Agriculture

Culgaith has always been mainly a farming village, for the land is good for mixed farming. The chief drawback is the Helm wind which blows from the fells every now and then, particularly in the Spring. Farmers hate it, for it is a very cold, dry wind, and nothing can grow while it is blowing. Methods of farming have changed in an amazing way, even since the turn of the century. Before the days of mechanisation everything had to be done by hard, manual labour, with the aid of horses. Every farmer kept a few carthorses, according to the size of his farm, while today Margaret Stamper is the only farmer who owns one. Every farmer, too, had his Galloway, on which he rode when going to see his sheep, cattle and crops. 

Boon Days

In the old days, when a farmer moved into a new farm at Candlemas, his new neighbours would organise a boon day or ploughing day, when each farmer sent a man with horse and plough and did a day's ploughing. It is not so necessary to do this nowadays, for with tractors, a farmer can soon catch up with his work.

Harvesting

When corn was cut with scythes, and later with reapers, many women and children were employed in "making bands."  The children were paid a shilling a week at one time for this. Before the day of the threshing machine, farmers threshed their corn with flails. These consisted of two long pieces of wood joined together by a piece of leather which acted as a hinge. One piece of wood was used as a handle and the other as a beater to beat the corn from the husks. Later, the threshing machine was introduced. At first, many farmers had their own horse-drawn machines, then later Thomas Thompson and his sons started a threshing business. For many years they travelled the countryside with their thresher, drawn by a traction engine. Harold Thompson, a grandson of Thomas, still carries on the business.

In the days when farm-workers lived in at the farms where they worked, they often slept on beds filled with chaff. After a threshing day the farmers' wives would empty their old ticks and fill them with clean chaff, or caff, as it was generally called.

Nowadays practically all farm work is mechanised. Every farmer has his tractors and many have balers and combine harvesters, etc. 

Dairy

Milking is all done by machine, and all the farmers sell their milk to the Express Dairy at Appleby. When the milking had to be done by hand, the farmers' wives, daughters and maids had a much harder time, for many of them had to help with the milking, and they had to feed the calves and make the butter. The usual dress for women when going to milk consisted of a striped petticoat (generally a blue background with red and yellow stripes), a skirt doubled up and pinned in a bunch at the back of the waist, a coarse apron on top of this, and a "clout hat," or sunbonnet.

Before the days of separators, the milk was set up in large, shallow bowls on the stone dairy shelves, and when the cream had risen to the top it was removed with a saucer-shaped, perforated implement with a handle. The cream was put into a cream pot and after a few days was churned into butter. Some of this was sold in the village and the rest taken to Penrith market. Farmers' wives and daughters took huge, flat butter baskets and "stood the market," getting as good a price as they could.

Farm workers

Besides all the dairy work the women had to do, they had a lot of hard work in the house. Many of the hired men lived in, and they had to be fed and their rooms to be kept clean. All bread and cakes were baked at home, and a tin-opener was almost unknown. Houses had very few amenities- no water laid on and no electricity. The kitchen ranges were enormous affairs and had to be blackleaded regularly. The stone floors were to scrub several times a week, likewise the white table-tops. Food was generally plentiful and wholesome, but plain and served in the plainest of ways. Porridge was the main item for breakfast. At dinner time a boiled dumpling was often served first (to take the edge off the appetites), then followed meat and potatoes on the same plate. Farm wages were very low-under a pound a week for married men. Unmarried men and girls were paid half-yearly. A young boy just left school was lucky if he earned £5 during the half-year, and a grown man who was able to under- take any job on a farm, could earn £12 for the term. Sometimes a term lasted 28 weeks, depending on the date of Easter. Women's and girls' wages were similar to men's, but they worked much longer hours. They generally worked from early morning until the supper things were washed up, then probably a pile of mending would be produced for them to do. Women and girls in private service, such as the vicarage, were very badly paid, often receiving no more than 2s. 6d. a week. People doing casual work received very small wages. For instance, turnip hoers were paid three halfpence per 100 yards, and potato pickers about eighteen pence a day.

Auction

On Auction Mart days all stock had to be driven to Penrith or Lazonby there were no lorries in those days. When a farmer bought animals at the auction, he often hired drovers to drive them home. These men hung about the auction mart, often very shabby-looking fellows, carrying long sticks. For a small fee they would drive a farmer's purchases to their destination, then walk back to Penrith.