits out of buyers for
the government, who knew little of the value of timber. The traditional
yard of this neighbourhood is 37 inches ; by re-measuring with a yard of
36 inches, extra profit can be made.
CHAIR MANUFACTURE AT STOKENCHURCH Ill
under discussion. Some employers believe that this would
pay. But the hills would make it extremely expensive, and
a development of lorry traffic appears more likely.
While there is some attempt in Stokenchurch to utilize
waste in making up small articles, there is scope for a well
managed toy industry in connexion with the chair factories
which would give employment to girls. The bodies, legs,
and stands of children's wooden horses are made here. They
go elsewhere, as brushwood goes to brush factories, to have
their manes and tails and coloured stripes added. Their
shape is none the less acceptable to children because it is
suggested by the machinery for chair legs and broom-heads.
In Chesham, where there are many brushwood factories,
wooden spades and other toys are made from the waste ;
but here too there are pieces left over, of suitable shapes for
an ingenious toy-maker to fashion, while wooden toy-
makers find it difficult to obtain material for their needs.
The neighbourhood of chair and brushwood works are
obviously favourable to toy-making.
Here it may be remarked that many of the English toys
fail because they are made for grown-up people rather than
for children. The feeling is to a child as important as the
appearance, and the firmness and roundness of a turned
article is better than the flat sharpness of fret -work. More
attention should be paid to the machinery for ' roughing
out ' toys which can be finished by hand. Too much hand
work puts the toys beyond the means of most parents, and
children do not want their toys to be too precious. An
artist who is extremely successful in making painted toys,
owing to her imaginative designs and practical workmanship,
explained that much of the hand work is so mechanical that
it would lose nothing in being done by machine, while the
worker would gain much by being relieved of the drudgery.
More attention should be paid to the possibilities of the
small-power engine combined with handicraft. There is
a great deal of work for the art schools in teaching practical
design in relation to trade demands, and special study of
possibilities for rural wood industries might do much to
encourage good production. The other great need in a wood-
land area is for a organization for marketing the products
and for keeping producers in touch with the needs of the
market.
112 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
Other Turnery
A Bowl Turner. On Bucklebury Common, not two miles
from Thatcham, turnery may still be seen in a very primitive
form. For generations the family of Lailey here and at
Chievely have been bowl turners, and at Wellhouse there
was a group of bowl turners a generation ago.1 It is to be
feared that the industry will die out and nothing be left
but the name of Turners Green, for George Lailey is the
only turner left who makes elm bowls and he cannot get
a younger man to help him. When first visited his mother
was helping him to saw blocks of elm wood for the bowls,
but as a rule he now gets this done at a saw-mill.
Material. Logs are cut so that the round side shall form
the outside of the biggest bowl which is roughly hacked
into shape with an axe, and then the inside is scooped out
on his lathe in one piece. A succession of bowls are thus
cut from one block, one inside another, with hardly any
waste. Even the small piece in the centre will make a peg-
top. Bowls, he said, are turned from poplar wood in the
North, but they are shallower, and all the material inside
a bowl is wasted. Owing to the economy in timber of
Lailey's method, he has had large Government orders for
bowls used as ladles in munition works. While still under
army age he was exempted as indispensable.
Trade: He is now (November 1919) too busy on a Govern-
ment contract to undertake private orders, and much
regrets being single-handed. He has a pony-cart and has
to fetch his timber and take his bowls to the station. He
sells to Harrods, the Army and Navy Stores, Whiteley's, and
to private customers. Trade is good, and though he has
raised his prices, the buyer at a London shop said he could
get a better price if he asked for it. Apart from the useful-
ness of these bowls for washing up silver, many people
preferring them to enamel because there is no fear of
scratching, their beauty and durability would ensure their
popularity amongst people interested in handicraft, and the
buyer agreed that a shop which specialized in such things
would be more suitable than general stores. The work on
the bigger bowls is very strenuous, for the tool which cuts
them on the lathe has to be pressed against the body to
keep it in position while the bowl revolves. It was stated
that engineers have often been to see whether machinery
could be used, but so far without success, because all
1 See Lawrence, The Country Home.
WOOD TURNERY 113
other methods would grind the whole of the interior to
waste.
The Craftsman. This bowl turner is an example of the
craftsmen who do not reckon values merely in pounds,
shillings, and pence, and though in many cases loyalty to
other workmen makes them careful not to undercut prices,
tradition is so strong in them that it almost goes against
conscience to charge more than the customary prices of
their predecessors. Lailey is said to be doing well, but he
has his holding and his common rights, and no wife or
family to support. In cases like this, a Handicrafts Associa-
tion can do valuable work by making the craftsman known
to people who are willing to pay for art and workmanship.
He can turn about four dozen bowls a day, or, with sawing
and chopping, about twelve dozen a week. The price varies
according to size — from 3s. to 3d. A brother-in-law, who
had been gassed, tried to help him for a time but could not
learn, and found it too hard work. Making the smaller
sizes, however, is not hard work, and it is quite possible
that by getting a better price he could induce a younger
man to take it up. He also makes platters and candlesticks.
The Pole Lathe. One of the two lathes in his workshop
has been in use for over a hundred years. The ' mandrill ',
to which the wood for the bowls is fixed, is made to revolve
by means of a treadle and a flexible pole, fixed at one end.
From the loose end, near the roof of the shed, a leather
strap passes downwards round the mandrill, and again
downwards to the treadle to which it is fixed. In pressing
down the treadle, the mandrill revolves, and the pole is
bent downwards ; in releasing it, the pole springs up again
to its natural position, turning the mandrill in the reverse
direction. The turner stands in a pit, working the treadle
and grasping the tool which cuts the bowl as it revolves.
A pole lathe could easily be constructed by boys in a work-
shop, and bowl turning would be an interesting addition to
the curriculum in a woodwork class. Sometimes a pole
will last as long as ten years. The tools are simple, that
chiefly in use consisting mainly of a long, narrow piece
of bent iron, tipped with steel, which must be kept sharp,
fixed in a wooden handle.1
1 The beauty of the country where this unique craft is carried on
cannot be forgotten. Bucklebury Common stretches for three miles
along the top of a ridge, and the scattered homesteads of the commoners
seem to grow out of the dells and dips of its surface no less than the
woods which run down the gullies and cover the bottoms on either
2415 TT
114 THE WOODLAND INDUSTRIES
Other Turneries. No other turners have been found in
villages except the chair-leg turners of the Thame and
Chiltern district and the few underwood turners, though
occasionally a carpenter has a lathe. There are turners
for cabinet-makers and builders at Oxford, Beading, and
Banbury. As a rule, there is not enough turnery for a
single builder or carpenter to keep a lathe and a turner
constantly occupied. In Oxford there is only one turner
whose son is helping him, and it was said that there is room
for another good one. At Reading a man was doing well
in a miscellaneous trade, mostly for furniture makers.
Repairs are sent by furniture shops to the turners. This
man had worked as a journeyman, and not being satisfied
with the pay, set up for himself. He has three or four
lathes worked by gas power. At Banbury, besides the
turners employed in furniture works, a turner is at work
on a primitive lathe to which his father was apprenticed
about 1840 at Brackley. He is an excellent craftsman,
intensely interested in his craft, who likes to work out his
own designs. He is also a good carpenter, carver, inlayer,
and French polisher. He * does up ' antique furniture for
dealers. He is an example of the men who easily become
the prey of the dealers, and in spite of the great demand
for old furniture are scantily paid for their highly skilled
work and artistic talent. He turns anything on his small
lathe, from a wagon-wheel hub to a minute chessman, in a
dark cottage room, crowded with bits of furniture and
woodwork.
Some means ought to be found for registering these
original and talented craftsmen, and putting them into
touch with associations for the crafts, which might have
local branches and depots linked up to their central
depots.
It is not uncommon for village blacksmiths and carpenters
whose main work tends to be confined more and more to
repairs, to do good original and decorative work, and there
hand. In May the common is ablaze with gorse. Dark clumps of fir
stand tall above this stretch of gold. The orchards are white with
blossom, and in the woods, rich dark faggots lie in a sea of bluebells.
Here and there a woodman is seen sorting the stakes and trimming them
with a sickle. His rhythmic movements as he works up the line of
faggots add to the beauty of the scene. Not only in the radiance of
spring is this country beautiful. We may contrast the environment of
these woodland crafts with any industrial surroundings, and ask whether
they are not worth preserving as a national tradition which may yet be
a source of inspiration to workers.
OTHER WOOD INDUSTRIES 115
is a need for better organization to bring rural craftsmen into
touch with one another and with purchasers, and to open
the way for mutual instruction and encouragement between
craftsmen in town and country alike.
Other Wood Industries
In saw -mills dealing with local timber, it is not unusual
to find that wheels, wheelbarrows and other articles are
made on the spot. In many saw-mills the only manufacture
i is that of nail boxes for iron works as a means of using
waste. This is an easy way of disposing of it, for it is
unskilled work, and is done by boys and girls with auto-
matic machinery for the sawing, but it bears a very small
! profit as there 'is much competition. In others toys are
j. made. The difficulty lies in teaching the boys and girls
I who are employed, and very little is attempted in this way.
i In some temporary saw-mills set up to deal with a surplus
I of timber felled for war purposes, girls were being employed
in making boxes and fire-lighters. It was said that girls
i employed at bench saws got on well because the noise
prevented talking ; if they were painting they had to be
put far apart. It was also said that they were not usually
satisfactory on a process which required skill in the adjust-
ment of the machinery, though they did well on automatic
work. At Inkpen an interesting business has been built
up close to the woods. The shortage of houses, and scarcity
and expense of lodgings made expansion difficult, and this
firm would welcome some means of transport for labour
from surroundings villages. This would be costly if borne
by a single firm alone.
Considerable attention was being given to methods of
jdealing with the quantities of sawdust accumulating in the
woods. Some firms had made fire-lighters, but doubt was
expressed as to the market for these. Engines are being
advertised which will consume all ' offal ', and some of the
engines used locally have furnaces which will burn sawdust.
In most cases the fuel for the engines is the waste wood
which accumulates in a saw-mill. In some cases valuable
timber is being used as firewood which could be utilized in
a, by-industry.
It is difficult in the uncertainty of the market to-day to
get any clear opinion as to the prospects in wooden by-
industries.1
1 See Part I, chap. 3, pp. 45, 48, for Village Wheelwrights and
Oarpenters.
H2
CHAPTER II
OSIER CULTIVATION AND WILLOW BASKET-
MAKING
(a) Osier Beds in Berks, and Oxon.
ALTHOUGH the survey is in no sense complete, the following
facts, collected in the spring of 1918, may be of use for
comparison with the conditions in other districts. No books
are kept, but the figures given appear, by comparison with
the extracts given below from other sources, to be approxi-
mately correct.
Description of Beds
The most extensive, with an area of about 150 acres, not
all lying together, are near Newbury. The Paringdon beds
are worked by basket-makers who have moved to Walling-
ford. In two cases, sewage works have been found planted
with osiers, one of them seventeen years ago. At Chinnor,
beds have been given up in favour of keeping ducks, but
one grower stated that the two industries could be combined
if the ducks were kept off the beds during the two months of
sprouting. Farmers own beds, or have waste places or
hedgerows planted with osiers, and sell the rods standing to
the local growers and ^sometimes to the merchants. Large
quantities used to be brought in this way to Oxford and
distributed over the country. The opinion of the basket-
makers is unanimous as to the neglect and consequent poor
quality of these rods. They explain that the art is not
understood, the wrong kinds are planted, set too thinly and
in too swampy ground. Some allotment holders plant their
plots with osiers and consider it profitable to do so. The
Kennet beds have suffered greatly by the bursting of the
river bank ; a considerable amount of produce has been
wasted owing to the heavy floods preventing the cutting
until too late. Contrary to the practice of the old-fashioned
growers, osiers are grown very sucessfully away from streams
where the soil is heavy enough to hold moisture ; the soil
being less swampy makes it easier to work. Further, rods
grown in swamps are apt to be too pithy, and to become
riddled with worm. This was said to be the drawback of
LABOUR 117
rest-country rods ; midland rods were better, but Grantham
>ds, with artificial irrigation, the best. The Lavingdon
grower stated that the small Berkshire beds were so neglected
as to be difficult to clear and that it would be advisable to
plant new sets on new ground.
Foreign Sources
Rods and osiers are imported from Holland, Belgium,
ranee, and the West Indies. The French excel in the
jultivation of the light osiers for fine work. It is specially
iportant that they should be fine, smooth, and straight.
Markets
Osiers were bought up by the Government during the war
'or shell-cases. The one large grower in the district sells
mostly to a big London firm ; lately he has also sold to
iSt. Dunstan's, and smaller quantities in Cornwall and in
other parts of the country ; a Leicester firm is now buying
up rods in this neighbourhood. The grower's price to local
basket-makers was stated to be £1 a bolt. The usual method
is to sell per 80 bolts ; the weight varies, but roughly
averages a ton. He had been selling at £56 a ton, 4 sizes
mixed, and found on calculation that this was equivalent
to £75 or £80 a ton for the best sorts. He sells them ready-
peeled for the most part.
Labour
The same grower employs about twenty men, the labour
being fairly constant through the year. He also keeps a
farm on which the men do a certain amount of work. The
slackest times on the beds are August and September ;
thus labour is set free for the harvest. The labour required
is estimated at one man to ten acres by two growers in
Berkshire. It may be noted in this connexion that this is
a woodland district where there is a good deal of varied
labour. The labour question is acute, and the difficulties
are partly attributed to the lack of houses, but more generally
to the upheaval of the labour market by the wages given to
both sexes for government work regardless of skill and of
what the particular industry can support. Employers state
that they can afford to pay wages for work on a Government
contract which they cannot afford on a commercial one.
The sorting, which is skilled work, is done by women ; the
peeling is usually done by women and children.
118 OSIER CULTIVATION
Wages
All are paid by piece-rates. The employer interviewed
stated that before the war a good man could earn 35s.
a week, and about £2 10-s. Od. now ; an exceptionally clever
man had earned £2 10s. Od. before the war and was earning
about £5 now. Other growers reckoned the earnings as
about £2 now. Peeling is now 3d. a bundle ; a quick worker
can do three in an hour. Cutting is about 5d. to 6d. a bolt
(6 bundles). The old-fashioned basket -makers used to
employ children to peel with a knife instead of the peelers'
tool ; they cannot now get this labour, the pay apparently
being no longer any inducement while women can secure good
wages elsewhere. A good sorter, a woman, could earn about
£1 a week working short time (about 10 to 4).
Prices
Selling prices were said by the local basket -makers to
have advanced 500 per cent. One man quoted an advance
from £25 before the war to £120 now.
Prospects
These prices were admitted as sufficient to support the
above wages, but growers expect a fall. The largest grower
looked to the expansion of his farm when prices should fall.
The question of machinery arouses interest and is dealt with
in Ellmore's book,1 but at present the beds in this district are
too swampy for its use. It may here be noted that an engineer
in this locality had been approached as to the purchase of a
government tractor, but had declined, and the Newbury engi-
neer who had bought it was expected by a progressive farmer
to lose on the transaction owing to the long period of idleness
during the wet spring. A small grower in the same place
who had, contrary to the advice of the local growers, planted
away from the water with excellent results, was speculating
as to the development of small ploughs and of machinery for
small holdings and osier beds. He preferred to cultivate
a small bed single-handed with occasional help from one
man than to go to the trouble of employing labour.
Retailers expect a fall in prices and give warning that at
one time there was a slump in osiers.
1 The Cultivation of Osiers and Willows, by W. P. Ellmore, Dent, 1919.
COST OF PLANTING NEW BEDS
119
Estimated cost of planting new beds
A purely speculative estimate was given of the cost per
acre of planting 150 acres :
An acre would cost £24 to dig at 3s. a pole. (In the present state of
the labour market men would not dig at any price) .
22,000 sets (best rods) at 10$. per 1,000
Levelling and planting ........
24
11
6
41
The following extract from Mr. Ellmore's book shows the
approximate cost of osier-growing per acre :
First Year.
Ploughing old turf per acre
19,360 cuttings, with carriage and packing
Planting if let by piece
First year hoeing four times
Rent and rates ....
Cutting and carrying of .
Interest on outlay ....
Second Year.
Rent and rates ....
Hoeing four times ....
Cutting and carrying off at Is. 6d. and 10s
a ton .....
Incidentals of filling in plants that failed
5 per cent, interest on first year's outlay
Third Year.
Rent and rates
Hoeing three times .
Cutting and carrying off .
Incidentals of filling in &c.
5 per cent, on first year's outlay .
Pre-war.
£ s. d.
400
15 0 0
150
2 10 0
1 15 0
1 0 0
1 5 0
26 15 0
1 15 0
2 10 0
1 10 0
15 0
1 5 0
7 15 0
1 15 0
1 10 0
250
10 0
150
750
1918.
£ s. d.
4 15 0
19 10 0
1 10
3 10
1 15
1 5
1 12
33 17 0
1 15
3 10
200
17 6
1 12 0
9 14 6
1 15 0
2 12 6
300
12 6
1 12 0
9 12 0
Net cash results as shown thus work out as follows, taking
present-day figures 1917-18 as a basis for calculation :
First Year
Second „
Third
Expenditure.
£ s. d.
33 17 0
9 14 0
9 12 0
53 3 0
Receipts.
£
8
32
56
96 5 0
120 OSIER CULTIVATION
Extract from Encyclopaedia of Agriculture. Green & Sons.
1908. Report on an island between Kew and Richmond
taken from the Quarterly Journal of Forestry for April.
1907.
Expenditure.
£ s. d. £ s. d.
Rent . . 15 0 0 By sale of 60 bolts of
Rates and taxes . 100 first size rods at 8s.
Cutting bolts at 6s. a per bolt. . 24 0 0
score . . 22 10 0 By value of 5,000 bas-
Sorting 750 bolts at 15s. kets at 15s. per dozen 312 10 0
a score . . . 976
Peeling 560 bolts at
lOd. a bolt . 23 6 8
Making 5,000 baskets
at 7%d. each . . 156 5 0
Planting 5,000 cuttings
at 2s. 6rf. per 1,000 . 12 6
Weeding ... 5 0 0 336 10 0
Trenching. ..384 236 10 0
236 10 0 Net profit . 100 0 0
The land in question was about 6J acres, rented at £15.
When taken over in 1900 it was planted with old stools,
but since then planted with about 30,000 cuttings.
A crop grown at Mount Sorrel, Leicestershire, which turned
off 7 tons to the acre realized £8 per ton in 1918 when cut
and bundled as grown.
(6) Basket-Making
District Investigated.
Within a radius of about 25 miles of Oxford the following
basket -makers have been visited, and except for one or
two men working for retail shops the list is believed to be
exhaustive :
1 at Caversham 1 at Cholsey
1 „ Twyford 1 „ Wantage
3 „ Reading 1 ,, lUynsham
2 ,, Inkpen 1 „ Chipping Norton
1 ,, Midgham 1 „ Chipping Campden
* 1 ,, Thame 1 ,, Oxford
1 ,, Wallingford 1 ,, Banbury
also the following retail shops which keep or kept before the
war one or two basket -makers at work either on the premises
TRADE ORGANIZATION 121
or in their own homes, in this case generally buying all they
could make :
3 at Oxford (one the Blind Depot ; one an ironmongery
company ; one a basket and rope shop).
2 „ Newbury.
2 „ Reading.
It will be seen that the industry is carried on by the
riverside of the Thames and its tributaries. The most
thriving makers are those who still have access to local
rods ; if they do not actually lease beds of their own it is
the custom to buy the rods standing and to cut them them-
selves as a rule. The most thriving also have retail shops
of their own, though in four cases (at Oxford, Wallingford,
Thame, and Chipping Campden) they have a wider connexion
as well. Before attempting to classify local makers, it is
advisable to give a brief account of the national organization
of the industry, for nowhere within the investigated area
is the industry at present conducted on a large scale, eight
being the greatest number quoted as employed in one work-
shop (at Oxford) before the war, though several would take
on more men if they could get them and the material.
Trade Organization and Description of Local Firms
Although there are large workshops where over a hundred
are employed, the industry keeps, owing to the absence of
machinery, to the somewhat primitive type in which an
apprentice can, if he have the opportunity, become a master
man. The small employer at any rate is a man who
has served his apprenticeship, and has worked and usually
still works on his plank ; he usually also has a know-
ledge of osier cultivation, though where work is done
on a large scale, osier cultivators, basket-makers, retailers,
and sometimes wholesale merchants form as a rule separ-
ate businesses. In Liverpool, London, and Birmingham,
there are firms which carry on both basket-making and
wholesale dealing in rods. Since basket-making is an
industry which requires little capital it is common for
journeymen to set up for themselves. In the towns, these
men get their osiers from the big firms to whom they under-
take to sell their products ; they dare not sell in the open
market lest they should be boycotted for material . Frequently
they fail, and ' go back on to the plank ', that is, once more
become journeymen. They are called ' garret ' men and
122 BASKET-MAKING
this system is disapproved of by the trade organizations as
conducive to undercutting of prices. A good workman
setting up in a town will be taken on again if he fails, but
in the country failure is more disastrous, because there are
not the same chances of starting again, and notoriety,
either for good or evil, is more easily won. Rural basket-
makers are also dependent on big firms for their supply of
osiers, at any rate in this district where the small local
beds are almost useless. They benefit by their connexion
with the big firms by being able to procure kinds of baskets
which they cannot make ; many a small shop is supplied
in this way, and a basket-maker becomes a retailer ; occa-
sionally he gives up making and becomes a retailer only.
It is possible to classify the local makers roughly into
the following groups :
(1) Those who make for local farmers, &c. only, taking
their wares round to the farms and coal merchants, or who
work mostly or entirely for a retail shop in the market
town. Of these there are two old men in a village where
there used to be osier beds ; three brothers who have to
pay 305. a load for the carriage of rods from Guildford and
Shrivenham &c. and drive a cart to all the farms within
30 miles ; a clever and original odd-jobber who started two
or three years ago having taught himself, and does wooding
and allotment cultivation, &c., in his spare time, has lately
taken on an allotment in very bad condition at a rental of
65., planted with osiers, which he hopes will yield him some
material until he can plant and get a return. He sells
mostly to coal merchants on the Oxford station. He has
recently married and is hopeful of being able to make his
way. His case is unique in this district, all the others
having been duly apprenticed or having learnt from their
fathers. (He picked up carpentry in the same way, making
his own tools, and makes mechanical toys of old watches.)
The three brothers mentioned above have all been in the Army,
but prefer independence and small earnings by continuing
their father's connexion to better pay elsewhere. They have
relations in the trade at Worcester. They own a few osiers,
having land of their own, the rest they buy by the acre from
the farmers, &c., and cut themselves. They could not afford
to employ labour at the present rates, as it would cost them
double what it would produce, though they or their father
used to employ a man from time to time, probably of the
vagrant class. Of those working for retailers, one is blind,
in Oxford, another at Inkpen prefers the regularity and
TRADE ORGANIZATION 123
saving of trouble in spite of lower prices. (For coal baskets
retailed at 2s. 6d. he received Is. I0d.).
(2) Those who follow a second calling ; e.g., three were
publicans and preferred the second calling — two having
entirely given up basket -making — one of whom at Abingdon
admitted that there was a very good opening now in the
place, and was going to assist the newly established ex-
soldier, trained at St. Dunstan's with advice as to marketing.
All agree that basket-making has been very badly paid,
that they have had to work long hours to make a living,
and several have compared the earnings unfavourably to
the agricultural wage, assigning the cause generally to the
cheap, though generally inferior, foreign baskets. But from
the evidence of the retailers, and of the more successful type
of basket -maker to be described below, it appears that the
poverty and depression of these men is partly due to lack
of skill ; instead of serving a thorough apprenticeship, they
have picked up from their fathers possibly one kind of
basket only, depression and insufficient livelihood have
reacted on their work, and the decline of local osier-growing
and lack of means to acquire land for beds of their own,
has put them at a disadvantage. The price of small quanti-
ties of rods from a distance is prohibitive, and in this con-
nexion it may be remarked that two London merchants who
import largely, attributed the rural maker's poverty to this
cause and strongly advocated the cultivation of local beds
for local use. Also through sentiment, no less than through
fear of losing old customers they have failed to raise their
prices even in the war scarcity in ratio to the increased
cost of material. Hence they use poor material and turn
out poor work.
(3) A third type are those who own their retail shops and
also own or lease beds. A comparison of this type with the
others shows under what conditions basket -making can
flourish in rural places. First, they have a shop where they
can show good work to advantage. The Oxford, Thame, and
Wallingford baskets are of striking quality. Secondly, they
know the trade thoroughly and can turn their hands to all
kinds of work, including chairs, side-cars, and original
designs, undertaking domestic as well as agricultural work.
In several cases their connexion has extended for some
distance ; one man said he had refused a good order from
Co vent Garden owing to lack of labour last year. Thirdly,
even though they invariably have to supplement their own
osiers by buying, if they can buy them standing they can
124 BASKET-MAKING
cut them properly. One of the best makers, also an osier-
grower, stated that it paid him better to do the cutting,
peeling, and making all himself (with his father, brother, and
two journeymen) rather than employ women who were
paid 3s. a day for peeling, because the men could do very
much more in a day. As a rule peeling and sorting are
piece-work. Fourthly, it is evident that the absence of
imported rods has put the osier-grower, who is a capitalist,
at an advantage over the small maker with no beds, especially
since the Government has bought up large quantities of
rods for shell-cases.
(4) One man belongs to a slightly different type, since he
makes agricultural and fruit baskets only, chiefly for the
Midland fruit growers ; he employs six men, and would take
six more to start a school. He believes in keeping one man
to one kind of work. Other rural employers state that this
means slightly quicker work and therefore higher pay, and
in agricultural work it tends to cheaper production, but for
local markets the power of meeting all needs seems more
important than the slight gain of time. Local masters at
any rate are agreed that apprentices should learn the whole
trade and then choose their own line. In the big firms,
however, they receive instruction from a skilled workman
who probably keeps to one class of work, though not entirely
to a particular kind of basket.
Markets and Competition
In the Covent Garden market there is keen competition
for baskets with Holland. The Dutch are said to have
flooded the English market with rods some twenty -five
years ago, with the result that the English beds were
neglected. Then they ceased sending rods to England owing
to ah embargo on their export by the Dutch Government,
but sent baskets instead. Covent Garden merchants own
.baskets which are sent down to the country fruit and
vegetable growers to fill, because baskets owned by big
merchants are more easily traced and less liable to get lost
than if they are the property of a countryman. Whole
fruit crops are sold by farmers to merchants who undertake
the picking. A similar tendency is seen in Birmingham
where fruit-dealers send baskets down to the Evesham
district. Even in the Midlands competition in * gardeners'
baskets ' from Holland is felt, in spite of the expense of over-
land carriage. Thus the stimulation of local osier produc-
tion is recommended particularly by Midland basket -makers
TRADE ORGANIZATION 125
who wish to keep the Midland markets for the English
industry. Many Evesham growers, however, own their
baskets. Owing to the tendency for baskets to be made
where they will be sold, the trade is to some extent con-
centrated in certain big towns. Baskets are sold in large
quantities to factories, shops, laundries, coal merchants,
and for domestic use. Basket-work also includes the making
of cane and wicker furniture of all kinds. Therefore with
gardeners' baskets also bought in towns, the town market
becomes more important than the rural one. There is no
export trade in English baskets.
Organization of Employers and Employed
The Employers' Association came into existence some
three years ago, since when each of the four associations
affiliated to it have greatly increased their membership, 'and
a fifth association for the West of England has been formed.
The Midland makers appear to have been the moving spirits
in organization. Nottingham is the chief Midland basket-
making centre. The workers are organized in five unions,
some of which are of old standing. In 1918 an Interim
Industrial Council was formed, the working of which appears
to give great satisfaction both to employers and employed.
Organization does not appear so far greatly to have
affected the rural basket -makers, at any rate not directly.
The most go-ahead men are considering whether to join the
Midland Association and are likely to do so ; these are men
returned from the army. One is awaiting information
before establishing himself in his mother's business ; a man
near the Evesham osier beds and fruit districts is an
enthusiastic member of this association and spoke with
great satisfaction of the Whitley Council. The better
prospects in the towns, no doubt largely attributable to
trade-union organization, have been drawing the more
enterprising and skilled journeymen away from the country,
leaving the local work to be done by a single-handed maker
or by the members of a family, with occasional help from
a vagrant labourer of a type who has cast discredit on the
trade. Itinerant workers have, however, often been of
a better type, receiving travelling money from their unions
and moving according to the demand for work. One of the
local masters was a travelling journeyman of this type
before he bought his business. He now has two apprentices
at work, one deaf and dumb, and the other with defective
sight ; he has more work than he can do and would employ
1 26 BASKET-MAKING
two or three good journeymen if he could get them, or would
take apprentices, male or female, if properly bound. He
keeps no accounts, but by working long hours he appears
to be making something over two pounds a week in spite of
time he spends in taking his wares to the local markets by
rail, and to the farm sales. His prices are very low ; he
does not care to raise them to old customers. He does all
kinds of work, designs baskets, and conceived the ingenious
idea of reseating chairs with split osier when cane was
scarce. He had bought so-called 'African' osiers from
Liverpool at £70 a ton, paying heavily for the carriage.
They were of excellent quality with little waste. He was
in the habit of buying in Birmingham. Not being near
beds, and not having much space, he prefers to buy ready-
peeled for white work. The business was formerly owned
by a man who used to keep twenty-three or four basket-
makers in the district at work, including two at Oxford, who
subsequently set up retail shops for themselves. This man
was a merchant and used to sell baskets all over the country,
mostly ' pots '. The rods were bought from a riverside
merchant at Oxford.
The Demand for Labour
The shortage of labour is hampering the town and rural
employers alike. The President of the Employers' Federa-
tion attributes the scarcity to the too stringent restrictions
in the number of apprentices allowed by the unions per
journeyman. Through the Industrial Council these regula-
tions have recently been altered and more apprentices
allowed. * I Where more than a hundred journeymen are
employed there is no restriction. In the rural areas the
shortage is put down to inadequate prices, cheap foreign
baskets and low pay. A rural basket- maker, approached
as to whether he would teach soldiers, said he had declined
on the grounds that it would not be worth the soldier's
while to learn. But the more enterprising type of master
craftsman described above would gladly train more men
(and in one case women) if he could get the material. In
Oxford a rapid and skilful maker of chairs and all kinds of
basket work asked to be mentioned as being willing to
undertake to train thirty soldiers in basket -making and
osier cultivation, and said that there was a good opening
for a basket-factory in Oxford. He believes in training
men for the whole industry, and was anxious to be approached
by the Government in the matter. Two other good crafts-
LABOUR 127
men were willing to undertake training, but a warning was
given by a prominent employer which shows that the trade-
union regulation of apprenticeship is due to the fear of
half -trained labour lowering the standard of the industry.
The apprenticeship system, whereby the teacher profits
financially according to the progress of his apprentice, is
deemed to make for sound and thorough training. There
is reason to hope, however, that the trade will not put
serious obstacles in the way of the rural employer in this
or in other matters, and in any case, the local cultivation
of his material would tend to freedom as would the local
market for his products.
The opinions of a good opening for a factory in Oxford
was endorsed by a rod merchant, who stated that even
before the War it existed, and by the retailers, one of whom
keeps two basket-makers at work on the premises, the other
kept one before the War, but it was doubtful whether it will
pay him to do so again. Both mentioned the better quality
and cheaper output of baskets made in a factory. Villages,
however, are not suitable for basket factories owing to the
great storage space required and the cost of carriage of so
bulky a product. Three rural employers wanted more
journeymen, however, and in residential quarters there is
an increasing demand for general work, e.g., laundry baskets.
Two London merchants, one of whom deals in rods and in
agricultural baskets, the other doing a high-class trade
in light goods, considered that the trade would stand con-
siderable development both in male and female labour. One
of these stated that he had no time to train any one, but
that he was ready to employ many more trained workers,
and that if a scheme were put forward to deal with this
question he felt sure the trade would give it hearty support.
Probably no better all-round instructor could be found than
the rural master craftsman of the best type, who not only
knows the commercial as well as the manufacturing side of
the industry, but has an immense pride and interest in good
work, both in the sound cultivation of willows and in all
branches of willow work.
Women's Labour
The problem of sectional labour (i.e. men doing a part
and women a part of the same article) which the trade
unions do not at present allow, and of female labour in
general, was discussed at a meeting of the Industrial Council
for the trade, but no definite conclusion had been reached
128 BASKET-MAKING
by the autumn of 1919 with regard to dilution of labour.
Opinion is divided on this matter ; trade unionists do not
altogether care for women working in the same shops as
men, though dilution of labour would actually increase the
men's earnings in some cases, where women can be put to
the lighter work. The cheapness of foreign baskets is partly
attributed to the more economical system of sectional and
family labour abroad. One of the large London merchants
spoke in favour of developing the cottage industry on
foreign lines, but doubted the capacity of the people for
this kind of work, considering the present waste of intellect
in rural England as almost criminal. A certain amount of
women's labour is being satisfactorily employed in Birming-
ham and Nottingham. In Oxford light work with the wands
or thin ends of rods and with split rods was described as
eminently suitable for women. In this connexion it is
interesting to note the Eynsham baskets made from riverside
rushes. These used to be made before the workmen's flag
baskets came in from Spain, and, owing to the absence of
these at the moment, there is a great demand for rush
dinner or tool baskets ; ladies' shopping and work-baskets
also meet with a ready sale. The industry has extended to
Yarnton, and through the Women's Institutes to other
villages.
Wages
Basket -making is paid throughout by piece-rates. The
highest wages quoted, and confirmed from another source,
were £6 in a week in a large London factory for agricultural
baskets. (The term * gardeners' baskets ' is used in the
trade for these and fruit baskets, flats and pots, &c.). In
Wallingf ord £4 to £5 was cited as the earnings of good
eight-hour workmen where high-class goods were made in
a town ; for farmers' baskets alone this man did not think
wages would be more than £2. Rural workers have failed
to raise their prices even in the present shortage enough
to meet the increased cost of making, and farmers are
waiting to buy. A worker near Reading, where the price
of baskets is low, had given up making them except in his
spare time because he said he would have to work till eight
or nine at night to make 35s. a week, and he considered
himself a quick worker. The Oxford maker, a rapid worker,
making chairs as well as baskets, stated his time to be worth
£5 a week. The Wallingf ord man supposed he had earned
£3 a week two or three years ago, before joining the Army,
WAGES 129
but he explained that he was then only just establishing
his shop and evidently expected to increase his business now
that he was demobilized. His father owns beds at Faringdon
where they work still for a few weeks from time to time,
though they have moved to a better centre for their shop.
The following figures are taken straight from the wage book
of a rural basket -maker, making gardeners' baskets only :
Week ending March 15.
£ s. d.
Able-bodied man 38 agr. baskets at Is. M. . 366
Delicate man 30 „ „ 2 12 6
1 man 13 months at trade 24 „ „ .220
The last had been a carpenter and painter but was no longer
allowed to follow an out-door occupation. He would learn
a skilled trade more easily than the ordinary apprentice.
Employers and independent makers in this district
consider an eight hours' day very short and are in the
habit of working much longer. The rod grower and
basket-maker mentioned as working up his own business
has occasionally worked from four in the morning till seven
at night and did not mind doing so.
The earnings of blind men must be considered separately.
Taken at random over a period of twelve months, the
average wages of five men in a London factory were £3 6s. Qd.;
£3 ; £2 10«s. 10|d. ; £2 Ss. OJd. ; £2 6«s. 8d. The prices asked
for goods were somewhat in advance of other retail prices
and the secretary said that at times there was a difficulty
in getting a sufficient number of orders to keep the men
employed up to their full capacity. In Oxford no difficulty
is found in disposing of the work of two blind basket -
makers. It was strongly felt that the civil blind should
be on the same footing as regards pensions for disability as
the ex-soldier, and satisfaction was expressed that the matter
was under consideration by the Local Government Board.
Blind institutions are well represented on the Employers'
Associations for cane and willow work. The After-Care
Committee at St. Dunstan's supplies to two proficient makers
appliances which help them to keep the shape and size
correct ; these are simple, but the time for making is con-
siderably lengthened by setting them. The blind do very
good work, but in the finer branches the baskets have to'
be finished by a sighted man.1
1 The after-care work, in supplying materials, giving extra instruction,
and encouraging blind workers when they return to the somewhat
depressing atmosphere of ordinary life amongst ' sighted ' people, is of
great value.
2415
130 BASKET-MAKING
Two well-established makers in the district had money
to extend their business and were eager to do so. Both
believed that the moment to capture foreign trade had come
and both were agreed, though unknown to one another,
that if the Government could act generously with regard to
releasing men and stimulating osier cultivation, there was
nothing to fear from foreign competition. But there is
considerable difference of opinion on this point. A Notting-
ham firm which had suffered severe competition from
Dutch workers who had come to England to learn and then
beaten them in competition on their own ground, met the
difficulty by changing their staple product to furniture —
bath-chairs and spinal carriages, in which they now excel.
It has been repeatedly stated in this area that basket -
makers have always been underpaid, though things are
slightly better now.
Material
The shortage of material is even more hampering to the
industry than the shortage of labour. It is significant
that in the President's address to the Employers' Association
he mentions ' raw material and the cultivation of the willow '
with arbitration, unemployment, technical training, research
and export conditions as certainly being amongst the
important questions which will claim the consideration
of the Interim Reconstruction Committee, of which he is
Chairman. Though a confirmed free-trader, he speaks
emphatically of the need for English cultivation. He is
also President of the Midland Employers' Association, and
it is from the Midlands that the need of English willow
cultivation is most strongly expressed. But as we have seen
it is endorsed by London merchants. The secretary of the
London trade-union, speaking of the 47-hours' week, said
it was the dream of the workman to own a bit of land, and
cultivate it in his spare time. Ellmore's newly published
book on osier cultivation l is found in the hands of town and
country makers ; the local makers with only one exception
consider that it pays the basket -maker to grow his rods.
A London merchant recently bought over £500 worth from
near Newbury, and an Oxford merchant supported the
evidence of the local basket-makers as to the neglect and
lack of labour on the local beds. Two retailers of baskets,
however, added a caution with regard to foreign imports
which are expected when the damaged Belgian beds come
into full bearing and the continental scarcity is met, one of
1 The Cultivation of Osiers and Willows, by W. P. Ellmorc, Dent, 1919.
MATERIAL 131
them mentioning that at one time there was a slump in
osiers.
The question of osiers is largely one of quality. For some
types of work, light ' osiers ' are required, such as are grown
with great success in France. For the heavy work the rods
of Somersetshire do well enough, but rods are apt to be
spoilt (1) if the leader is eaten by a fly, (2) if it is cut by the
frost. This causes them to branch out, to be rough and
difficult to work, adding considerably to the time which the
basket-makers must spend on his work, and spoiling the
results. Different varieties thrive in different soils ; one
experienced grower considered that sets should be put in'
various places experimentally for a year, before deciding
which variety to adopt. Asked what it would cost he
remarked, ' Do you mean to do the thing properly ? ' and
mentioned from £30 to £50 an acre ; another grower who
had experimented with great success mentioned £50 ; and
one landlord interested in a soldiers' hospital is said to have
spent £100 an acre on planting. The tending and cutting is
expert work ; beds are damaged by not being kept clean
while the sets are young, and the stools can be ruined by bad
cutting. Much of the local material is so poor as to be of
little use to the makers, who therefore prefer foreign rods.
Usually the makers in this district buy the rods standing and
cut them themselves, paying women or children to sort and
strip them, and boiling them if for buff work in a tank. It
takes five years for willows to reach their full bearing
capacity, though in three years the yield is considerable,
and a few can be cut even the first year.
Conclusion
To sum up, with regard to organization, there are two
types of basket-making firms which are likely to continue
to prosper. On the one hand there is the factory, situated
in a centre where (1) material is easily obtained in large
quantities and where (2) large orders can be quickly
executed, thus avoiding the long storage of bulky material
and still bulkier product, and the costly method of transport
in small quantities. Thus the industry has become localized
in seaport towns, and in big midland towns such as Birming-
ham, Leicester, Nottingham, and Leeds. Factories use
large quantities of baskets ; the neighbourhood of paper-
mills would give an opening. On the other hand, there is the
rural workshop on a small scale, making mainly for a purely
local market, undertaking all kinds of work, including
I 2
1 32 BASKET-MAKING
repairs, and in most cases having a shop in which to display
samples.
With regard to labour, the town journeyman keeping
to the same class of work, if not to a single article, makes
more money on the piece rates, but an apprentice or journey-
man is more likely to become independent if he has learnt
the whole business and can adapt himself to the demand.
In a striking number of cases in various occupations,
independence is preferred to higher earnings and shorter
hours. The preference usually goes with a genuine love of
the craft pursued and a broad-minded interest in its many
aspects ; it is also worthy of note how many rural craftsmen
and their sons have risen to responsible positions.
With regard to material, both types of successful industry
are connected with the source of material. Large basket-
making firms in London, Birmingham, and Liverpool, are
also rod merchants, selling their surplus to smaller firms.
In the Trent Valley many osiers are grown ; these have
helped the Midland industry. The rural basket -maker
cultivates at least a few rods if he can, and wishes to cultivate
more, though in some cases evolution has separated the
two industries. He recognizes the need of expert knowledge,
and novices are ready to avail themselves of expert advice.
At the present time, the skilled rod grower is doing very well
indeed, and the need for better cultivation is felt throughout
the trade. As for promoting the cultivation on a large scale,
the opinion has been expressed on many sides that osier
growing is a form of cultivation which pays as well as any,
and that excellent rods can be grown in England. But
in view of the uncertainty of future prices, and of the slump
in the past, the need is felt in the trade for research. But
there is sufficient evidence to show that in riverside dis-
tricts osier growing and basket-making have been inter-
dependent, and that in suitable areas they should be carried
on in close co-operation, if not by the same people. If this
is not done, rods should be carried to basket -works at a
distance, rather than baskets be sent to distant markets.
With regard to expansion, the proceedings of the Interim
Reconstruction Committee show that there is considerable
scope, probably for women as well as men ; and in rural
areas, growth and development are seen to increase the
demand for household, garden, factory, and commercial
requisites, of which baskets are one. The development of
aeroplanes also creates a demand for baskets.
With regard to training, it is of the utmost importance
CONCLUSION 133
that it should be thorough and efficient, and in this connexion
it may be remarked that great scorn is expressed by profes-
sional basket-makers for the poor work which was turned out
from some of the hospitals where amateur teachers were relied
upon, and that the trade-union restriction in the number
of apprentices is partly due to the fear of undercutting by
makers of poor quality. Experience shows that the success
of the basket-maker in England depends on a high standard,
and this is one of the aspects in which the Interim In-
dustrial Reconstruction Committee is interested.
With regard to capital, the failure of a rural basket-maker
through setting up with insufficient capital is more disastrous
than in the case of a town one. Basket-making requires
little capital compared with other trades, but a reserve or
credit is necessary ; otherwise in bad times the temptation
to undercut for the sake of a little ready money for family
needs is irresistible. Capital for osier-growing is also needed
by rural basket-makers, and in most cases a retail shop is a
great help, and the connexion with big firms who can
supplement the basket-maker's own work may be valuable.
It may be thought that the laws of supply and demand
will adjust the supply of labour and material to the demand
for baskets, but in the present circumstances the demand is
urgent and the supply not ready ; osier cultivation and
basket-making need time, skill, and experience, and mean-
while there is neglected land which is suitable for osier-
growing thus giving occupation to men and women who are
ceasing work connected with the War. There is on this
account a case for speedy action on the lines of the following
suggestions which are believed in general policy to represent
the wishes and opinions of the trade.
A County Agricultural Committee, or a group of Agri-
cultural Committees in neighbouring counties, especially
in the Midlands, might apply to the Board of Agriculture
for a Grant in aid of the necessary expenses of salary, &c.,
and undertake to make as soon as possible a survey of osier
beds and of land suitable and available for osiers, and to
approach the landowners as to leasing these beds for a term
of years.
A panel of experienced osier -growers might be formed, in
suitable localities, to give advice as to situation, soil,
variety of willows, and all other problems of cultivation,
so that local experience and wider scientific knowledge
should be available for intending osier-growers. Basket -
makers could be informed of all particulars of the panel
134 BASKET-MAKING
through the Trade Organizations, or where not yet organized,
through the local authorities ; the After-Care Committees
for the blind, and the Authorities dealing with training and
re-settling of the disabled, should also be put in touch with
the panel. Experiments in setting and growing osiers in
different soils could be conducted at the Rothamsted Experi-
mental School, or by some other body undertaking scientific
research. It would be desirable, where necessary, to assist
basket-makers or osier -growers of a good type with a grant
or loan in respect of the initial outlay on cleaning and rent
for the first three years, and it might be advisable to guarantee
the rent during this period. It would be well if all grants
were conditional on an undertaking to work under super-
vision or inspection of a person approved by the panel, and to
keep accounts according to an approved method and submit
them for inspection during the period for which the grant
or loan is made. Every encouragement should be given, and
the support of the Basket-Makers' Interim Industrial
Reconstruction Committee should be solicited for all schemes
which will affect the trade.
CHAPTER III
NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
(a) Glove-making
GLOVE -MAKING is to a considerable extent a rural industry,
the cut-out gloves being made up by village women in their
homes, and in village factories, and small firms still carrying
on the whole process in country towns. The industry
extends from Worcestershire to Devonshire, and it has also
been heard of in Northumbrian villages ; for some gloves
the ' East End ' is probably more important than all the
other areas together. The chief centre in Oxfordshire is
Woodstock, where there are eight glove factories. At
Charlbury there are four ; at Chipping Norton two ; at
Oxford one has recently been opened ; at Witney there is
one. Another large glove factory is now (1920) in process of
being built in Oxford.
Some of the factories are independent, being managed by
the proprietor, himself a skilled glover ; some are branches of
bigger factories elsewhere ; while others are owned by
leather dressing firms and by commercial houses which
carry on a wholesale or retail business, or both, in gloves and
sports appliances. The small branches are managed some-
times by skilled foremen belonging to the locality, and some-
times by business managers.
Besides the factories where the whole of the processes are
carried out, there are workshops and sewing schools for
women only, under the management of a forewoman or
teacher, with occasional visits from the manageress responsi-
ble for organizing all the women's work of a firm. A number
of outworkers are employed in connexion with these work-
shops.
Processes of Manufacture
The work is subdivided into many processes. Men
do cutting, staking, packing, and sorting ; women do making,
pointing, finishing, button-holing, putting in fasteners,
padding, and other processes according to the type of glove.
The number of cutters employed is the key to the industry,
the work of one cutter affording employment for a large
136 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
number of women. The proportion between different
classes of workers in and attached to one of the local factories
is as follows :
MEN.
Cutters
Sorter and puncher
Manager
Pointers
Makers
Liners
Finishers
Learners
Tiers
Welters
Sprayer
WOMEN.
Total
12
1
1
Indoor.
2
5
14
Outdoor.
87
4
6
3
2
1
103
but there are many variations according to the type of glove
made. There is considerable difficulty in adjusting the
numbers of various classes. The following figures were
given by the largest employer of female labour in Oxford-
shire to illustrate the shortage of female labour, but they
include areas outside the county :
Dozen Pairs.
Week Ending. Cut. Made.
April 12, 1919 ... 614 567
„ 19, „ . 908
„ 26, „ . 896
May 2, „ . . 789
770
580
910
/ Pre-war output
1 reckoned at 1,150
1 doz. pairs per
Week.
(Leaving 380 unmade) 3,207 2,827
The correct proportion of male to female workers was
given as one to six. In the small firms we find the proprietor
doing the cutting himself or employing a single cutter and
two or three boys to help him, the making being done by
outworkers, and the proprietor's wife or a woman employee
pointing before they are sent out and finishing when they
come back.
Glove- cutting is a highly skilled trade, the period of
apprenticeship, which used to be sometimes as much as ton
years,, being now as long as five or six. Cutting involves hard
work in stretching the skins,1 andis not considered suitable for
women. They have, however, been employed successfully in
cutting fabric gloves which require no stretching Little
skill is attached to the other work done by men or boys,
machinery being used to slit the fingers.
1 Skins are stretched lengthways so that they may stretch broadways
when fitted on the hand.
GLOVE-MAKING 137
Making, i.e. seaming the different parts together,1 is as a
rule the only process now done by home workers, except
for the padding of cricket gloves in Woodstock. The
reason for this is that the making is a longer process ; point-
ing, buttoning, and finishing are quickly done, and it is
not worth while to send out large batches of gloves, nor is
it worth while for the same outworker to have a separate
machine for different processes. In some cases other pro-
cesses have been done by the same outworkers who do the
' making ', but the work is apt to be badly done unless under
supervision in a factory.
Local Conditions o/ Labour
Several factories and sewing schools and a large number of
outworkers were visited in the spring of 1919. Conditions
were changing rapidly, and the following description will
show what they were before the recent movement for
organization had taken much effect in Oxfordshire, the most
backward county in this respect. Organization was des-
cribed as chaotic, and the truth of this statement was borne
out by investigation in the village where the greatest number
of glover esses are found. They were working for nearly a
dozen different firms, each with its own rates of pay and
system of deductions. It is the policy of the firms to keep as
many hands as possible on their books ready for a time of
stress, and the policy of the workers to take gloves from
several firms in case of a shortage or cessation of work.
The gloves come by rail, post, agent-carrier, managers in
motors or on motor cycles, or are taken to the nearest depot
by the workers themselves who may spend half a day on the
'journey.
Earnings are difficult to estimate owing to the system of
piece-rates and the numerous varieties of gloves made.
The whole industry is paid by piece-rates which apply to
factory hands and outworkers alike. A good cutter can
earn £5 or £6 a week, and an apprentice expected to make £5
a week immediately on finishing his term of service. Dis-
satisfaction was expressed at the rates being lower in this
district than in the towns. Rates had risen by 108 per cent,
on the pre-war rates of each district. Stakers, whose
work is unskilled, were getting more than cutters, and
similarly amongst the women, pointers were getting more
than makers, the reason being that a very slight rise, e. g.
of a farthing per dozen means a big increase on the large out-
put of the unskilled workers. These anomalies however
1 ' Forchettes ' are the pieces sewn in between the fingers, ' quirks ' are
small gussets sewn at the base of the ' forchettes '.
138 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
were shortly to be put right by the Interim Industrial
Reconstruction Committee, a form of Whitley Council which
is described in Chapter II.1
By giving charts to be filled in for a week by forty home-
workers, it was found that the average earnings of machinists
were a little over 4=d. an hour, and those of handworkers
from \^d. to 3jd. These figures do not represent the
average earnings in the locality as a whole, for the charts
were for the most part filled in by employers of the most
backward firms. But it was admitted by the manager of the
best firm that the rates were too low throughout, the
average earnings being probably not more than 5d. for
machinists and 3d. for handworkers. Deductions are made
for thread on the grounds that it might be extravagantly
used. One firm only was supplying it free. Machinists
also have a heavy expense to meet in buying their own
machines, except in the case of the biggest firm which lends
them free of charge. These machines, however, cannot be
used except for gloves, while the machines which the workers
purchase can be adjusted to ordinary sewing. This is seldom
done, and }^et the worker gets no return in higher payment on
the grounds that she bears manufacturers' costs. But she
has the advantage of being free to work for any firm. The
prices charged to workers for these machines are three times
as great as would be the cost to a firm which purchased them.
Payment is in instalments and may last over a year. In the
sewing rooms too, the girls hire or own their machines.
These have cost them recently as much as £10 and £11.
The average weekly earnings of eight machinists who filled
in charts were 85. 3|cZ. and the weekly instalment for the
machine was recently 5s. a week, so that their net earnings
for about forty weeks would, with deductions for thread,
oil and insurance, be barely 3s. a week. Home workers
seldom give more than four days a week to gloving, and even
on these days, household duties have to be done in most
cases. The other days are reserved for washing and house-
cleaning. It cannot be wondered that the backward firms
find gloveresses scarce and that the best firm, which supplies
machines and gives facilities for training, is attracting the
workers.
The very low rates which obtained previous to recent
reforms can be attributed on the one hand to the lack of
organization amongst the firms and the low standard of the
more backward firms, and on the other hand to the low
agricultural wages and the necessity of supplementing
the family earnings while a young family was growing up.
1 See pp. 34, 35 and 142-4.
GLOVE-MAKING 139
Many a mother has had to toil in this way during the years
in which she could least spare time and energy from her home
duties. People in one village ' were regular cowed down ' one
of the older women in the principal gloving villages said. The
pre-war rates appear to have been not more than half the
average calculated on the charts. Women would undercut
one another for the scanty shillings and the work alternated
between rush and idleness. The hardship which was
involved in cases where a woman had to support herself on
the work is obvious.
The usual method for sickness insurance is for the firm
to deduct a penny and pay the other fivepence on each unit
of 9<s. for hand work, and to deduct threepence on each unit
of 13s. for machine work. Home workers seldom, if ever,
earn enough for the firm to be liable for half the insurance
during the whole year, varying sums therefore have to be
made up by the worker at the end of the year. In Yeovil,
before the unit system was devised, the effect of the Act was
to stop home work in favour of factory work. A similar
effect is seen in the Ready-made Clothing Industry. One
married woman gave the insurance benefit as her reason for
making gloves.
During the past year, great improvements have been
effected in the conditions, partly owing to the keen demand
for female labour by all the firms, and partly to the influence
of the progressive elements amongst both employers and
employed. Separation allowances and high wages obtainable
by girls in aeroplane hangars and other works, and greater
prosperity amongst the agricultural labourers was causing
a great decline in the number of gloveresses. The Workers'
Union is determined that gloving shall not be done under the
old sweated conditions, and the better firms realize that
the only way to establish the industry on a sound footing
is to raise the standard of pay and the quality of work.1
Thus the number of sewing schools where young workers
can be trained has been increased.2 The following account
shows the methods of the firm whose workers were seen to be
working under far the best conditions, so far as Oxfordshire
is concerned.
In the chief factory the machines are worked by power.
There is a branch factory in Oxfordshire employing ten
men and five boys, and two sewing schools in neigh-
bouring villages for training outworkers (of whom there are
about 120 working for this firm) to use treadle machines.
1 For recent piece-rates see p. 143 under Organization of the Workers.
2 But subsequent events indicate that employers were eager to get
enough hands for the post-war boom in trade.
140 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
When the outworkers are proficient, the machines are
taken home on loan. The instructresses at the schools
are in touch with the local factory, and the neighbour-
hood is visited once a month by the organizer from
Worcester who is in charge of. the women's work for the
firm. These schools are not permanent rooms, in fact the
organizer was contemplating a collapsible building which
could go from village to village spending a few weeks
in each. Girls vary in the time it takes them to learn ;
six weeks is usually considered sufficient, but to become
a skilled gloveress who can keep up her output a much
longer time must be allowed. The organizer was much
interested in hearing that a preference had been expressed
in some of the villages for working in a small factory rather
than at home, and stated that with twenty workers on the
premises and outworkers as well, such a factory would pay.
She hoped to work groups of villages from a centre, using
a motor to take the superintendent and to distribute the
work ; isolated villages would be too costly in administra-
tion.
With regard to training, the better firms realize that any
influence which tends to raise the quality of the work is
to the good of the industry, and would welcome educa-
tional facilities. The organizer finds that the rural work
is as good as the town work which has deteriorated
since the workers have been doing quite unskilled work
(machine minding) in munition works. With regard to
discipline, she has no difficulty in the country. This firm
evidently has excellent teachers and superintendents.
Another manageress found the village workers inferior in
skill and speed to those in town, and put it down to the
fact that, there being less inducement to spending in a
village, the girls are apt to slack off at the end of the week
when they have earned the specific amount desired.1 In
view of the urgency of increasing the output, the fact that
increased rates mean diminished output is annoying to the
employers. Probably, however, this is due to the suspicion
which the extreme irregularity of employment, combined
with sweated rates in the past, has implanted in the minds of
the workers. The fact that firms are developing small
factories promises greater regularity, since these workers will
have to be insured against unemployment; it is obvious that
one reason for employing so many outworkers has been the
fluctuating demand for work. Another reason, however, is the
traditional skill of the women in gloving villages. Where a girl
1 This complaint is almost universal in town and country alike.
GLOVE-MAKING 141
has ' been among gloving ' she learns more quickly than one
I who has never seen it. The Worcester firm stated that its
best workers were outworkers, and some experiments made
by this firm with regard to the effects of fatigue on output
brought out very interesting points. They make a practice
of allowing their rural workers time off for seasonal occupa-
tions, such as potato lifting in and near Charlbury, fruit
picking and hay-making in the Evesham district and
Dorsetshire. They find that the output of these workers is
superior in quality and quantity to the output of those
engaged in gloving all the year round, partly because the
strain on the eyes is relieved, and partly no doubt because
the workers come fresh after a change to their work. Cutters
employed by this firm were working about three hours a day
overtime during the war. At first their output increased
from approximately fifteen to eighteen dozen pairs a week,
but at the end of the eighteen months it had dropped to the
level of their normal week. One manager is inclined to the
view that the interruptions of the home worker give just
that refreshment which advocates of Scientific Management
now considered necessary (e. g., 10 minutes rest per hour) for
the best output. For the same reasons, progressive firms
welcome recreational movements which tend to make village
life more interesting.
Material
The staple material is sheep -skin, the heavier skins being
tanned or sometimes pipeclayed or coloured for riding,
driving, and sports gloves. The lighter skins, mostly
English, are dressed, oiled, and bleached or dyed for Chamois
washable gloves. Sheep -skins vary greatly in texture and
thickness according to the breed and the climate where the
sheep are reared. The ' Chamois ' gloves are made to a
large extent from English skins. Skins are imported from
S. Africa, India, Arabia, Australia, &c., roughly preserved
but not dressed.
Small firms are at a serious disadvantage in obtaining
material as against larger firms with capital and agents in
various parts of the world. It appears that the possession
of large stocks of leather is in some cases the cause of a rush
for labour while high prices prevail. Since the beginning
of the war there has been a great shortage. Recently large
quantities of skins and hides have again been imported, but
after dressing they are exported to Europe and America.
142 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
Leather glove manufacturers are organized in the follow-
ing associations :
The Worcestershire and District Glove Manufacturers
Association.
The Yeovil and District Association of Glove Manu-
facturers.
There is also a National Association of Fabric Glove
Manufacturers.
The three largest firms employing labour in Oxfordshire are
now organized ; they employ between them most of the workers
in all the chief gloving centres ; firms paying less than the
standard rate find workers difficult to get. These Associa-
tions do not exist solely for the purpose of combating labour.
With regard to regularity of employment, the principal
firm believes that with proper organization and develop-
ment of the export trade, there need be practically no
unemployment in the industry, and resents the payment of
insurance for unemployment. It was noticed that the small
firms had no hope that the trade would ever be regular,
except in a case where they kept to a stock class of goods for
a steady market, but another big firm in the neighbourhood
also hopes for great improvement in this respect. Its
representative pointed out the difficulty of the small firm
with little capital, which could make to order only, and not
for stock, and therefore attempted to catch labour for busy
times, only to drop it when the rush was over.
But this tendency was by no means confined to the smaller
firms, and many workers prefer to keep to an old firm at very
low rates rather than take higher rates from a firm in which
they have no confidence for keeping them employed.
The workers are organized in the following Unions :
The Amalgamated Society of Gas, Municipal and General
Workers.
The Workers' Union.
The Amalgamated Society of Glovers (men only).
The United Glovers' Mutual Aid Society (for Yeovil).
Gloveresses belong to the two General Unions. It is
believed that the numbers have increased rapidly lately,
but at the time of investigation little headway had been
made. The indirect influence, however, had been consider-
able. The fact of being invited to join the Workers' Union
with the agricultural labourers, and the propagandist
work carried on in the villages was showing the women the
GLOVE-MAKING 143
need of standing by one another and not undercutting one
another's rates. The good effect was greatly enhanced by
the Interim Industrial Reconstruction Committee set up in
June 1918. These committees are a form of Whitley
Council, devised for those trades still too backward in
organization for the Joint Industrial Council in its complete
form. The threat of establishing a Trade Board has had the
effect in this industry of stimulating voluntary organization,
and the Interim Industrial Reconstruction Committee was
successful in fixing a standard time-rate of Sd. an hour on
which all women's piece rates are to be adjusted. This was
raised in November 1919 to 8%d.1 The rulings of the Interim
Industrial Reconstruction Committees have not, like those of
a Trade Board, the sanction of the law, and the small firms
have not yet joined the Associations, but it is up to the
organizations of workers and employed which are represented
in equal numbers on the Interim Industrial Reconstruction
Committee to see that they are carried out. It is believed
that the rates are actually being paid on this basis now,
and it is not likely, with the keen competition for labour,
that firms offering less would obtain workers.2
Trade Competition
Competition was keen before the war from Belgium
and Germany. France cannot be rivalled in the lighter
suede and kid gloves, in which she excels, but England can
hold her own in the heavier driving gloves and other heavier
makes, and also in the washable gloves which are in vogue
since about 1910, when improved methods of dressing and
bleaching were introduced. Competition is also keen from
America and is feared from Japan. English gloveresses
have been inferior in care and finish to the makers of the
Continent, and great importance is attached to quality and
therefore to training and general education in raising the
standard and steadying the output. It is probable that the
industry will continue to be a rural industry, and interest
is shown in the possibilities of developing electric power,
both in village workshops and in cottages themselves.
Owing to the small bulk and weight in proportion to the
value of the article, expenses of transport can be borne in
this industry 3 provided organization is economical. The
1 Now after the resumption of foreign competition it appears that the
rates have been pushed too high. January 1921.
2 For activities of Interim Industrial Reconstruction Committees, see
Section on Organization in the General Discussion, p. 35.
3 Contrast the Ready-made Clothing Industry, in which the bulk and
weight of material is likely to be prohibitive to outwork.
144 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
utter lack of organization and the low status of agricultural
labour were the causes of the low standard of work and
wages in the industry, but organization has created a
revolution, and it appears likely that the industry may
thrive under modern conditions now that the attention
of employers and workers is directed, by their representation
on the Interim Industrial Reconstruction Committee,
not merely to discussions on hours and wages, but to the
means by which the industry can be developed. Whether
the large factory recently built in Oxford will swamp the
rural industry in this county remains to be seen. But
it is clear that any schemes for further development of the
rural side of the industry would have little chance of success
without the support of the trade, and that this support should
be enlisted through the Interim Industrial Reconstruction
Committee. A liaison officer from the Ministry of Labour is
attached to the Interim Industrial Reconstruction Committee
and regularly attends the meetings, and is the recognized
channel between the trade and the Government.
Conclusion
That the industry is expected to flourish is obvious from
the capital that is being sunk in machinery and the efforts
that are being made to train young workers. The firms
which are likely to prosper are those in which the village
factory is a branch of some bigger establishment. These
firms in several cases have their own leather- dressing works
and are in several instances connected with retail houses,
e. g. of sports goods, the gloving being one department only.
Though the rates have been low they are now standardized.
With regard to regularity of employment it was noticed that
the small local firm^ with the exception of one which kept
to a -single type of serviceable glove, admitted that there
were great fluctuations and believed that this would always be
the case. The better firms, however, hope for more regularity.
The fluctuations of demand are evidently a reason why
home work is employed, no unemployment insurance being
paid on home workers, but the development of small work-
shops may therefore be taken as an indication of the hope
for greater regularity. The firms which can make for stock
are in a better position in this respect than the firms which
cannot afford to make except for actual contract. At
present the shortage, expense and poor quality of the
material is hampering the industry, and particularly the
small firm with less facility for buying on favourable terms.
The demand for gloves is greatly in excess of the supply,
GLOVE-MAKING 1-15
and there is keen competition for all classes of labour of
good quality, but especially for makers who are women.
Electric power is being used in Woodstock for turning
the sewing machines and is apparently being contemplated
in the villages.1 The work is popular amongst a certain
type of girl who does not care for the life in a noisy factory.
It is popular with those parents who do not care for their
young girls to leave them for work at a distance. But
most girls would much prefer the sociability of a village
factory to working in their own homes, and it would probably
be better for them. It may here be remarked that from this
point of view the encouragement of the village workshop for
girls would be wise, especially while it is necessary for them to
earn while still very young. It would be particularly valuable
if the industry in question could be so organized that the girls
need not work whole-time in the factory, but could be free to
help in the home or the garden. For seasonal work, one firm
makes a point of releasing its workers, e. g. for fruit picking,
&c. As things are at present, little girls or boys have far
too heavy burdens placed upon their shoulders in looking
after the younger children and helping with the work.
If the cottages were larger, and there were suitable oppor-
tunities for an elder girl to earn something towards her main-
tenance for the first few years after leaving school, it would
often be very beneficial to the family. In the present con-
centration on the economic aspect of industry, other con-
siderations are apt to be overlooked. The existence of a
village industry which afforded employment for young girls
would enormously simplify the problem of continued
education. Even in cases where the industry itself is a blind
alley, training could meanwhile be given with a view to
other employment later. If domestic service is followed,
a girl of sixteen or eighteen is more fit than a girl of fourteen,
and the mothers who can keep their girls at home for these
few years would welcome part-time occupation for them.
Employers, however, would not wish to train large numbers of
young gloveresses for temporary employment only, and the
whole problem of adolescent labour is too important to be
left wholly to the responsibility of individual firms. With
regard to girls, it has been found in various industries
that they will not take the trouble to learn skilled pro-
cesses, for, unlike a boy, they do not look upon their employ-
ment as a permanent means of livelihood, but as a temporary
occupation to cease with marriage. The neatness and cleanli-
1 But ' making ' is rarely done on power machines.
2415 TT
146 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
ness of the gloveresses' homes made a very favourable im-
pression which may very well be due to the opportunities
for training in housewifery afforded by this home industry.
There is at the present time such a demand for reliable
labour, though limited to some extent by the shortage of
leather, that the best firms would probably be willing to
co-operate in educational or social schemes calculated to
improve and steady the supply of gloveresses. It is realized
by the employers that the supply depends on making the
conditions attractive, and improving the amenities of village
life. Since in the Oxfordshire villages gloving is at present
the only industry of any considerable extent which affords
openings for women, it would be well to take advantage of its
opportunities.1
At the same time it is felt that alternative occupations
should where possible be provided, and probably the methods
of collective marketing already being applied to garden pro-
duce, &c., could be extended to certain lines of clothing
other than gloves, which, with careful organization, could be
profitably made in villages.
Experiments in leather dressing and gloving on co-
operative lines might also be useful. And in cases where the
gloveresses own their machines, instruction in adjusting them
to other kinds of needlework, e. g. by the County Council
Instructor in dressmaking, would probably be welcome.
Lectures on the industry would certainly interest the
workers, and might help to clear their minds as to the cost
of production, for with the tradition of sweated rates the huge
present prices are an obvious cause of dissatisfaction.
Hand-gloving, owing to the ease with which it can be
taken up for a short time, the small space it takes, and the
pleasantness of the work, when the skins are well dressed
and not too dark in colour, is particularly suitable for the
home worker, it being hardly worth while to do machine work
unless a considerable time can be spent on it. But it is
doubtful whether the public will be willing to pay the price
which the new standardized rates will involve. Expenses
of administration are heavy in proportion to the small
output of a handworker. But this branch of the industry
is one which might be taken up by voluntary organizations,
1 A scheme was to have been carried out under the Employment Bureau
for training a few women in receipt of unemployment donation at Wood-
stock. But owing to the prospective opening of a big factory in Oxford,
the scheme fell through, since some of the workers would have had to
travel from Oxford for their training.
GLOVE-MAKTNG 147
In conjunction with other home industries for delicate and
older women. Arrangements could be made with a firm for
ready-cut gloves, or skilled cutters could be employed. The
(dressing of c chamois ' can be done in villages, and it is
probable that some women could learn to cut and stretch
i3hese lighter skins in the proper way.1 By a well-organized
system of co-operative selling, these gloves might find their
1 quality market ' with other good rural products. They are
•superior in wear and comfort to machine-sewn gloves of the
same type. But the public has still to learn that hand-
work, if it is to survive, must be adequately paid for
according to the time and skill required.
Rabbit-Skin Gloves
The curing of rabbit -skins and making them into * bag '
gloves, with knitted or wash-leather palms is a popular
industry amongst Women's Institutes in Oxfordshire.
There is a keen local demand for these, and the rate of 6d.
an hour on which prices were based by the Fur Craft Guild
proved sufficiently attractive for women with a certain
amount of leisure to take up the work with zest. Sales are
for the most part made privately through friends. Probably
quick and proficient workers can earn considerably more after
a period of practice than 6d. an hour, and the home curing of
skins, if well done, is undoubtedly profitable. Skins fetching
only 2d. in a village, are, if cured and sent to Worcester for
glove-making, worth a shilling. There is much room for
improvement in curing, but Institute members are extremely
interested in comparing notes as to methods, and considerable
improvement is being effected. The type of gloves usually
made are easily cut, not requiring a skilled cutter.
Experience in the fur -glove industry points to thepossibility
of co-operating with gloving firms with a view to getting the
cut-out palms and other parts, and making more elaborate
fur gloves. Care should be taken that the prices charged do
not mean lower earnings than those fixed by the Glove
Industry Interim Industrial Reconstruction Committee,
and expert instruction and a high standard of work is
essential.
(6) Leather Dressing
There are two distinct methods of dressing sheep -skin
for gloves. Dark gloves are tanned or coloured and treated
with a preparation of egg-yolk to make them soft and
1 Women's Institutes are cutting and making leather gloves entirely by
hand. On this experiment it is hoped'to report later.
148 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
elastic. Large quantities of eggs are imported for this
purpose. ' Chamois ' and other light washable gloves are
dressed in oil and soft soap, and bleached in the sun or
by chemicals. The first process is almost extinct as a small
rural industry, owing to the use of large machinery. Just
as the rural shoe-makers have been affected by the con-
centration of tanning, where the processes are greatly
expedited by use of machinery, so small gloving firms,
no longer carrying on, or connected with, local leather-
dressing works, have to buy their material in the open market.
By comparison of a large leather-dressing factory at Abingdon
with small fellmongering works, it appears that con-
centration in a factory where the skins can be quickly dealt
with is in the interest of health. In spite of the odour, this
industry is stated to be healthy. Labour-saving machinery
was still in process of instalment to minimize fatigue and
assist the cleanliness of the operations. Experiments have
been made by this firm in employing women on processes
where only men have been employed before, and these
have met with much success. Of about 500 employees more
than half were women. Equal piece-rates are given to men
and women ; three women are said to do as much work as
two men. The hours were short, and it was said that the
women could earn from £2 to £3 a week. Skins are dressed
in a number of ways at this factory, the speciality being a fine
white washable leather. The waste is sold for lining jewel
cases.
The old-fashioned methods, which are now practically
extinct, were heard of in a leather-dressing and colouring
factory at Woodstock which had been closed. It was
stated to have been an unhealthy trade, the men employed
seldom living beyond fifty. The air was thick with chemicals,
and the egg mixture ' could be smelt a mile off '. This was
trodden into the skins in large barrels by men ' trotting
about on it ' until the skins had absorbed all the egg and the
water was left clear. In modern factories fans are used to
carry off the dust of the colouring substance ; the skins
are churned by machine and salted yolk is used for the
dressing.
The question of starting leather-dressing factories on
co-operative lines in connexion with municipal or co-opera-
tive abattoirs in a gloving district deserves attention.
The nearest works, apart from those at Abingdon, are at
Hereford, Bristol, and Chippenham. Hides are bought up
by dealers, who visit the markets and send to the big factories.
READY-MADE CLOTHING 149
It would be necessary to have the factory on a large enough
scale to make it worth while to put in up-to-date machinery.
The Abingdon works deal with an enormous number of
skins every week. The finishing processes of chamois
dressing are done by local firms in some cases, and wash
leather can be seen bleaching in the sun at Woodstock. It
would be worth while to investigate further the possibilities
of chamois dressing and of curing and furrying as a rural
industry connected with the manufacture of fur and wash-
leather articles out of local material.
(c) Ready-made Clothing
Only two firms which employ rural labour in the whole-
sale clothing industry have been found in the district
investigated. One of these is established in Oxford and the
other in Abingdon. They used to be branches of the same
firm, and the industry sprang from a debt paid by a linen
draper to a small shopkeeper in the form of a bale of linen,
towards the end of the eighteenth century. Out of this the
shopkeeper's wife made a labourer's smock, which was soon
bought by a passing farm labourer ; she sold a succession
of smocks and so the industry was built up. The sign of the
old shop is kept as a relic on the factory wall. This firm
still made labourers' smocks within living memory, but the
village smockers have almost died out. Now both firms
make men and boys' Hop clothing ', i. e. suits.
Of trade organization there is little to be said. The rural
work consists in this district entirely of outwork, the
machine-cut garments being distributed in a few villages
and in Abingdon for making up or finishing at home.
Generally it is the finishing — i. e. sewing in linings — which
is put out. This must be done by hand. Some outworkers
take machine work.
Large quantities of outwork used to be done in the villages
round Liverpool, Colchester, and elsewhere ; but apart from
a temporary impetus given to outwork by the shortage of
female labour and of factory accommodation, outwork
in this industry is dying out. Three reasons were given for
this, and these show that a revival on the old lines is im-
probable and undesirable. First, tailoring has been done by
the very poor as outworkers under insanitary and un-
satisfactory conditions. In Abingdon it is done in the
poorest and dirtiest parts of the town. The homes of village
outworkers are often better and cleaner than those where the
150 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
housewife goes out to work, but the lack of supervision makes
it difficult to keep up the standard of work. Homework
used to be done on the worst and cheapest lines of clothing,
and the demand for this class of goods has declined, especially
since the war began. In the cheap lines country-made goods
did not fetch so good a price as those marked ' London-made '.
Secondly, during the last forty years a change in the trade has
been taking place which has increased the cost of pro-
duction all round, and is making the expense of outwork
prohibitive. Orders are decreasing in size ; where hundreds
of the same make and size would have been ordered thirty
years ago, dozens or less are ordered now. Fashion, even in
men's clothes, changes more rapidly, and there is greater
variety in the needs of different districts than formerly, so
that demand is more difficult to estimate. This means that
instead of putting out a week's work at a time, work has
often to be taken out one day and brought back the next.
The carriage of small and frequent parcels to villages
several miles away is too costly. Thirdly, the passing of the
Health Insurance Act has caused employers to substitute
factory work for outwork, except in the case of outworkers
whose output was sufficient to make the weekly insurance
contribution worth the employer's while. At Abingdon
the immediate result of the Act was to reduce the number of
outworkers from 300 to 200, and this had in the summer of
1919 fallen to about 70. A fourth reason was that the work
done recently on Government contract was not allowed to
be put out. The fixing of minimum rates by the Trade Board
established in 1911 was not cited as a reason for the decline
in home work, but the rise in piece rates would no doubt tend
to the discarding of the less efficient workers, although some
of the older women are evidently kept on for personal
reasons, having worked for many years for the same firm.
Conditions of Labour
A few outworkers in the villages of Cumnor and Appleton
are employed by one of the firms who used to let contract work
to a factory in a village a few miles away where outwork was
also done, but this factory was closed down soon after the
war began. This firm has also been contracting with
employers of outworkers at Swindon, but hopes shortly to
have all the work done on the premises. The other firm
employs outworkers in Appleton, Culham, Sutton Courtenay,
Drayton, and Wootton.
K CLOTHING i5i
The following extracts are given from notes on interviews
with outworkers :
".4. Started work at 11 years old ; at that time did smock frocks for
men. She does not remember what they were paid, but they were glad
of the work, although it was badly paid. Now (at 70) she is too old to do
much, but does what she can. She does trousers right through, but puts
some of those allotted to her out to be done, paying the worker full price
for them. When she married she took up trouser work and received as
little as Is. Qd. to 2s. a dozen. She thinks before the war they received
3d. each pair and 2%d. for ' fly-falls '. Cannot say definitely what the
price is now, she only knows it is ' all right '. * It is much better now
than it was in old days ; there is a bit of bonus and it all helps along.'
The firm pays her a few shillings a year, not so much as a pound, for the
use of her room, but she is well satisfied because the others pay her every
week. She evidently acts as distributor.
B. Aged about 60. Worked at dressmaking a few years ago, and took
up ready-made men's trousering because she could pick it up and put
it down when she wanted to, and it fitted in with her home life better. Her
husband does a lot of gardening ; they keep pigs, four goats and chickens.
They ' believed in being a little bit self-supporting '. The work she does
is termed finishing, all the machine work being done at Oxford. The
home-workers put on buttons, make button-holes, put in watch pockets,
rule pockets, and fill in linings. The work is taken to them by the firm
on Mondays and Thursdays, the amount delivered depending on the orders
the firm has. The workers are paid by the pair. Some weeks they get
more and some less, but the master is fair, and distributes the work fairly.
They are glad of the work and the money is a help. Before the war they
were paid for one garment 3d. (finishing and pockets), now they receive 5d.
and a war bonus. One pair does not take quite an hour to do. They were
supposed to earn about Id. an hour, and she thought they did earn about
this. They had recently joined the United Garment Makers' Union, paying
3d. a week. The bonus had been 5d. in the Is., now it was a little more.
C. Age 30-5. Soldier's wife. Took up work while husband was abroad.
Receives 5d. a pair for one kind of trousers and 4d. for another (finishing)
and a bonus of 5d. in the Is., lately raised to Qd. ; she thinks this is due
to the union. She thinks the money should have been paid on the trousers
and not as a bonus, and that it will be taken off. They pay insurance,
the firm paying 3d. on every 14s. earned. She is not always able to do
14s. worth. At the end of the year there are always (insurance) expenses
to be paid by the workers.
D. This worker is considered one of the best in Abingdon. She finishes
little boys' trousers. Pay is much better since she joined the Union.
The Union Organization has made no trouble between the workers and
employers, but has done a great deal of good. Some of the work is paid
for at nearly double the previous rates. Before the additional pay it was
very difficult to live on outwork, working almost night and day she could
not earn sufficient.
The following are her net earnings, including bonus and allowing for
deductions : j
S. tt.
Week ending May 9, 1919 . . . 15 ll£
„ „ 16, „ 18 6
23, „ ... 23 1
She works from perhaps 8.30 in the morning till 8 at night except for
152 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
house work (cottage beautifully clean and a very superior one) and cannot
afford to go out much. Her insurance card is fully stamped at the end of
the time so that she has not to pay arrears. The bonus has made a great
difference in this respect (i. e. 14<s. can be earned in the week). She pays
for thread and cotton about Qd. to 8d. in a fortnight. She would much
rather work at home than in a factory. She is not strong and could not
stand the noise, but can work well in the quiet. She used to keep house
for her father who worked for this firm, and at his death was in great
distress because she could not face factory life. They promised her work,
and it is her livelihood.
All the workers spoke very highly of the firm.
These records show that trousers which used to be finished
at \\d. a pair and at 3d. before the war are now finished at
7 \d. including the bonus. The work takes less than an hour,
and probably the earnings are more than the minimum of Id.
an hour fixed under the Wages Temporary Regulation Act.1
The following from a print issued from the Office of Trade
Boards in April 1919 shows the movement of the minimum
rates fixed by the Tailoring Trade Board :
Tailoring Trade Board (Great Britain)
A minimum rate for female workers of 3|rf. an hour was fixed on August
19, 1912. This rate was varied to 3|d. an hour on July 19, 1915, to 4d.
an hour on February 26, 1917, to 4|d. an hour on November 12, 1917,
and to 5d. an hour on March 25, 1918.
On July 19, 1915, the rate was extended to cover certain branches of
the Retail Bespoke Section of the trade.
A minimum rate of Qd. an hour for female workers employed in the
cutting room was fixed on October 23, 1916.
A minimum rate for male workers of Qd. an hour was fixed on August
19, 1912. This rate was varied to Id. an hour on February 26, 1917, and
to Sd. an hour on November 12, 1917.
Under awards of the Committee on Production many workers, both
male and female, receive bonus in addition to the rates to which they
are otherwise entitled.
The minimum rate fixed by the Tailoring Trade Board for
Ireland was raised in June 1919 to 8d. for men and to
4:%d. for women, many workers receiving a bonus in addition.
There was a fear of raising the Trade Board minimum rates
to a level from which they might have to be reduced later
and they were kept considerably lower than the amount
actually paid under the Wages Temporary Regulation Act,
by means of a bonus.
A Village Ready-Made Clothing Factory.
This factory employed at its busiest time between twenty
and thirty women and girls. Most of the work was done
1 Passed in order that there should not be a sudden drop from war-
time wages.
READY-MADE CLOTHING ir>3
in the factory, but for the handwork outworkers in three
villages were also employed. The work was let on sub-con-
tract by one of the local firms which supplied the garments
ready cut-out. The profit to the contractor appears to
have been small, and after the war had begun he could not
pay enough to retain the workers. Labour was irregular and
discipline difficult to maintain, and soon after the war the
factory was closed down, because only seven girls remained.
The women employed were mostly married. In its earliest
days girls worked the machines and older women did the
basting and pressing.
A. Aged about 50. Had worked at the factory from when she left
school at thirteen to the time she married at twenty-four. She started
basting at 3s. a week, working full factory hours, finally by small rises
working at machine for 9s. a week. Did no home work, as she helped her
mother, the rest of the family being boys.
B. Aged about 60. Worked at factory up to 13 years ago ; payment
for pressing and basting was 6s. Qd. a week. Hours 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. ;
Saturdays 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. Machine hands working same hours received
8s. to 9s. The days she ' worked at the factory were the happiest days of
her life'. She ' would gladly go back to work again and no end of girls
(in this village) would go back'. She worked for 16 years at the factory
and was a widow. She brought up her two children on the 6s. 6d., the only
help she received was from a brother for rent.
C. Aged 30-35. Worked as machinist at factory till she married. Hours
were 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. on week days ; 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturdays, with
20 minutes for lunch, one hour for dinner and half an hour for tea, making
an ordinary day of just over 10 hours. She went home for meals. After
she married she took in work at home, doing finishing, button -holes, and
sleeve-heads, receiving 7s., 8s., 9s., or 10s. a dozen. At this time she had
five children. She enjoyed going to the factory.
The highest rate quoted, 9s. a week for a fifty-six hours'
week (meal times excluded) would give less than 2d. an hour ;
it is therefore quite clear that the Trade Board regulation,
which in 1912 fixed a minimum of 3Jd, was evaded. Evidence
points to the desirability of trade union organization in
industries in which wages are regulated by a Trade Board.
Writing in 1915, Mr. R. H. Tawney (Minimum Rates
in the Tailoring Industry) pointed to trade union organiza-
tion as the obvious means of ensuring the enforcement of
the minimum rates, and already the trade boards had been
found an incentive to organization. The fear of Workers'
Union officials that the establishment of a Trade Board in
the gloving industry would prevent the workers joining
the union is not borne out by experience in the tailoring
industry in this district, for the United Garment Makers'
Union has been remarkably successful in enrolling outworkers
and in improving their position. The rates have risen 150
154 NEEDLEWORK AND .SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
per cent, since the war, and the workers who are kept on
probably increased their weekly earnings proportionately.
Employers and employed appear to be on excellent terms,
and it is satisfactory to note that the employers have not
recently had to complain of the poor quality of work.
Though this may be partly due to the turning off of the less
efficient, it is noticed that better pay is an encouragement to
good work.
But it is evident that the employers regard outwork
as a thing of the past in this industry, only surviving to
meet a temporary difficulty. Neither is there any ground for
expecting village factories to be established for producing
clothing of this kind. On the other hand, the work, both
in the home and in the factory, is undoubtedly popular, and
though the expense of rural organization, and the increasing
use of machinery for various purposes, makes it unlikely
that men's tailoring will survive as a rural industry, these
arguments do not necessarily apply to other forms of needle-
work. In connexion therefore with the four needlework
industries investigated, some opinions have been recorded,
and suggestions made, as to the possibilities of co-operative
effort and good organization in turning the village women's
taste for needlework to better account.1 This problem,
however, since it touches on that of art and handicraft, is an
extremely difficult one, and much local investigation will
be necessary to discover how far the obstacles which beset the
voluntary organizer can be overcome in any particular
district.
((/) Machine and Hand-knitting
Here and there, in town and country, knitters are to
be found who make their living, or part of it, by taking
orders for knitting, generally from a woolshop or wholesale
merchant, sometimes directly from neighbours. If wool
can be bought under wholesale conditions, knitting can be
made to pay, and a retailer of wool and fancy needlework has
the additional advantage of a retail connexion and a window
display. Retailers will employ knitters on the premises or
put out the work to be done. At the present time, they are
very busy owing to the shortage and exceedingly poor quality
of woven hosiery, which it is to be hoped is only temporary,
and to the fashion for knitted ' j umpers ' . The following notes
refer to interviews with two wool and fancy shopkeepers who
knit for their customers, and with other individual workers :
1 See p. 171.
MACHINE AND HAND-KNITTING 155
A. Procured a machine three or four years ago. It pays her because
she gets her wool wholesale. Would have to work very hard to make it
pay alone. It needs attention, and she is constantly interrupted for the
shop. She employs one woman, no demand at present to justify more.
She can give Is. a pair for stockings and 9d. for socks, but this bears no
profit. She had been told that eighteen months ago the price given (by
wholesale merchants) for knitting stockings was 3d. a pair. ' Many women
are taken in by advertisements of knitting machines telling them they can
earn £1 a week in their spare time. They cannot possibly do this as they
have to buy wool in small quantities at retail prices. The swindle ought
to be stopped. It is difficult now to get women to knit — e. g. gloves — by
hand, because they are lazy, and won't use their brains.'
B. Visited in July 1919. Employs eight girls, would not teach more.
Has so many orders that she cannot make for stock. Would give Is. Qd.
or so for knitting ladies' stockings. The cashmere ones are so poor that
there is a demand for knitted ones. People will give more for good things
— e. g. a workman had ordered socks at 6s. a pair. Her girls divide the
work ; one machines, another finishes, another presses.
O. Another knitter spoke of home workers being taken in by sellers of
knitting machines. A seller offers 4d. a pair for not less than ten dozen
pairs of stockings. The machine is bought, the buyer not realizing how
long it will take her to make the ten dozen. It takes a long time to learn
to work rapidly, and in the winter the working day is short in the dark
cottages. It is of little use to attempt it as part-time work unless the
mornings can be given to it. She was just now giving a girl 15s. a week
and her tea ; the girl was not very satisfactory. Many girls will not give
fcheir minds to the work and it needs care. There is a good deal of finishing,
when the machine part is done, and this too needs care. Girls at Waifs
and Strays Homes are trained as knitters. Just now, ladies' knitted
' jumpers ' were paying very well indeed. As a rule, she did not get
anything like Id. an hour and did not want to expand. She had just been
asked for samples by a London firm, but had refused. She had the garden
and a house which she let, and with the knitting she could make a living,
but could not save. It paid her far better to work for London wholesale
houses than for local private customers who thought that if a thing were
made locally it ought to be cheap. She was very busy.
D. A male knitter in a small town was also visited. He brought up his
family on his knitting ; he, the son, and two daughters all knit. He left
it off during the war owing to the cost of wool. The son is now doing some-
thing else, but the father and daughters want to take it up again. They
have three machines, all out of repair. They make socks, stockings, vests,
&c. At one time they were well off, but the business dwindled and dwindled,
chiefly owing to the competition of the Co-operative Society (of which he
is a member and strongly approves). They had got the address of the
knitting machine manufacturer from him, and had had similar garments
made in a big factory in Manchester. He would like to knit for a shop
which should supply the wool, and the daughter said she would make
inquiries from shops at Oxford. The father is old, and in receipt of
a pension. They used to display samples in their small window and make
any garment to order.
Machine-knitting ris very suitable for vests, children's
jerseys, &c. Socks and stockings, being nearly always made
of two-ply wool, instead of four-ply, such as is used for hand-
knitting, are very inferior in wear to hand-knitted ones,
156 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
though superior to woven hose in that they are easily
refooted. As for machines, the flat are said to be easier to
work than the round, though hose made on these have to be
seamed up by hand, and this takes some time.
A feAV old hand-knitters were found. One male knitter was
also a lace-maker. Ladies trying to revive hand-knitting as
an industry have sold socks at less than they would cost
knitted by machine. At the present time advertisements
are to be seen for knitters of ladies' jumpers, which state that
there is a great future for them. But it is not probable
that the demand will expand very much, as machine-
knitted jumpers are coming into vogue. Many people
knit their own. With the coarser wool now used, how-
ever, there is very much less work in them than in the
finer knitted coats of a few years ago, and it may here be
remarked that the comparative simplicity and absence of
elaborate trimming in ladies' and children's clothes is in
favour of the hand- worker, since they depend on cut, style
and colour, rather than on the amount of work put into them.
If English knitters would adopt the German method of
manipulating the wool, which is far quicker than that
taught in England, they would have a better chance, but it is
unlikely that hand-knitting is capable of much development
as an industry, in spite of its great usefulness for family
purposes and its value as a pastime and an additional
source of income for those whose sight or health is failing.
The difficulties in the way of machine knitters are : (1) lack
of organization for obtaining material or selling goods to
advantage ; (2) want of skill in using machines ; (3) fraudulent
advertisements of machines. As one of the industries which
can be carried on by crippled or ' sub-ordinary ' workers it is
not without its value, and it is worth considering whether
assistance could not be given to those in possession of
machines by offering instruction in their care and use, and
by establishing a depot for supplying material and disposing
of produce. In a small town in East Yorkshire there is
a stocking factory employing about fourteen girls in which
the machines are run by power. It was doing well before the
war ; it turned out hose, children's jerseys, caps, &c. By
keeping each machine to a particular kind and size of gar-
ment, much time and trouble in setting the machines would be
saved, and probably for this reason a knitter working at home
ought to be in touch with a market which would take one or
two articles in considerable quantity. It may be added that
the United Garment Makers' Union which has done so much
MACHINE AND HAND -KNITTING * 157
for the employers in tailoring might also be successful with
rural knitters.
There is a Joint Standing Industrial Council for the
Hosiery Trade. There is nothing in the law to prevent a
Trade Board being established in the unorganized sections
of the industry, though there might be considerable opposi-
tion from the organizations. But a Trade Board would not
touch the class most in danger of sweating, because they buy
their wool, own their machines and sell their work, and are not
employees. The knitting industry illustrates the dangers :
(1) of instituting a Whitley Council in a trade not com-
pletely organized which covers any considerable number of
unorganized workers ; (2) of evading standard rates, fixed
either by a Trade Board or by organized workers, by supply-
ing material and buying the product, or buying the product
without supplying the material. The Ministry of Labour is
paying attention to this difficulty, but it is extremely
difficult to investigate the conditions in this industry. If all
owners of machines were licenced, discovery and ventilation
of grievances would be easier. But the hand- worker would
not be safeguarded. The most hopeful remedy is education
and better facilities for material, training and sale, through
the Women's Institutes and other bodies who organize
home industries. With the present vogue for hand-knitting
it is of special importance to guard against exploitation.
(e) The Lace Industry
The ' Buckinghamshire lace ' industry extends over
Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire, and Northamptonshire, and
into the Chiltern and Thame district of Oxfordshire, and
is still carried on by the older women.
The women sell a certain amount of lace privately, but
the more usual methods are to dispose of it to dealers who
send buyers to the cottages to take it into shops, or to
dispose of it through one of the voluntary lace associations
which have done much to revive the industry during the
last twenty -five years. The condition of the workers can
clearly be shown by quotations from letters received by
ladies interested in the industry and the workers :
' When I came to live here nearly thirty years ago, I found the village
workers in a sad state. They earned \d. an hour in yarded lace, and Id.
an hour in borders or collars. All work had to be taken to a town seven
miles away, the distance often walked. Sometimes the work was bought,
sometimes not. When bought, half or whole value taken out in drapery
goods. I put myself in communication with a London buyer, learnt to
158 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
make the lace, and began collecting, paying full value in money. After
some years I was rewarded by hearing that Bedford buyers were paying
full value in cash.
Since then so many collectors come round (there are ten now) that I have
gradually withdrawn, especially as I do not like this coarse work called
lace. . . . There is neither point nor yarded lace made here now. In fact
nearly the whole village is making the coarse stuff, that is not worthy of
the name of lace, compared with the beautiful fine work that used to be
made here. Of course the reason is that it is much quicker made and
better paid. One cannot blame the workers. They earn 3rf. or 4d. an hour.
I hear one mother with five children (one a baby) earned 10s. Qd. last week.
Sixpence-halfpenny borders — pre-war — are now Is. \0d. Pre-war 3d.
yard lace is lid. a yard. The cotton has increased from 4s. 6d. Ib. to
£1 4s. Od. wholesale. Some workers in other villages still make the fine
Beds, lace, mostly collars.'
From the Wycombe district :
' I am afraid there is no hope for the industry as far as development
goes. The old lace-makers spent all their school-time from before they
were five years old at their pillows, learning nothing else, and so acquired
a quickness and dexterity in handling their bobbins and pins which none
of the younger people can ever reach. No young woman who has attended
an elementary school and learnt lace-making at home can make as much
lace in an hour as her mother could in fifteen or twenty minutes.
The work can only be done as a little addition to the family income as,
if it was paid for as ifc should be, the price would be a prohibitive one.
Before the war an old woman working most of the day could just earn
a living but she could not do so now.'
From an organizer of the lace industry :
' Trade dealers get hold of these lists and visit our workers.'
From another letter :
' I do not think the. lace will ever produce a living wage ; it is useful
to the aged women, who can earn £5 or £6 a year to augment their old age
pension, but my best workers do not earn 2d. an hour. I once tried to
make this the minimum price, but I could not sell the lace, and I put it
to the workers whether they would return to the lower price or cease
working and they chose the former. I much fear the industry will entirely
fail. I find it very difficult to get any order carried out, and several friends
who belong to the different associations tell me the same thing.'
Another organizer says :
' I can no longer get fine typical Bucks laces made.'
The information contained in these letters is typical of
what has been discovered by personal investigation, and
may be summarized and supplemented as follows.
The Relation of Organization to Conditions of Work
Contrary to what is usually the case with rural industries,
the poorer type of production pays best. Lace of the best
quality does not find a market and has almost ceased to be
made because the price given does not compensate for the
LACE INDUSTRY lf><)
time spent. This may partly be due to the fact that the
organizations for selling the better lace have not been
efficient, through lack of capital or business ability or both.
There is a keen demand for coarse lace l and buyers are
competing with one another in the villages to get hold of
it, and workers who do not need to earn their entire
living are taking up the work and making 15s. a week
or more.
The Anglo-Belgian Lace Association, with which several
other Associations are now affiliated, recently raised the
prices paid to the workers to double that which they were
before the war. The pre-war earnings were in several cases
quoted as 1 %d. an hour ; sometimes 2d. This Association is in
a better position for selling the good work than organizers
who have no London depot, and there is a demand for
fine Bucks, lace, but it is difficult to get the women to
make it.
A great deal of the coarse lace is sold by buyers at 10
per cent, commission to a merchant who carries on a con-
siderable overseas trade, as well as disposing of quantities
in English shops and privately. At the present time, the
workers are getting better terms from the trade buyers
than from the lace associations. But in comparing, a few
months ago, districts where a lace association has been at
work with other districts, it was found that, though the
women did not receive more money per hour, they benefited,
first, by their goods being bought and paid for as soon as
they were finished, and secondly, by the interest taken in
their skill. They were much encouraged by the interest
and were helped by the loan of prickings and the certainty
that all their work would be bought. Unfortunately, the price
given for hand-made lace has been based on a standard of skill
and speed which is quite impossible under modern conditions.
Women brought up from childhood to produce lace as if they
were machines had to compete with the Nottinghamshire
machines and sell to a public which did not discriminate.
Fashion now decrees that hand-made lace shall be used for
household linen, but the public, which wants it cheap, still
does not discriminate between the beauty and wearing
qualities of well-designed and well-made lace and a web
which is carelessly thrown together, and is inferior to a really
good machine-made article. Lace-making has always been
a fluctuating trade, and there is no certainty that the
1 This demand continues (in spite of the fact that foreign lace is now
coming in in large quantities,
100 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
present boom will last. The type of lace now in vogue is
similar to the cheaper sorts of the lace from Malta and
Belgium, where it can be bought very cheap.
It is impossible to tell whether there is a future for good
Bucks, lace, because no attempt has recently been made to
pay a price to the workers which can compete with that
given at the present time for the coarse kinds. It requires
more skill as well as more time. Unless a fairly large output
and sale can be secured it cannot possibly support the cost
of selling. This is clear from the following account of the
industry from a dealer's point of view.
A business worth thousands has been built up in lace
of the Maltese type from very small beginnings, by buying
direct from the cottage doors. Local persons of either sex
with a little capital, say £50, which can be invested in lace,
are invited to buy, and sell to the dealer at 10 per cent.1
The best market is at Xmas and as neither the merchants
nor the retailers care to tie up capital in stock which must
be held for longer than can be helped, good prices are given
before Xmas and there is a rush for the lace. The whole
principle of this business is quick sales ; therefore cheap
types of lace are encouraged. It is possible to make a profit
on a small commission on work for which there is a large
middle-class demand, but it would not pay the dealers to
stock the fine lace which is chiefly bought by the aristocracy.
If voluntary associations, however, have capital at their
disposal and can afford to wait, they have a better chance.
A London retail depot would be far too costly for a merchant
of this type who makes his profit at the busy seasons and
wants to keep his running expenses low.
Competition between the trade and voluntary com-
mercial organizations has benefited the worker to some
extent. But the prices are still too low, and lace is not
made where there is a competing industry, except by old
people. The demand for good lace is also growing, but
trade is so brisk that it is not at the present time worth
a lace-maker's while to lose time over learning a new pattern,
as she is willing to do at slack times. The inference may be
drawn that if the brisk demand were taken advantage of,
the price paid for good lace raised, and the commercial
dealings properly organized, the industry could be put on
a steadier footing. The fact that as many as ten buyers
1 An instance was noted of a grocer who had in any case to visit villages,
and therefore had no extra travelling expense, taking 5 per cent, only
and selling to a lace school.
LACE INDUSTRY 161
were visiting the same village speaks of great waste of time
and money. A London depot for lace alone is extremely
costly in proportion to the scope of the industry. But there
is such a keen demand for dainty white work in the West
End shops that fine Buckinghamshire lace, made up into
well-cut garments, designed to show off the quality of the
lace with no other trimming, would probably sell at prices
which would repay the worker.1 This would benefit the
older women who have learnt the beautiful ' ground point '
and typical Buckinghamshire patterns, who love the work
and in many cases need the earnings.
Training
There are a few lace schools in existence, and a number
of Buckinghamshire schools have applied for lace classes.
There is a shortage of teachers, and traditional workers
sometimes complain that the art is not properly taught in
the schools. This is another piece of evidence to show
the importance of teachers being willing to learn from
local experts. It is hoped by promoters of these schools
that children taught in their school days will take up the
art some day when they are older.
But there are dangers in teaching children a trade which
can be carried on at home. A schoolmaster's wife who
introduced lace-making into the school was obliged to drop
it for the sake of the children's health, because they were
kept at their pillows in the evenings when they ought to
have been playing out of doors. And by teaching the
rudiments of a craft, a supply of cheap labour is created
which could be employed for more useful ends. Lace is
a luxury trade, and it is not in the interests of rural or
national economy that able-bodied women should spend
a considerable part of their time earning threepence or
fourpence an hour in an unnecessary trade. The money
earned is enough to tempt them from other occupations,
and not enough to support them. It shows the urgency
for some form of organization which shall prevent the
exploitation of cheap rural labour. It has been said by
people in the lace trade, that to force up the rates by means
of government regulation would be fatal to the industry,
and possibly if this were done suddenly much hardship
would ensue. But the workers ought undoubtedly to be
organized, and there are signs that they would be willing
1 Throughout the war, the demand for fine lace and needlework on baby
garments continued in spite of a drop in other luxury markets.
2415 T
162 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
to join some form of * Union '. The workers are not them-
selves represented on the Lace Associations as they certainly
ought to be. The methods of sale are wasteful, both in the
trade and in the voluntary associations. There are too
many of the latter, and they depend too much on the
chance of there being a person of business ability available.
If children are taught, restrictions as to the sale of children's
work may be necessary. There is a great deal to be said
in favour of their being taught the traditional patterns.
Lace-making is one of the methods by which * lissomeness '
so useful in needlework and in all kinds of handiwork can
be acquired. The pleasure which the occupation gives to
old or delicate people is evident, and the beautiful work of
some of the older women is a proof that eyesight has not
been impaired.
Workers whom the Industry would benefit, and suggestions
with regard to Organization
The lace industry is not one that should be encouraged
for a large number of rural women as a subsidiary occupation.
Lace-makers in the past were renowned for their ill-health
and pallor, even when the industry was ' flourishing '. But
as a remunerative occupation for girls and women unfit for
ordinary industrial life, it deserves to be encouraged, owing
to the pleasure derived from the work and the beauty of
the lace at its best. The organization of needlework and
other crafts is undertaken by such philanthropic bodies as
the Fine Needlework Association which has a depot in
Beauchamp Place, London. By co-operation with the
Lace Associations and the Women's Institutes, valuable
service could be done to needy lace-makers and to others
who are suited to the work. It would be well worth while
to try the experiment of concentrating on the best workers
and the best designs, paying a fair price for their skill and
time, giving instructions and patterns where necessary,
getting the lace made up on attractive articles by experts
in design and cutting out, and getting into touch with a
' quality market '. All this has been tried, except for adequate
payment. Probably the costs of putting lace on the market,
which have prevented the voluntary organizers from being
able to pay adequate rates for work, would still be pro-
hibitive in any organization which dealt with lace alone,
but if the same organization were dealing with other rural
products, the costs would be distributed, and capitalization
need not be so heavy as for the one industry alone. The
CONCLUSIONS 163
Voluntary Organizations have done valuable service, but
they need co-ordinating. Dealers too have done valuable
service, and it is quite possible that, if they were protected
against risks involved in buying articles which have to wait
for a market, their experience and commercial ability might
be enlisted in economizing commercial costs and raising the
quality of the work.
(/) Summary and Conclusions
The industries included in this Summary are gloving,
ready-made clothing, knitting, lace-making. Dressmaking
to order and designing, making and decorating of ladies'
and children's blouses, frocks, &c., and other forms of fine
needlework may also be conveniently considered in con-
nexion with these. Gloving and ready-made clothing are
part of a factory system, the workers being paid piece rates ;
knitters and lace-makers are ' independent ' and sell their
products. In the gloving and ready-made clothing trades
conditions have greatly improved since the war owing to
competition for labour, Trade Board action, and labour
organization, together with good demand for output. In
the case of gloves, development of the rural work, both at
home and in small factories, is expanding, whereas in the
case of tailoring, rural work is, so far as the existing firms
are concerned, dying out, owing to the heavy costs involved
in small-scale and scattered production, the increase and
complexity of modern machinery and the decrease in the
orders received by manufacturers. In knitting, the expense
and poor quality of woven goods has increased the demand
for machine and hand-knitted hosiery, &c., but knitters are
unorganized and do not seem fitted to take advantage of
the situation. The making of genuine Buckinghamshire
lace is dying out with the older women. Earnings are very
low, and it would be impossible for a woman who had not
devoted the greater part of her school days to the lace
pillow to earn a living wage at lace-making unless the rates
could be doubled at least. There is a great demand for
white needlework and embroidery, &c., of good quality, but
in spite of the time and money devoted to the Buckingham-
shire Lace Industry, sales are uncertain and irregular. There
is a boom in the coarser pillow lace which is bought up by
dealers, and new workers are being attracted to learn, as
they can earn considerably more than on the fine lace.
The Voluntary Organizations have been, undoubtedly,
L2
164 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
a blessing to the workers who have had a regular sale and
immediate payment for all they could make, whereas when
they sell to dealers trade is irregular. With regard to
dressmaking in this neighbourhood no systematic investiga-
tion has yet been made though there are two to six dress-
makers in many villages.1 A few of the old smockers are
still to be found who do beautiful work. In the course of
investigation, however, certain facts have emerged and
opinions have been recorded, which throw light on the
possibilities of needlework industries if efficiently organized
on co-operative lines.
Co-operative Organizations of Needlework and Similar
Industries
Gloving, ready-made clothing, and knitting are all carried
on by machinery, and are capable of expansion by means
of power applied to small factories. The heavy type of
clothing made in Oxford, however, is not suitable for rural
production. Hand-knitting, lace, embroidery, and hand-
sewing of gloves, are home industries. But in hand as in
machine work the possibilities of the village workshop in
providing companionship, economy in lighting and heating,
and peace from family interruptions, as well as facilities
for supervision and instruction, should not be overlooked.
In gloving, the methods are combined ; the village workshop
or factory is the centre of instruction and the depot for
the work, but in order to make the organization pay, home
workers are also employed. This arrangement, where the
pay is adequate, is certainly popular amongst workers. The
girls like the factory, but the mothers who cannot leave
1 Village Dressmakers and Trade Board Regulations :
Village dressmakers give an example of how Trade Board regulations
can fail to stamp out sweating. If there are as many as four or six dress-
makers working independently in one village, they can undercut one
another and then prevent one another from employing labour, which at
the cut prices and the Trade Board rates would be too costly. Probably
there is no more sweated class than the village dressmaker, who will sit
up for long hours to finish an order, because her prices are far too low and
she therefore takes more work than she can get through in reasonable
working hours. She is an extremely useful person to the villagers, since
she can turn old garments into new and cut down grown-ups' clothes for
the children. A very useful work would be done by an organization which
should supply the dressmakers with sufficient work for external sale so
that they were steadily employed, and need not, therefore, take in more
work than they could in times of a rush. They are apprenticed, often
clever and skilled, and are very ready to learn. Their help should be
enlisted in a scheme for developing needlework industries.
CONCLUSIONS 165
their homes like work which can be done at odd times at
home, and for those who have time it appears to be valuable
as a pleasant pastime. But the principle of supplementary
work at a lower standard of payment for the leisure hours
is dangerous. For an able-bodied woman it ought to be
unnecessary. If she prefers to use her so-called ' leisure '
in making articles for sale, she ought to be paid a fair
price if the work is good. By taking as a criterion the
economic soundness of an industry, its ability to support
its workers at a living wage is obviously encouraged. Poor
work of any kind is unsatisfactory from every point of
view. Dealers are always ready to take advantage of cheap
labour, and it is essential that home industries should only
be organized on a basis of rates of payment which would
afford a living to the normal workers for a normal day's
work. Otherwise these ' pocket -money ' workers will
compete unfairly with others who are entirely dependent
on this kind of work. On 4)he other hand, the fact that
knitting, lace, and gloves can be picked up at odd moments,
do not take up the space of a machine, and can be taken
out of doors and done whilst ' minding ' the children, is an
argument in favour of rather a lower scale of pay than
should be maintained for more exacting work.
There is no reason why expert business ability should not
be available for the voluntary societies which encourage the
crafts, in spite of the fact that they have in the past been
inclined to hold themselves aloof from ordinary trade as
something tricky and degrading, not without reason. The
importance and the method of securing a steady market
is not always understood. An occasional exhibition is -a
useful and necessary form of advertisement and may secure
orders ; some effective system of distribution of goods
through the trade is also necessary. But the expenses of
establishing many small industries are prohibitive unless
met by private means, and where an industry depends on
an individual well-wisher who gives time and money, it is
apt to collapse when this help is withdrawn. It may never-
theless be perfectly sound, only time being required to put
it on a self-supporting basis. It is very possible that grants
given to this or that particular industry in its early stages
might have a similar result ; it might collapse if the grant
were withdrawn. The commercial side of rural industries
is frequently under-capitalized. But real and valuable
assistance could be given by promoting organization on
co-operative lines, i. e. by encouraging co-ordination and
L3
166 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
economy in buying and selling, by placing trade information
at the disposal of organizers, by expert instruction not only
in craftsmanship but in every branch of the business, and
by making widely lyiown the opportunities of the industries,
keeping a register of proficient craftsmen and craftswomen,
and standardizing wages and prices, with special provision
for learners and sub -normal workers.
The making of garments with smocking, stichery, simple
embroidery, knitting, lace, also glove -making and furriery
could be organized in villages by a combination of factory
or workshop work and part-time home work. Quite apart
from monetary advantages, needlework is a pleasure and
interest even to able-bodied women in their leisure, and
to the disabled it is invaluable. The women who would
chiefly benefit by organized rural industries are :
(1) Old and elderly people who are left without sufficient
means for independence.
(2) Old or delicate people whe need interest and occupation
and would be glad of some extra money.
(3) Delicate, disabled or other sub -normal people who
must support themselves.
(4) People with a certain amount of leisure who either
need, or are glad of, pocket-money.
(5) Girls too young to go into service or other work or
are needed at home, and need (a) occupation and interest ;
(6) training which will be useful either in their work or
their homes afterwards ; (c) money to help towards main-
tenance.
There are enough people in these categories to form an
important part of the rural community. It would inflict
hardship in many cases if prices and rates were fixed in
such a way that these people should be precluded from
earning. The problem is how to give them occupation
without doing harm to others who are industrially employed.
If the payment were as far as possible standardized on the
basis of the earnings per hour of the normal worker working
under normal conditions, it would be possible to pay the
sub-normal worker or learner according to her ability, and
in necessitous cases to supplement it. The societies which
already exist for helping these cases, i. e. giving work,
holidays, and sometimes a home, to invalids, could be
assisted and their work correlated and extended. In every
county a register could be kept on which all sub-normal
and disabled workers should be invited to enter their names.
Voluntary workers could be enlisted to visit the cases in
CONCLUSIONS 167
their locality, existing agencies being used where practicable.
Particulars of the workers' abilities could be registered.
Material and machines could be bought on good terms, and
depots established for distributing and collecting the work.
The Women's Institutes, Girls' Friendly Society, Charity
Organization Society, the schools, the Workers' and
Garment Makers' Unions could all be invited to help. It
is not suggested that the organization should touch invalids
or old people only, but any who are in real need of this kind
of employment, or who could be productively employed in
it. The Federation of Women's Institutes have arranged
useful courses, e. g. in rabbit-skin glove-making, rush basket-
making, &c., but it seems that in many cases the women who
learn to make these things are not really in need of the
employment and are too busy to keep it up. Industries have
sometimes been encouraged at the expense of other impor-
tant work. The Institute is a valuable channel for instruc-
tion, and the atmosphere of a good Women's Institute is
favourable to co-operative enterprise. And considering the
great part played by personal reputation and credit in rural
businesses, the ' goodwill ' of an organization such as the
Women's Institutes is a real business asset. This develop-
ment has greatly improved the prospect for rural industries,
and has shown how they can be organized. But the improved
agricultural wage has done even more, for it has taken away
from the workers the necessity to compete and undercut
one another for a ' sweated wage ' to eke out the weekly
earnings for a scanty livelihood.
Possibilities of development of needlework industries
Four retailers of clothing were visited in Oxford and
consulted as to the likelihood of a steady demand for well-
cut and well-designed children's clothes. Two of these
wished to see samples, one laying stress on the high standard,
good finish, and accurate cutting required ; the others stating
that a great variety of styles would be needed : it was
difficult to get the type of clothing they required, and
they preferred not to stock more than a quarter or half
a dozen of - one style, these to be cut in different sizes.
This firm would prefer to supply its own material. Both
were expanding their own workshops for this kind of work.
A third stated that clothes made in the neighbourhood
would be of no use to them. The buyer in the fourth pointed
out the great difficulties to be faced. From the samples
168 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
which he already had for next spring (he was visited in
August) it could be seen at a glance how useless it would
be to attempt to compete with power-driven machinery in
the cheap lines. He explained that these would be turned
out in huge quantities, the material in one colour alone
being purchased by the thousand yards. The only hope
would be to make a ' specialty '. If, however, power were
to be installed in local factories it would be a different
matter. He would be glad to give any help he could. As
a business speculation it would be a risky one. He sells
a certain amount of Irish knitting, but amateurs do not
realize the importance of exactness in quotations of sizes, &c.
As to demand, if shown two articles of identical quality,
purchasers at the present time choose the more expensive,
imagining it to be better or smarter, such is their ignorance
as compared with their mothers. But this state of things
would not last ; when there was less money people would
have to buy the cheapest they could get.
The secretaries of two County Fruit and Vegetable
Societies see possibilities in a scheme for distribution and
collective marketing of village needlework. One stated
that it would be a distinct advantage to his society if the
vans used for collecting market produce, of which there is
not always enough to pay the transport expenses, could also
be utilized for distribution and collection of other articles.
The depot for these would have to be close to the depot for
garden produce in each village, to avoid waste of time in
collecting. The other thought it a matter which might be
taken up by the Women's Institutes. The great difficulty
in these collecting schemes is the poor quality of much of
the produce and the failure of the villagers to realize the
importance of the appearance and condition of their vege-
tables, &c. All are agreed that the articles must be of
good quality so that the prices can support the expenses
of organizing small-scale industry.
Another difficulty lies in the rapid changes of fashion
and consequent instability of the market for clothing.
Retailers dare not give large contracts because as soon as
a big manufacturer pushes a new style by engineering the
fashion, stocks are left on hand which can only be sold at
less than cost price. Hence the huge prices asked for
fashionable clothes whilst in season.
Briefly, the difficulties are uncertainty of demand, expense
of transport, &c., and the need for skill in cutting out,
designing, finished workmanship, and expert knowledge in
CONCLUSIONS 169
accurate grading and quotation of sizes, styles, &c. But if
capital were available and good salaries are offered for first-
rate designers, cutters and business managers and instructors,
all these difficulties might be met. They must be considered
separately.
(1) Demand
There is an important distinction between a luxury and
quality market. It is obviously unwise to attempt to cater
for an unstable luxury market. It is on the other hand
useless to compete in goods which are turned out satisfac-
torily in huge quantities from big factories with power -
driven machines. But in clothing there is necessarily a good
deal of hand-work, and the public which demands individu-
ality, Wasteful simplicity, good cut and decoration done by
hand, is increasing rapidly. Education by means of Infant
Welfare Centres and Mothercraft Schools is improving the
taste of working women in the same direction. At present
the demand for embroidery and embroidered garments
cannot be met. The question is how to get the workers
in touch with the market with the utmost economy in
organization.
Exactly the same problem arises in other rural crafts.
Carpenters often make beautiful furniture and smiths do
beautiful iron work of a kind for which there is plenty of
demand, but they have little opportunity of coming into
contact with it. For disabled men or men unfit for heavy
work light craft work is useful, both for its curative and
pecuniary value. The remedy would be to establish local
depots for the sale of local products in good shopping centres
and places frequented by visitors. Oxford, for instance,
would be an excellent centre. But isolated depots would
be of little use. They should be linked up with one another
and a clearing-house established in connexion with a London
depot, special regard being paid to export facilities. Such
industries as already have London depots derive great
benefit, but expense would be minimized if these were
better co-ordinated. They cannot in any case take the
place of local depots, which have the advantage of local
interests.
The question whether the establishment of new depots
would be better than making use of existing business houses
is difficult. Granted real business ability, the new depot
would probably be best, for an ordinary business firm will
not tell its customers where its wares are produced. The
170 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
special interest of locality in the case of crafts adds a very
real value, and such names as Thames Riverside Rush
Industries, Cotswold Elf, Bowls from Turners' Green, &c.,
are attractive. There is a still more important educative
value. One of the serious rural problems is the lack of
intelligence on the part of the village shopkeepers. They
have little opportunity of comparing and judging of the
value of goods ; they are supplied by commercial travellers
and have not much variety to choose from. And sales are
still made at the cottage and farmhouse door on a system
of credit and instalment which is certainly a temptation to
extravagance to village girls and women. An existing village
shop might be made the depot of local produce, or a special
shop established. It would be the distributing and collecting
centre, keeping in touch with a larger depot in the market
town, which again would combine the functions of retail
house and clearing-house, the principle of organization being
to meet local requirements and to dispose of the surplus in
the best market. Further, if it pays a commercial busi-
ness to send round agents to the villages for the sale of
all kinds of goods from sewing-machines and coats and
skirts to buttons and boot-laces, it might pay to use the
collecting vans for the distribution of finished products.
The trade methods, e. g. the use of buyers and commercial
travellers, could be adopted with great economy by a co-
operative society for all kinds of suitable rural produce.
Dairies send milk vans long distances for the collection of
milk, and the development of motor traffic has provided the
needed channel between the villages along the main routes.
For the improvement of the village shop we may certainly
look to better education as the surest means. When children
are trained in co-operative methods while still at school
they will apply them later to trade and production, and the
best kind of business ability, i. e. the power of meeting
peoples' wants promptly and economically, will be commoner.
(2) Transport
It has already been suggested that collecting vans already
in use should be employed in distributing and collecting
needlework. Where villages are away from the route,
carriers could connect them with a convenient depot. It
must be remembered with regard to transport that the
articles should be light and compact in relation to their
value, as in the case of fur and leather gloves.
CONCLUSIONS 171
(3) Designing and Cutting. Instruction
It would be absolutely necessary to employ an experienced
cutter who could cut to scale and grade the sizes accurately.
In order, however, to give the amplest possible scope to
local talent, he or she should be ready to make use of the
local dressmakers, who would be valuable as organizers and
supervisors in their own villages. The dressmakers have
usually served an apprenticeship but would probably be
thankful for the opportunity of further instruction. The
same principle applies to design. If the industry is to
develop healthily, originality in design should be encouraged.
If the articles are to be strictly uniform they had far better
be made in a large factory. There must, of course, be
uniformity to a certain extent, in order to make it possible
to sell in bulk, but the uniformity to be aimed at should be
in accurate cutting, good quality, and careful finish, rather
than in colouring and design. The very strength of a rural
industry is that it is done under conditions which are
favourable to originality and artistic growth ; the small
workshop and not the large factory is the nursery of art.
It is true that ' Arts and Crafts ' organizers have seldom
succeeded in getting good or passable designs from the
workers, but what has been impossible in the past may
be easy in the future. The dearth of artistic talent is
partly the result of our neglect of art in education ; it
has made us as a nation suffer, slums gladly,, and has also
deprived us of invaluable sources of healthy enjoyment.
Part of the instruction should be in the principles of design,
in form, colour, and decoration. The result of such teaching
where given becomes apparent in increased interest and
better workmanship, even if it fails to evoke originality.
The staff of the local Education Authority would have to
be enlarged and instruction could be arranged through
Women's Institutes. This is already being done, but there
is a shortage of teachers, and special training for teachers
would probably be necessary.
In considering the expense of instruction, it must be
remembered that even if the industry is unable to bear
the expense involved, it is well worth undertaking. First,
because women like needlework. Secondly, because it is
advisable to give the best training in home-making. It is
difficult to get girls to take sufficient trouble to become
skilled in an occupation which they only look upon as
temporary and expect to cease with marriage. Even if they
172 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
do not marry, there are a variety of good openings for first-
rate needlewomen as well as for other branches of house-
wifery. The important point is that it should be ' first-rate '.
With the difficulty of finding suitable employment for
young country girls near home, the educational aspect of
rural industry should be kept in sight. If a village industry
helped to provide employment and the means of livelihood
to young people in a group of villages while they were
receiving continued education under the new Act, and at
the same time provided training for the future, it would
more than justify its existence. Many mothers fear to send
•their young girls away to face town life or life in domestic
service at the delicate and immature age of fourteen, and
yet cannot afford to keep them at home unless they are
earning. If the houses are enlarged and improved, the
establishment of village workshops and even the organiza-
tion of home-work would meet the difficulty. The preference
of girls for factory rather than home-work should be remem-
bered ; and the gloving and ready-made clothing industries
give examples of how large-scale production, in the matter
of cutting out and other processes, can be combined with
small-scale production under the same firm.
For the establishment of a needlecraft industry in a county,
at least two well-paid organizers would be necessary : a
business manager and a practical superintendent of the
work. The peripatetic teachers of the Education Authorities
could also be utilized ; this arrangement would have the
advantage of connecting the instruction given in the schools
with the development of the industry.
Existing organizations should be used, but the control
should be in the hands of a business manager engaged for
the purpose. The same manager might also be in charge
of other co-operative societies, or it might be better, as in
the case of a poultry and egg society which is managed by
a prominent and enterprising grocer in the market town,
to put a retailer, with a ready-made connexion, in charge
of the organization at first.
Accounts should be accurately kept not only at the
centre, but in every village, and books should be available
for inspection in order to ensure that the rates of pay are
satisfactory, and the whole management economical.
Instruction in keeping accounts would be a grefct help to
organizers of village industries, and the keeping and pro-
duction of accounts should be a condition of a.ny grants
received.
CONCLUSIONS 173
Capital for opening depots, meeting salaries at the begin-
ning, and buying in bulk, &c., will be necessary. One of
the difficulties mentioned by amateurs is the unwillingness
of big firms to supply trhem direct with material or to allow
any reduction on a quantity. A central body which could
secure good terms and hold stocks, both of material and of
products, would be necessary. Such a body would also be
in a position to give advice as to the state of the market
and new openings ; it could disperse the products over
a wide market so that a certain sameness would not interfere
with the customer's desire not to be dressed exactly like
her neighbours ; it could also advertise with greater economy
than the local organizations. At the same time it need not
hamper local initiative nor supersede voluntary effort. In
order to secure the best results, there should be co-operation
both locally and centrally between the education authorities,
the agricultural departments, and the employment bureaux.
The scheme here worked out for needlework could be
adapted for other crafts, especially for such crafts as supply
the needs of the home, for it is in household goods, toys,
upholstery, light furniture, &c., as well as in clothing, that
diversity and originality are demanded. The need for
originality must be borne in mind, for when the models
come to be copied in large-scale production, it will be
necessary for the workers to have the power of striking
a new line.
Survival of Weaving and Hand-looms
The weaving for which Berkshire was famous before the
woollen industries migrated to the West and North, where
more rapid streams gave greater water power, and later,
where coal and iron were near, survives only in the
Witney blanket and the Chipping Norton cloth factories,
the carpets of Abingdon, the plush of Shutford, and the
hand-woven headpieces for halters which are made at the
old rope -works in several small towns. At Oxford hand-
woven materials are made, some of the workers being blind
and disabled people, and there is a good sale for their work.
It seems advisable to defer reporting on new or revived
weaving industries until other examples have been studied.
The cloth and blanket factories are in no sense rural, except
for their situation in an agricultural district. It is interesting
to know that the Chipping Norton cloth factory used at one
time to turn out horse cloth. There are a few hand-looms
174 NEEDLEWORK AND SIMILAR INDUSTRIES
here, called pattern looms, new patterns being woven in
small pieces on these. But the hand pattern looms are being
superseded by power pattern looms with a special device
suited to the purpose of weaving many patterns on one piece.
In the Abingdon Carpet Works only hand-looms are used,
and the weavers are mostly old men who are content to
work as they have worked in the past though their earnings
are not high. The Thames rushes are woven into the Isis
matting, which is a speciality of this firm ; each rush is
pushed through the warp, which is of yarn. These looms
are worked by women. It cannot be known whether the
demand for hand- woven English carpets can survive the
increasing cost of production for long. At the little village
of Shutford, five miles from Banbury 5 plush is made both
on power and on hand-looms for a varied demand. Before
the war all the Courts of Europe were clothed on state
occasions in Oxfordshire plush from Shutford or Banbury.
The seats of the English Houses of Parliament are uphol-
stered in Shutford plush. Brilliant patterns were shown of
pieces sent to Turkey and Roumania, but it could not be
foretold whether this connexion would be worked up again.
Dyeing used at one time to be done at Shutford, but now the
material for the plush, silk, cotton, or mohair is dyed
elsewhere. The power-looms are run by a twenty-horse-
power suction gas-engine, supplied by Tangyes of Birming-
ham, which effects a great saving in fuel; the manager
stated that the gas product of one ton of coal was used in
three weeks as against three or four tons of coal a week by
the steam engine used formerly. The hand-looms are used
principally for a very strong mohair plush, supplied to
cotton mills, where it is put on rollers to which the fabric
clings in the process of weaving. There is a good demand
for this plush. The machine-made plush is woven double ;
two pieces worked face to face on the loom are cut apart
as the weaving proceeds, leaving the pile standing out
on the inner surface. The pile of hand- woven plush has to
be shaved by hand. Beautifully made shears and shuttles
used in the industry are the products of bygone craftsmen
of the district. Plush is no longer made in Banbury itself,
the only survival of weaving here being webbing for horses'
halters.
There are several examples of horses' halter-heads being
woven by hand at rope-works, where the only ropes still
made are the short pieces used for the reins of these halters.
At one rope -walk long pieces were being turned out by three
SURVIVAL OF WEAVING AND HAND-LOOMS 175
generations in a family business who also spin their yarn,
but rope-making has for the most part departed to sea-ports
and larger towns where machinery is used. Short lengths
are twisted by means of a jack to which the ends are fastened.
Boys do this work ; girls who weave the webbing do not like
dipping their hands in the size used in making rope. The
looms are simple and primitive in character and could easily
be made by a carpenter. One end is fixed to a wall at
a convenient height for handling and the other on a stand
on the floor. The halter-heads are woven in a piece about
six feet long. The warp passes backwards and forwards in
one piece, round a screw at each end, the loops at either
end being gathered when the weaving is done and button-
holed with string into strong round eyelets. It is the
strength of these eyelets, not obtainable in a halter made
of cut lengths of webbing which fray at the ends, which
accounts for the survival of this industry. When the
industry was investigated the workers were poorly paid,
and it was suffering from severe competition from the
East End, but it has recently come under a Trade Board.
Though there is a keen demand for these hand- woven
halters, a local employer found it impossible to com-
pete in the wholesale market because only two of his girls
would work and keep up the output. He had, therefore,
dismissed the others. He said that large firms where a
forewoman could keep the girls in order were supplying
the wholesale market. The rates were so low before the
Trade Board that the industry was not likely to attract
good workers. Another reason given for the survival is that
it is worth the while of a man in a small way of business to
make certain articles himself where the demand is not great
enough for him to purchase large quantities wholesale.
Thus a rope and yarn dealer will get some of his yarn woven
into halter heads though he buys all his rope. Halter-makers
are in some cases employed by ironmongers. The survival
of this interesting industry points to a possibility that it
might pay to make small articles, such as girdles, hat-bands,
children's reins, on hand-looms where lengths of cloth would
not pay. It would be worth while to give these halter-
weavers the opportunity and encouragement to learn to
adapt their skill and their looms to making various objects,
in good colouring and interesting patterns, for their own use
or for sale, for constant work on the same material and in the
same colour is very monotonous. It takes about twenty
minutes to weave a headpiece for a halter.
INDEX
Agriculture, 40.
and economic value of rural
industries, 66.
and repairing businesses, 44, 66.
in relation to rural industries, 18,
56, 57, 58, 59, 67.
a seasonal industry, 50.
and transport, 43.
use of by-products of, 42.
Agricultural baskets, 30.
engines, other uses for, 43.
implements, manufacture of, 21.
life, 40.
prosperity, 52, 61.
wages, 23, 101, 109, 167.
wages, subsidizing, 56, 60.
Allotments, 52.
Amalgamated Society of Wood-
working Machinists, 91.
Anglo-Belgian Lace Association,
159.
Apprenticeship, 16, 36, 37, 38, 39,
73, 121, 127, 136, 171.
Apprentices and learners, 74, 125,
126.
Area investigated, 19.
Artist-craftsman, sphere of, 66.
Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society,
76.
Arts and Crafts organizers, 171.
Automatic lathes, 91.
Barrel-hoops, 23, 92, 93.
demand for, 83.
Basket-makers, classification of,
122, 123, 124.
rural, 30, 122, 130, 134.
Basket-making, 21, 23, 24, 30, 31,
35, 52, 54, 120-34.
competition with Holland, 124.
factories, 127.
firms, types likely to prosper, 131.
and capital, 121, 131, 133.
and Employers' Association, 125.
and labour, 126, 132.
and openings in, 126, 127.
and prospect of development,
127.
and training, 132.
and wages, 128, 129, 138, 139.
and women's labour, 127, 128
Bench-sawing in saw mills, 53.
Besom-making, 23, 94, 95.
Bicycle and motor shop, 27.
Bowl turnery, 112, 113.
Box- and toy-making, 53.
Broom-makers, 94, 95, 96.
lack of co-operation, 95.
and wages, 96.
Broom-making as part-time occupa-
tion, 96.
By-products, 48, 49.
of agriculture, 42.
Canal, neglect of, 90.
Capital, of small businesses, 26, 27,
72'.
Capitalization of —
basket-making, 121, 133.
coppice-growing, 87.
gloving, 144.
lace industry, 27, 160.
osier- growing, 133.
needlework and similar indus-
tries, 169, 173.
small retail shop, 27.
Carpentry, 24, 38.
Census of occupation 1911, 44,
52.
Chair-leg turnery, 102, 103, 104.
costs and earnings, 104, 105, 106.
prospects, 106.
Chair-making, 23, 24.
caning and rushing, 53.
earnings of workers, 33, 107, 108,
109.
prospects, 110.
and power machinery, 104, 107.
and toy industry, 111.
Charity Organization Society, 167.
Claims for assisting rural industries,
64.
Classification of industries, 20, 21.
local basket-makers, 122, 123,
124.
Clothing, demand for, 24.
industries, 49, 149-54.
Cobbling, 24.
Commission on sales, 29, 160.
Cooperage, 24, 92, 93.
Co-operation and education, 40,
73.
Co-operative organization, 26, 71,
72, 164, 167.
INDEX
177
Coppices, figures showing the differ-
ence in value of, 81.
Copse wood, method of selling, 79.
Copyright, 66.
Cost of administration, 29.
Country craftsmen, qualities of, 60.
County Fruit and Vegetable So-
cieties, 168.
Crate-rods, 23, 92, 93.
Creative work, 16.
Credit, 30, 167.
banks, 26.
Danger of possible failure of rural
industries, 57, 58.
Decline of rural industries, causes
of, 64.
Delicate persons, 54.
Demand for clothing, 24.
Demand for needlework, 169, 170.
Depopulation, combating, 55.
Development of market towns, 63.
Disabled persons, 49, 54.
Disabled soldiers, 55.
Disabled soldiers training in basket-
making, 96.
Disabled soldiers training in broom-
making, 126, 133.
Domestic service, 44, 52, 53.
Dressmakers, 34, 49, 50, 164, 171.
Dressmaking, 34, 53, 54, 163, 164.
Dyeing, 174.
Earnings (see also Wages), 31, 33,
46, 113.
causes of decline in agricultural,
101.
causes of improvement in, 32.
Economic prospects of rural in-
dustries, 64.
importance of subsidiary work-
shop crafts, 49.
value of rural industries, 66.
Economy in commerce, 72.
the use of power and transport,
43.
Education, general, 36, 38, 40, 60,
61, 62, 64, 66, 70, 72, 73, 74, 75.
Act, 1918, 52, 73.
adult, 74.
and co-operation, 40, 73.
and infant welfare centres, 169.
and mothercraft schools, 169.
Educational interest and transport,
62, 66, 72, 75.
agencies, 74.
work of societies, 76.
Electrical power, 28, 43, 91, 143, 145.
Employers' Association, 125, 129,
130.
Employment of spare labour, 50.
Engines, 88, 90.
small, portable steam, 27, 43, 45,
174, 175.
gas and petrol, 27.
oil, 27, 43, 46, 91, 104.
Evening classes in woodwork, 38.
Expansion of rural industries,
causes of, 65.
Failure of rural industries, danger
of, 57, 58.
Farriers, 27, 46, 47, 48.
Farriery, 24, 38.
Federation of Women's Institutes,
167.
Fine Needlework Association, 162,
Fur Craft Guild, 147.
Future development of rural in-
dustries, 77, 78.
Gardens as seasonal work, 51.
Garment Makers' Union, 167.
General education, 36, 38, 40, 60,
61, 62, 64, 66, 70, 72, 73, 74, 75.
Girls' Friendly Society, 167.
Gloves, demand for, 24, 147.
making, 51, 135-49.
Gloving —
hand, 146, 147, 164.
industry, 23, 51, 53, 56, 163, 164,
165, 172.
and adolescent labour, 145.
and alternative occupations, 146.
competition in, 143, 144.
curing skins for, 147.
earnings, 137, 138, 139, 148.
and eggs, 147, 148.
and electrical power, 139, 140,
143, 145.
and encouragement of village
workshops, 145.
and expectation of development,
144.
and fur glove industry, 147.
and labour, 146.
and labour-saving machinery, 148.
and methods of dressing sheep-
skin for, 147.
organization of, 142, 143.
policy of firms and workers, 137.
proportion of different workers
engaged in, 136.
178
INDEX
Grants, 133, 134.
Gullies, 42, 80, 81, 86.
value of, 81, 87.
Halter-heads or head stalls, 23, 175,
176.
Halter-makers, 30.
Hand-gloving, 146, 147, 164.
Hand-knitting, 164.
Hand-pattern looms, 16, 23, 174.
Hand-woven English carpets, 174,
175.
Hawking, 29, 30.
Hobbies, 55.
Home Arts and Industries Associa-
tion, 76.
Home-craft, 55.
Home-industries, 56.
Hoop-making, 92, 93.
Horses' halter-heads woven by
hand, 175, 176.
Housing, 62, 76, 84.
Hurdles, 38.
demand for, 100.
racing, 30.
sheep, 30.
Hurdle-making, 23, 52, 79, 97. 98,
99, 100, 101.
and wages, 98, 99, 100.
Industrial councils, 69, 74, 108, 125,
126, 143, 157.
Institute of Industrial Art, 76.
Insurance Act, 150.
Knitters, 34, 70, 71, 154.
difficulties of, 156.
Knitting, 31, 155, 156, 163, 164,
165.
dangers, 157.
earnings, 155.
machine, 155, 156.
opportunities of development,
154, 156.
Lace, 24, 27, 29, 39, 157-63, 164,
165.
Associations and the Women's
Institutes, 162.
coarse, keen demand for, 159,
160.
condition of the workers in, 157,
158.
earnings, 159, 163.
extent of Buckinghamshire, 157.
Maltese, 160.
and organization, 158-63.
training, 161.
Lack of capital, 27, 72.
market facilities, 62.
openings, 52.
ready money, 28.
Land work for women, 53.
Large-scale industry, 17.
machinery, 27.
production, 65, 66.
Lathes worked by gas power, 114.
Learners, 36, 37.
and apprentices, 74.
rates, 37.
Leather-dressing, 21, 147-9.
factories on co-operative lines,
148, 149.
Leisure, encroachment upon neces-
sary hours of, 56, 57.
Letting lodgings, 53.
Local Advisory Committees, 77.
Local Government, 62.
Local market, 29, 30.
Machinery and turneries, 80.
leather dressing, 148.
toys, 111.
Manual occupation as a hobby, 54,
55.
Market for
clothing, 168.
eggs, fruit, 29, 53.
osiers, 121.
parts and for chairs, 107.
vegetables, 53.
Marketing farm products, 59.
schemes, 71.
Master Farriers' Association, 25, 38,
46, 47, 48.
Master Wheelwrights and Imple-
ment Makers' Association, 45.
Material for
basket-making, 130, 132.
bowl turnery, 112
chair manufacture, 108, 109.
glove-making, 141.
Middleman, function of, 27.
Needlework industries, 163, 164,
172.
capital for, 173.
demand for, 169, 170.
designing and cutting, 171.
difficulties of, 168, 169.
instruction in, 171, 172.
market for, 168.
INDEX
179
Needle work industries (continued) —
possibilities of development of,
167, 169.
power-driven machinery, 168.
suggestions for establishing, 172,
173.
suggestions for organizations, 172.
and transport, 168, 170.
Oil engines, 27, 43, 46, 91, 104.
Organization of craftsmen, 48, 104.
on co-operative lines, 165.
of labour, 33, 68, 107, 137, 163.
of rural industries, 16, 25, 26, 59,
64, 104, 125, 131, 137, 144, 154,
166-9.
Organizations, voluntary, 163.
Organizers, Arts and Crafts, 171.
Osier-beds, 23, 87, 116, 119, 120,
122, 125, 133.
Osier-growing, 24, 42, 116-20, 132.
and capital, 133.
and labour, 117.
and prices, 117, 118.
and wages, 118.
suggestions for development of,
133, 134.
Osiers for basket-making, 130, 131.
Over- crowding, 61.
Paper- bag making, 91.
Part-time industry, 55.
and general education, 62, 66.
and seasonal worker, 51, 52.
People living in the country who are
not agricultural workers, 52.
who desire some manual occupa-
tion as a hobby, 54.
Philanthropic bodies, 54.
Pill boxes, 23, 89.
Plush, 23.
machine-made and hand-woven,
174, 175.
Pocket-money, desire for, 18, 55.
workers, 165.
Pole lathe, 113.
Power and machinery, 27, 107, 114,
115, 139, 168, 174.
Power machinery for chair-making,
104, 107.
glove-making, 139, 140.
Power pattern looms, 174.
Prices, dislike to raising, 25.
standardizing, 166.
Production of food and of raw
materials, 15, 21, 58, 59.
Prospects in
basket-making, 127.
chair-leg turnery, 48, 106.
turnery, 92.
Rakes, demand for, 23, 88.
Rake-making, 101.
and wages, 101.
Rapid changes in the market for
clothing, 168.
Ready-made clothing industry, 23,
139, 149, 163, 164, 172.
Reconstruction committees, 33, 34,
35, 39, 69, 132, 133, 134, 143,
144, 147.
Registration in farriery, 38.
Reins for horses, 23.
Standardizing prices, 49.
Steam engines, 43.
small portable, 27.
Stocking factory, 156.
Stokenchurch chair manufacture,
106-11.
Subnormal people, suitable work
for, 54, 166.
Subsidizing agricultural wages, 56, 60.
Suggestions for organization of
needlework industries, 172.
Supplying agricultural needs, 44,
45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 52.
Survival of rural industries, causes
of, 65.
Sweated industries, 70 ; rates, 56.
Tailoring, 25, 54, 149, 163.
Tanning, 147-8.
Technical training, 36, 38, 73.
Timber industries, 102.
Timber Merchants' Association, 107.
Toys and machinery, 111.
opening for, 28, 90, 92, 111.
Trade Boards, 33, 34, 37, 39, 50, 70,
117, 143, 150, 152, 153, 157, 163.
organization, 72, 149.
Trade Unions, 24, 31, 33, 34, 49,
56, 68, 69, 70, 71, 91, 100, 125,
127, 130, 153.
Treadle machines in glove-making,
140.
Training in
basket-making, 132.
glove-making, 140, 141, 144, 145.
lace-making, 161.
Transport, 28, 30, 42, 43, 53, 59,
62, 63, 64, 66, 72, 75, 76, 104,
115, 150.
180
INDEX
Transport
and agriculture, 43.
and chair manufacture, 110.
and underwood industries, 90.
and village needlework, 168, 170.
of wool and leather, 43.
Turnery, 23, 31, 84, 86, 88, 91, 101.
prospects of, 92.
unsuitable for weak chests, 92.
Turneries, 42, 90, 114.
and machinery, 80.
Types of firms investigated, 26.
Underpayment, 32.
Underwood industries, 23, 42, 79-
115.
and gamekeeping, 84.
and labour, 84, 86, 87, 90.
and transport, 90.
and wages, 85, 86, 91.
dealers in, 79.
decline in trade, causes of, 82,
83, 85.
division of, 80.
improvement in trade, causes of,
82, 83, 84.
possible development of, 80-115.
Underwoods, neglect of, 85.
care of, 87.
Underwood turnery and pole lathes,
88.
electricity, 91.
machinery, 91.
United Garment Makers' Union,
153, 156.
Utilization of land and material for
industries, 41, 42, 43.
Village clubs and institutes, 57.
Village ready-made clothing fac-
tory, 152, 153.
Village workshops, 38, 44, 45, 46,
47, 48, 49.
Vocational training, 58, 73.
Voluntary societies which encourage
the crafts, 77, 78, 160, 163, 164,
165, 166.
Wages and earnings
in basket-making, 128, 129.
in broom-making, 96.
in chair manufacture, 33, 108.
in chair-leg turnery, 104, 105, 106.
in farriery, 47, 48.
in gloving, 21, 137, 138, 139, 148,
164, 165.
in hurdle-making, 98, 99, 100.
in lace-making, 157, 158, 159,
160, 161, 163.
in leather dressing, 148.
in machine and hand knitting.
155.
in osier-growing, 118.
in rake-making, 101.
in underwood industry, 85, 86, 91.
in wholesale clothing, 151, 152,
153, 154.
in woodlands, 109.
in wood turnery, 113.
fixed by^Trade Unions, 24, 68.
high, objection to, 24.
standardizing, 166.
Waste material, 28.
Weaving, 43, 174-6.
Wheelwrighting, 24, 25.
Whitley Council, 33, 39, 125, 143.
157.
Whitley Report, 34, 35.
Wholesale clothing industry, 149.
interviews with outworkers, 151,
152.
reasons for dying out of outwork.
149, 150.
wages, 151, 152, 153, 154.
Women's institutes, 39, 42, 55, 71,
76, 147, 157, 162, 167, 168, 171.
Women • who would benefit by
organized rural industries, 166.
Women's labour in basket-making,
127, 128.
gloving, 139.
Wooden bowls, 23.
Woodlands and wages, 109.
Woodwork, 51.
evening classes in, 38.
• Woodworkers, 48.
Wood industries, 27, 32.
Work in
mills, 53.
shops, 53.
small factories, 53.
Workers' and Garment Makers'
Unions, 153, 156, 167.
Workers' Union, 139, 153.
Printed in England at the Oxford University Press
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