Until recently, Over Wyre was sparsely populated, a rural backwater hemmed in by the sea and cut off from the rest of Lancashire by marsh and moss. It is only in the last thirty years or so, with improved connections to the outside world and the development of new settlements, that the character of the area has changed, so that the majority of people are no longer dependent on the rural economy for their livelihood.
In the past, all manors in Lancashire, such as Parrox, were essentially centres of agricultural activity. In medieval times they were farmed according to the manorial system under which the greater part of the estate was divided into strips that were cultivated collectively by men resident in the village and associated with the manor. The holder, or lord, of the manor retained a substantial portion – the home farm – for his own use. This system remained the practice until about the middle of the fourteenth century when it became customary for the lord of the manor to rent out portions of his land to tenants who themselves employed labourers to work it.
Parrox is still a centre of agricultural activity but was, until the latter part of the twentieth century, much larger, incorporating a substantial estate within Preesall and around half of Pilling.
In the middle ages, the area was given over to mixed agriculture (arable farming and stock rearing). A high level of rainfall produced much grass for grazing cattle and favoured dairy farming, so that the area was noted from early times for the characteristic white, sharp-tasting, Lancashire cheese. Arable crops were mainly oats and barley, the damp climate being regarded as largely unsuitable for wheat. Beans and peas were also grown as a staple food item, while root vegetables were virtually unheard of in the area.
Around 1500, there was a substantial shift in farming practice. Much of the land formerly under the plough was given over to cattle grazing and the production of cheese and butter. This had the effect of leaving the ridges and furrows of the strip-farming system indelibly etched in the new pastures. Today these ridges can still be seen in fields not ploughed for more than 500 years. Where cultivation continued, horses gradually replaced the lumbering oxen as draft animals. Two sturdy horses could do the work of eight oxen.
It was not until the agricultural revolution of the eighteenth century that real innovations were made. Ploughs and carts were improved and implements, such as seed drills, began to appear. So too did new crops, particularly root vegetables, whilst selective breeding produced a better quality of cattle and other animals. The most far-reaching changes came in the twentieth century, however, when the internal combustion engine brought a major revolution to farming in Lancashire.
Tractors and binders made the harvest a much simpler task than it had once been, although the new methods still initially required the picturesque rows of hattocks: sheaves set up like tents in the fields to dry before threshing. A major event of the farming year was Threshing Day. The thresher, pulled by its huge steam traction engine, would arrive the night before and, in the morning, the great task would begin, as neighbouring farmers and their men joined in. The work continued from dawn to dusk, the men usually being fed by the farmer’s wife and a posse of female helpers. This colourful event vanished at a stroke with the introduction of the combine harvester.
Hay was now cut by a machine, pulled at first by a horse and later by a tractor, that did away with the hours of scythe work by a whole gang of men. One man with a mowing machine and a tractor could cut a five-acre meadow in a fraction of the time. Little hay is made in the twenty-first century. Instead, the grass is cut while still green and carted off to be made into silage, though it still serves the same purpose, namely the feeding of dairy cattle.
Farming in Over Wyre changed little over a period of many centuries. Then came a revolution in agricultural science and technology. The coming of the railway to Over Wyre in the late nineteenth century changed the face of farming in the area irrevocably. Crops, such as potatoes, could suddenly be grown on a large scale in newly cleared mossland and transported to distant markets overnight. The poultry industry took off to such an extent that by the time of the first world war, German troops were heard taunting soldiers of north Lancashire regiments with cries of “Lancashire hen farmers, cock-a-doodle-do!”
The pace of change has quickened so much in the last hundred years that our grandfathers would hardly recognise what is going on now in the fields they knew so well. We are keen that knowledge of the old ways should not be lost and we hope that, if you have any memories of the way things were done in the past or any information about Over Wyre traditions or practices, you will share them with us. We would also be delighted to add any photographs to our gallery.
Parrox Hall is a member of the Historic Houses Association