Category Archives: Picture of the Month

Picture of the month #9: Lambs

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After watching ‘Lambing Live’, seeing lambs in fields on my way to work and  cute pictures of lambs from @herdyuk, @farmersoftheuk and many more, every time I log on to Twitter, lambs seemed to be the obvious seasonal subject matter for our Picture of the Month post this time. One picture from our collections immediately springs to mind, as it featured in the John Tarlton exhibition last year, and is one of my personal favourites.

Image from John Tarlton countryside photographer 4 May to 8 Sept 2013

Image from ‘John Tarlton: countryside photographer’ exhibition, 4 May to 8 Sept 2013

But I felt sure that there must be more lambs in our photographic collections and sure enough, Photographic Assistant Caroline Benson was able to come up with these two beautiful images from the Eric Guy collection

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Eric Guy Collection P DX289 PH3_4049_1

 

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Eric Guy collection P DX289 PH3_4087B

Picture(s) of the month #8: Eric Guy’s working horses

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I noticed earlier this month that the Royal Mail has just issued a Working Horses stamp set featuring “six contemporary photographs of Working Horses performing therapeutic, ceremonial, environmental, draught and police duties” They’re beautiful stamps which immediately brought to mind the stunning photographs by Eric Guy in the MERL collections.

Eric Guy (1892-1966) was a commercial photographer based in Basingstoke and later in Reading. The MERL collection consists of 2000 glass negatives and some original prints, showing agriculture in central southern England from the 1920s to 50s. Our Honorary Fellow, Dr Jonathan Brown, has written a book about his work – ‘The Rural World of Eric Guy (Old Pond Publishing, 2008) so perhaps I should ask him to blog about this collection in more detail at some point!

Caroline Benson, MERL Photographic Assistant, has selected her favourite images of working horses from the Eric Guy collection.

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Here horses are being used to transport felled trees. It is interesting to see that forestry is still included in the roles of contemporary working horses.

 

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Click here for further details of the Eric Guy Collection and to explore our online catalogue.

by Alison Hilton, MERL Marketing Officer

Pictures of the month #7 – Floods in Berkshire

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Photographic Assistant, Caroline Benson has selected 2 particularly topical images from our collections this month…

 

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The subject of this month’s photographs will seem all too familiar to many people living by the Thames. They show the floods of November 1895 in the riverside village of Pangbourne in Berkshire. Small boats & punts can be seen transporting people along the streets & walkways constructed from wooden planks are used as pavements. The photographs are from the Sulham House Collection of some two hundred and forty prints showing life in and around Sulham between the 1880s & 1920s.

 

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Pictures of the month #6 – Canal life

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Photographic Assistant, Caroline Benson has resisted the temptation to select a festive image this month, instead sharing images she discovered whilst preparing materials for an education session last month…

The photographs this month are from a collection depicting canals & canal life. The two I have chosen were amongst a selection used by Philippa Heath, our Public Programmes Manager, in a school workshop held last month. The primary school children visited MERL as part of  Takeover Day and used pictures from our collection to create mini exhibitions (see an online version here) about life on the canals.

Unfortunately we don’t know the names of the people nor the location of the canal in these particular pictures but the date is August 1965.

The collection includes a variety of activities but here we have crocheting and painting.

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Crochet on the canal

 

 

 

Painting on the canal

Painting on the canal

 

 

Picture of the month #5: Artist in butter

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Caroline Benson, MERL’s Photographic Assistant has come across a most fascinating craft (which, sadly, definitely isn’t one which will be on display at our Traditional Craft Fair!) We didn’t quite squeeze this particular ‘Picture of the month’ into October, but I think it’s worth the wait!!

This month’s photographs are from a collection recently deposited at MERL. They show a craft, that I must admit, I didn’t know existed. They date from c.1906 and show butter sculptures made by William Burwell, who described himself as an Artist in Butter. The butter sculptures were sold for window decorations & for advertising & commanded quite a price, the basket of roses costing three guineas & larger window displays from between seven and fifty guineas. The sculptures were even exported, one going to New Zealand, where unfortunately the temperature was too hot & so it had to be held in a “cool chamber” until colder weather arrived. Mr Burwell displayed his work at exhibitions & we have a medal that he won at the Universal Cookery & Food Exhibition in 1907. The collection includes a number of glass plate negatives and photograph albums.

Artist in Butter - flower baskets - P BUR PH1_2

Artist in Butter – flower baskets – P BUR PH1_2

 

Artist in Butter - cockerel - P BUR PH1_1

Artist in Butter – cockerel – P BUR PH1_1

 

 

 

Picture of the month #4: Picking up the last of the Harvest

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As our Photographic Assistant is on leave this week, I thought I would try and use our database to find a suitable harvest image. I have to admit I usually run straight to my colleagues in the reading room when I need something from the archives, so I was really pleased that the terms I used (MERL, archive, harvesting, Farmers Weekly) to narrow my search revealed (amongst many others) this beautiful – and local – picture… That was the extent of my researching ability, however, and University Archivist Guy Baxter came to my rescue to delve more deeply and find out more about the image… (Alison Hilton, Marketing Officer)

 

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Picking up the last of the Harvest P_FW_PH2_H29_3 (2)

This photograph, by the Reading based photographer Eric Guy, shows “lodged wheat” being gathered up by hand in 1945. When a crop is “lodged” it means that it has been flattened by the wind, making it difficult to harvest. Eric Guy gave this photograph the caption “Picking up the last of the Harvest” but this particular print was not found in his own collection at MERL, but in the Museum’s Farmers Weekly’s picture library collection. In fact, the image was used in Farmers Weekly on 19 October 1945, with the following caption:

“The “Indian Summer” has enabled crops to be rescued in many parts of the country. This lodged wheat, on a farm in the Streatley Hills, near Basildon, Berks, was too much for the binder, but now it has been safely hand-gathered.”

A binder is a machine for reaping crops – now largely obsolete, as the combine-harvester does the job of both the binder and the threshing machine. For details of the binder on display at MERL, see the entry in our database 

Although at first glance the crop is being loaded onto an old farm wagon, a closer look reveals rubber tyres, and a tractor rather than a horse at the front.

 

Picture of the Month #3: Steam-powered buses

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written by Caroline Benson, Photographic Asssistant

Anyone who has experienced public transport during the hot summer months may like these two photographs where air conditioning is readily available.

TR RAN ET3/24/10 - a Thetford Road Steamer

TR RAN ET3/24/10 – a Thetford Road Steamer from the 1870’s

They are both from an album in the archive of Ransomes, Sims and Jefferies Ltd held here at MERL. Both date from the early 1870s and show early steam powered buses. The first, TR RAN ET3/24/10, was manufactured by Charles Burrell of Thetford, who termed it a Thetford Road Steamer. This particular one was supplied to the Turkish government for operating a bus service on Crete. The second photograph TR RAN ET3/24/34 shows Nairns Patent Steam omnibus, manufactured in Edinburgh in 1870. An article in “The Engineer” of January 28th 1870 describes how the design “… was to preserve as much as possible the appearance of an ordinary omnibus so as more easily to overcome the prejudice of the public.” The article also adds that Mr Nairn’s patent principle “…deadens noise and gives most ample adhesion in frosty weather.” Definitely a necessity in Edinburgh I would imagine.

TR RAN ET3/24/34 - Nairns Patent Steam Omnibus

TR RAN ET3/24/34 – Nairns Patent Steam Omnibus from 1870

No “first” and “standard” class then, just different prices for outside, at  two pence and inside at three pence.

Picture of the month #2: Tilting tractor

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This month’s picture has been selected by Guy Baxter, University Archivist, as one of the images featured in a new MERL calendar…

 

Demonstrating tilting. MERL P FW PH1_74689

Demonstrating tilting. MERL P FW PH1_74689

This image, from the photographic archive of Farmers Weekly, shows a Fordson Major tractor demonstrating tilting in 1947 – it was clearly an important test because the driver is wearing a tie and a white coat! The image is one of the many striking photographs featured in the MERL Tractor Calendar 2014, which will be available from the MERL shop this Autumn.

As well as photographs, MERL also has important collections of engineering drawings, instruction manuals, trade literature and promotional films relating to all types of farm machinery. And of course there are 3 of the most iconic tractors on display in the main gallery

Picture of the Month #1: The John Tarlton Collection

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written by Caroline Benson, Photographic Assistant.

The current temporary exhibition at MERL features the work of the photographer John Tarlton. This wonderful collection came to the museum in 2004 and  now, on the completion of the Rural Images Discovered Project,  we are ready to promote its full commercial potential.

A 'typical Essex college interior'

A ‘typical Essex cottage interior’

These two photographs showing domestic scenes & farmhouse interiors are quite a departure from Tarlton’s usual images. They are both quarter plate glass negatives and are amongst only a very few glass plates in the Tarlton Collection. I am often asked for interior shots by picture researchers and so I was particularly excited to find these – I was also pleased when the fireside image was used in the recently published Pitkin guide “Life on the Farm”.

'Typical Essex farmhouse kitchen showing C16th beams'

‘Typical Essex farmhouse kitchen showing C16th beams’

Little is known about the two photographs. The fireside image is described on the negative envelope as “Typical Essex cottage interior; farm bailiff & his wife” and the other as “Typical Essex farmhouse kitchen showing C16th beams.” I feel the longer I look at these two photographs the more I see, until I can almost hear the tick of the clock, and certainly the smell of pipe tobacco.