the milk industry in wiltshire

7
Vool46, No I February I993 Journal of rhe Society of Dairy Technology industry for 60 years, the Milk Marketing Board, could well fall to the great and glorious European Community Directives and one wonders how to keep a level headed approach. On the other hand, there are great chal- lenges facing your industry. Marketing people talk about added-value in a fairly relaxed way. To them it means adding an extra dimension to the use of the organization, be it the salesperson’s time in a call or extending the range of add-ons to standard products. In your industry added value, as I see it, is an urgent, indispensable, basic necessity if you are to replace the loss of demand which will come about by the change in your pattern of distribution. The move into added-value products is being worked on, hopefully with some urgency. You are facing much competition of packaging and methods of presentation of added-value products such as mousses, yogurts, trifles and those in the general dessert market. Much good market research will be needed, followed by a creative design effort if you are going to knock some of the European products off the shelves in supermarkets. One has to wish your industry well. The milk industry in Wiltshire JOHN H SMITH Wingreen, 4 Jackson Close, Devizes, Wiltshire SNlO 3AP The tradition of dairy farming has long been established in Wiltshire. By the year 1500 the north of the county was almost entirely devoted to dairy farming in the rich clayland areas, and by 1600 butter and cheese manufac- ture had become more specialized than that of most other counties in England and Wales. Until the middle of the 19th century farmers made butter and cheese from their milk which was then sold in local markets or to produce merchants. Shallow pan setting for cream manufacture was still in vogue, with butter being made in a variety of ingenious churns and sold by the farmer’s wife in weekly markets, made up, printed and laid out on cabbage leaves often at the butter cross in the heart of the town. Cheesemaking was carried out in round tinned-copper unjacketted cheese vats on the two or three scald system. John Aubrey reported that the famous North Wilts cheese-about one inch thick and 4-6lb in weight-was now giving way to the larger ‘truckle’ and circular cheeses. With the subse- quent introduction of the cheddaring process in the larger farm dairies, and newly emerging cheese creameries, circular bandaged cheeses of 50-60 lb weight became increasingly common. Cheese was usually sold direct to cheese factors at the monthly cheese fairs held at Devizes, Chippenham, Marlborough, Salis- bury and Weyhill to which buyers would Historical review. repair from as far as London. Occasionally the entire output for one season would be bought from reliable farmhouse cheesemakers in the autumn after the summer cheesemaking sea- son had ended. Cheese yields varied from 34.5 cwt in an average summer season, cows giving about 1.5 gallons of milk per day. The Devizes and Wiltshire Gazette for 14 October 1819 reported sales at Weyhill ranging from 60 shillings per cwt for the ‘best North Wilts Coward’ (full fat cheese) to 36 shillings per cwt for skimmed milk cheese, the latter often part of the staple diet for a farm labourer. To those of us accustomed to motorways, macadamized roadways and heavy duty road vehicles, it is hard to realize the almost insuperable barriers that the difficulties of travel in the pre-railway era imposed on the spread of improved farming practices and in the physical transport of agricultural produce, including milk, any distance for consumption in town or city. The greatest change to the agricultural scene in Wiltshire came with the introduction of the railway system-Brunel and his ‘navi- gators’. By 1840 the line through North Wilts had reached Bath, and by 1860 the London and South West Company had reached out into the west via Salisbury, South Wilts and Dorset. By 1838 the Atlantic had been crossed by the Great Western and Sirius-(both 24

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Page 1: The milk industry in Wiltshire

Vool46, No I February I993 Journal of rhe Society of Dairy Technology

industry for 60 years, the Milk Marketing Board, could well fall to the great and glorious European Community Directives and one wonders how to keep a level headed approach.

On the other hand, there are great chal- lenges facing your industry. Marketing people talk about added-value in a fairly relaxed way. To them it means adding an extra dimension to the use of the organization, be it the salesperson’s time in a call or extending the range of add-ons to standard products. In your industry added value, as I see it, is an urgent, indispensable, basic necessity if you are to

replace the loss of demand which will come about by the change in your pattern of distribution.

The move into added-value products is being worked on, hopefully with some urgency. You are facing much competition of packaging and methods of presentation of added-value products such as mousses, yogurts, trifles and those in the general dessert market. Much good market research will be needed, followed by a creative design effort if you are going to knock some of the European products off the shelves in supermarkets. One has to wish your industry well.

The milk industry in Wiltshire

JOHN H SMITH Wingreen, 4 Jackson Close, Devizes, Wiltshire SNlO 3AP

The tradition of dairy farming has long been established in Wiltshire. By the year 1500 the north of the county was almost entirely devoted to dairy farming in the rich clayland areas, and by 1600 butter and cheese manufac- ture had become more specialized than that of most other counties in England and Wales.

Until the middle of the 19th century farmers made butter and cheese from their milk which was then sold in local markets or to produce merchants. Shallow pan setting for cream manufacture was still in vogue, with butter being made in a variety of ingenious churns and sold by the farmer’s wife in weekly markets, made up, printed and laid out on cabbage leaves often at the butter cross in the heart of the town.

Cheesemaking was carried out in round tinned-copper unjacketted cheese vats on the two or three scald system. John Aubrey reported that the famous North Wilts cheese-about one inch thick and 4-6lb in weight-was now giving way to the larger ‘truckle’ and circular cheeses. With the subse- quent introduction of the cheddaring process in the larger farm dairies, and newly emerging cheese creameries, circular bandaged cheeses of 50-60 lb weight became increasingly common.

Cheese was usually sold direct to cheese factors at the monthly cheese fairs held at Devizes, Chippenham, Marlborough, Salis- bury and Weyhill to which buyers would Historical review.

repair from as far as London. Occasionally the entire output for one season would be bought from reliable farmhouse cheesemakers in the autumn after the summer cheesemaking sea- son had ended.

Cheese yields varied from 34.5 cwt in an average summer season, cows giving about 1.5 gallons of milk per day. The Devizes and Wiltshire Gazette for 14 October 1819 reported sales at Weyhill ranging from 60 shillings per cwt for the ‘best North Wilts Coward’ (full fat cheese) to 36 shillings per cwt for skimmed milk cheese, the latter often part of the staple diet for a farm labourer.

To those of us accustomed to motorways, macadamized roadways and heavy duty road vehicles, it is hard to realize the almost insuperable barriers that the difficulties of travel in the pre-railway era imposed on the spread of improved farming practices and in the physical transport of agricultural produce, including milk, any distance for consumption in town or city.

The greatest change to the agricultural scene in Wiltshire came with the introduction of the railway system-Brunel and his ‘navi- gators’. By 1840 the line through North Wilts had reached Bath, and by 1860 the London and South West Company had reached out into the west via Salisbury, South Wilts and Dorset. By 1838 the Atlantic had been crossed by the Great Western and Sirius-(both

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propelled by steam)-opening the way to transport independent of wind or weather.

The United States and Canada were rapidly expanding their wheat production while the railways of the New World and Atlantic steamships were gathering strength to carry their grain, butter and cheese to our shores.

The introduction of mechanical refriger- ation-particularly with access to cheap ammonia from our industrial plants in the Midlands-meant that butter and cheese could be transported across half the world effectively and economically. This would all too soon spell the death knell for local Wiltshire cheesemakers no longer able to compete with prices in the open market. Indeed, imports of factory made cheese from the United States rose from 3935 tons in 1850 through 9372 tons in 1856 to 17769 tons in 1870.

The repeal of the Corn Laws (1846) gave gradual but increasing impetus to the system of enclosures. Many small farmers found it no longer possible to work their farms, sold out, became labourers in the open market or moved to the industrial Midlands, railways providing easy and cheap access for them and their families. Finally, in the mid-1860s there was a series of disastrous summers that drove many farmers to bankruptcy and created a severe depression in the farming community nationwide, with particular effect in southern England.

Clearly against such a grim scenario some- thing of a miracle was needed and it came from adversity elsewhere. To understand the full cause and effect we have to look at the market for liquid milk in towns and cities and above all in London itself.

THE LONDON LIQUID MILK TRADE

Traditionally the milk requirements for Lon- don and town dwellers were supplied from cows either kept in town cowsheds or driven in by horse drawn floats from farms on the outer fringes of the built up areas (Whetham, 1964). These cows supplying the domestic milk market were milked two or three times a day and the milk delivered warm to customers as soon as possible after milking. Old prints reveal the use of yolks and wide-mounted pails of rather shallow design. In all prob- ability, the milkers themselves also acted as roundsmen after the milking operation was completed. There are numerous references to the dairyman’s ‘black cow’ (water pump), which was an important and almost indispens- able adjunct to the business of milk selling. Milk produced in excess of immediate requirements was put into shallow pans and the cream skimmed off 12 to 24 hours later and either sold to the gentry or made into butter.

It was, of course, a very hard life. Records show that at the well known town cowkeepers,

Messrs Tonks, a shop where cows were kept and fresh milk sold warm as required stood on the present site of the Albert Hall. Additional farms were based at the Holland Park Dairy and some 80-90 cows at Epsom in the heart of the country.

At Friern Manor dairy situated at Peckham some six miles from the Royal Exchange, milking was done at 1.30 am and again at 10.30 am, such milk being in London by 5 am or 1 pm for the afternoon trade. The cows were milked into tin-lined vessels and the milk then passed through several strainers to free it from every kind of ‘visible’ dirt, then placed in large cans which were barred across the top and sealed.

These town cowkeepers enjoyed a complete monopoly of the milk trade and their only worries were cattle plague and foot and mouth disease, which might wipe out their herds in the course of days. This amved during 1865- 66 where the combination of herding cows closely together in urban cowsheds with poor ventilation and limited knowledge of animal hygiene and good veterinary practice com- bined to create the ‘cattle plague’.

This was a virulent combination of rinder- pest, pleuropneumonia and foot and mouth disease, which swept through the London town cowkeeper herds and resulted in the deaths of some 26000 animals over a rela- tively short period. The supply of liquid milk was severely threatened and it was only by the enlightened activities of progressive dairymen such as Sir George Barham, later founder of Express Dairy, a proponent of milk delivery in 17 gallon churns, that the crisis was resolved.

It has been calculated elsewhere that while some seven million gallons of milk were imported into London by rail from some 220 urban stations to replace the milk lost from dairies affected by the plague, by 1880 sup- plies into London by rail had increased to some 20 million gallons (Whetham, 1964).

The growing demand by the public for ‘country-fresh milk’ also received a boost when a Health Authority check confirmed the unsatisfactory conditions seen in urban dair- ies. Indeed, even before 1865 the larger retailers were selling more milk than could be supplied by cows either in their town stalls or out on grass in the suburbs. Of necessity they began to buy the output of farmers conve- niently placed near railway stations in the home counties: naturally they sometimes accommodated other retailers with milk sur- plus to their own needs in order to minimize their own losses. Milk not sold was held over or returned to the farmer often sour and to his loss.

As more and more milk arrived at the milk platforms in London stations representatives of the firms arrived to collect the milk consigned to them, allocate some to the roundsmen for immediate onward delivery,

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arrange for the balance to go on to the wholesale depots and, if possible, sell any surplus on site or buy in any deficiency in volumes needed. From all this there gradually emerged the following:

The wholesaler, who became either a private individual or, increasingly, the agent of a large firm, being the link between the farmer who wished to sell his variable output week after week with minimum loss and the retailer who simply wanted even supplies of top quality milk delivered promptly.

The balancer of milk supplies, a wholesaler who sought out supplies further afield and was prepared to contribute finance to farmers in setting up country cooling depots usually sited strategically beside a railway station. Such depots often had manufacturing facilities to handle the surplus milk, milk being manufac- tured into either butter or cheese, the by- products (skim or whey) being sold back to the farmers for stock feed-often at little or no profit.

The first of such depots in Wiltshire was set up at Semley by Thomas Kirby, a London milk vendor who combined with local farmers in 1871 to set up the Salisbury, Semley and Gillingham Dairies Company, followed in 1879 by the North Wilts Dairy at Stratton and the Surrey Farm Dairy Company at Tisbury in 1882.

The farmer, who chose to surrender any past manufacturing at local level and re-equip himself to supply top quality cooled milk, usually on a half-yearly contract basis. Vari- ous other firms quickly followed, including the Melksham and Devizes dairies in 1894, which, some three years, later were to combine and form Wilts United Dairies.

Such deliveries by rail were in 17 gallon tinned steel churns in open waggons or closed carriages and usually by express train. Indeed, George Barham capitalized on this by setting up a company called Express Dairy and featuring a steam engine as the company logo for many years. While supplies of cooled milk direct from country depots helped to reduce the initial losses from souring, the overall chemical and bacteriological quality of such supplies remained somewhat suspect.

The Milk and Dairies Order of 1901 estab- lished minima of 3% fat and 8.5% solids-non- fat but bacteriological quality gave continuing concern. For example, in the hot summers of the 1890s and during the drought of 1911, epidemics of ‘summer diarrhoea’ were rife; in some London boroughs infant mortality in the third quarter of the year rose as high as 203- that is, one child in every five below the age of 5 died from milk-associated disease during the hot summer months. In 1917 some 30 samples of milk delivered to Manchester hospitals carried more than one million bacteria per millilitre. Today’s standard for farm milk sent by bulk tanker for pasteurization is not more

than 1OOOOO per millilitre, with strict control of delivery temperature. Of 750 samples taken of rail-borne milk sampled by health inspec- tors at London stations between 1916 and 1917 some 10% had active tuberculosis organisms.

Technical advances in milk processing to- wards the end of the 19th century could offer the public certain alternatives. The first of these was the introduction of sweetened condensed milk in either full cream or skimmed milk in tins.

In a research paper (Whetham, 1970) the following comments are made: . . . condensed milk became increasingly popular in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, especially in the poorer families. Some was pro- duced in Britain and there was a rising volume of imports. Sweetened condensed milk was both cheaper than fresh milk if diluted t o the same consistency and it also kept longer-an important matter in houses with no larders. Condensed skimmed milk was cheaper still and was much used, it was feared, for feeding infants. But many families never tasted fresh milk; they took their milk, already sweetened out of tins, thick or thin, according to the state of the family income.

An alternative was evaporated milk-ie, milk clarified, homogenized, heat-treated and filled into cans unsweetened.

STERILIZED MILK

Sterilized milk was introduced in the 1870s as a specialty for children. This involved filling glass bottles which were then secured with wired porcelain stoppers (similar to the swing stoppers in common use at the time for ginger beer bottles) and placed in water whose temperature was then raised progressively and held for considerable time before being cooled slowly and distributed on retail rounds. Although initially expensive, its use spread to the Midlands and the north where cramped housing conditions precluded domestic refrigeration and the increased shelf-life (one to three days) reduced the need for daily deliveries.

The most significant change was the intro- duction of milk pasteurization, which de- stroyed pathogenic bacteria through controlled time-temperature combinations safely and economically.

While Louis Pasteur had established in the 1860s that putrefaction and fermentation were the work of micro-organisms, the adaptation of his work to safeguarding milk supplies by the process of ‘pasteurization’ was not devel- oped extensively until the early 1920s, although milk that had been heat-treated became available from 1900 onwards.

Here the efforts of the Wiltshire based Wilts United Dairies were to the fore: early in the century they followed closely the pioneer work done in New York City by Nathan

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Strauss whose daughter had reputedly died from tuberculosis contracted from a raw milk supply. Through his efforts, bottled pasteur- ized milk had been available in limited quant- ities from 1893 in that city, principally for infants and the elderly (Selitzer, 1976). Exe- cutives from Wilts United Dairies went to see for themselves, and in 1921 United Dairies Limited, which had been formed in 1915 by four key London milk wholesalers, invested one million pounds in establishing pasteuriza- tion and bottling plants to sell milk in direct competition with ‘loose’ milk at the same price.

This was the single most important factor in the overall improvement of liquid milk for sale and was responsible for saving thousands of lives. Legislation -mainly based on the control measures set up by the dairy com- panies themselves-followed in 1926.

Such enterprise was also shown by a local farmer, Mr Ernest Cottle of Seend, who, after establishing a successful range of dairy shops in London, arranged to supply these by bulk milk road tanker from his Bulkington dairy near Devizes. Using 800 gallon glass lined bulk tanks of Danish design on a Maudslay chassis, a daily delivery took some six hours to reach London at an average speed of 12 miles per hour. In addition, in 1927 Wilts United Dairies was the first company to introduce the shipping of milk by 3000 gallon glass-lined rail tankers when supplies were sent simul- taneously from Semley in Wiltshire and Calveley in Cheshire to London (Figure). Each tanker saved the washing and sterilizing of some 300 x 10 gallon churns and much handling.

MANUFACTURING MILK IN WILTSHIRE

It soon became apparent that the milk surplus to London’s retail needs would have to be retained and manufactured at selected locations in Wiltshire. Existing creameries were extended to handle the traditional butter and cheese made: new products were devel- oped to provide flexibility against the chal- lenges in the open market from dominion- made butter and cheese.

To see how best such a challenge could be met we must examine briefly the raw product, milk, itself -its advantages and limitations.

Raw milk Water Nearly 88% of milk is water, which, while providing a good carrier for the fat, protein, ash and sugar, also makes it very vulnerable when, unlike the basic route direct from cow to calf via the teat, it can be exposed to outside agencies such as dirt, bacteria and moulds.

In addition, the complex chemical and physical interaction that takes place when milk is heated in an attempt to remove the water under normal atmospheric conditions limits what can be done. The technology for this was mainly developed in America by Gail Borden in 1856, who used as his basis work done in England on the invention of the vacuum pan in 1813 by Edward Charles Howard and its use for preparing milk by William Newton in 1835.

Fat The fats in milk provide an excellent source of energy but, because they are saturated, to some extent have recently been targeted by

Bulk milk trucks at Semley: Wiltshire’s first milk depot (1927)

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those who see a direct relationship between saturated fats and their effect on high blood pressure and heart disease.

Existing as tiny globules floating in the serum, they form cream if milk is left to stand naturally and also carry the fat soluble vitamins. The traditional source of recovery has been either as butter in temperate coun- tries or as liquefied fat such as ghee in warmer climates, usually for cooking.

Protein The milk proteins are a particularly valuable source for nutrition and exist as a suspension in the milk itself, linked with the calcium. Traditionally, the protein has been captured for extended storage by making either yogurt or cheese, which involved collapsing the fine suspension into various forms of curd. The protein can also be separated out by the addition of hydrochloric acid to heated skim milk to make casein, used in the past as an adhesive or for coating paper. Wartime efforts to recover whey albumin (as a substitute for egg albumen) by vacuum separation tech- niques proved uneconomic. Recent develop- ments now include ultrafiltration systems of particular value in the pharmaceutical and babyfood fields.

In the making of butter, most of the milk protein is lost as it passes out with the skim or buttermilk-both products being in fact highly nutritious in powder form.

Lactose The sugar in milk is about one-seventh as sweet as cane sugar and nowadays is used either by the pharmaceutical industry or by the food industry, the latter capitalizing on its reducing properties in baking. It achieved momentary fame during the early years of the second world war as the base adopted initially for the manufacture of penicillin and its recovery is normally from cheese whey by a somewhat arduous process of concentration and crystallization.

Ash Ash refers to the mineral elements in the milk of which calcium is of particular value. The link with the protein caseinogen ensures easy take-up nutritionally, which is of particular value to children in their metabolism and bone formation during early childhood.

DEVELOPMENTS IN TECHNOLOGY

The key to handling the steadily increasing volumes of ‘surplus’ milk lay with dairy technology developed in the latter part of the 19th century. This included: 1. The ability to concentrate milk under

vacuum conditions to provide sweetened or unsweetened milk with vastly increased storage potential.

2. The ability to separate the cream from the milk immediately by using the centrifugal separator, which gave fresh cream and skim milk, and from these fresh butter and access to the production of powdered milk.

3. An understanding of the scientific prin- ciples of cheesemaking-thanks to the work of Joseph Harding in Somerset whose efforts to teach these received inter- national recognition within his lifetime.

4. The ability to dry skim milk (and later full cream milk) effectively by systems of roller drying or spray drying in large circular heated chambers. This gave access to the nutritious part of the milk, bypassing the loss incurred in feeding it to stock as means of disposal.

5. The ability to tailor make milk in dry form to suit vagaries in dietetic requirements such as geriatric, invalid and babyfoods. Growth in the babyfood market reflected the changing social demand for an alterna- tive to breast feeding.

THE ESTABLISHMENT OF MANUFACTURING MILK The first major manufacturer of milk products was in effect the Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Company established at Chippenham in 1874 with some 65 employees. Pay rates were four shillings per day for men and one shilling per day for women (Victoria County History, 1959). This firm specialized in the manufac- ture of sweetened condensed milk: milk first sweetened with cane sugar then reduced in volume under vacuum before packing into small tins for domestic use. The Staverton factory was opened in 1897, both factories sharing a good local milk supply, access to plenty of water and the availability of redun- dant cloth mills with sufficient height for installing the condensing plant requried.

Later Nest16 and Anglo-Swiss, after amal- gamation in 1905, acquired a factory near Salisbury, which over its effective life made a wide range of products. Of passing interest was sterilized milk made for Union Castle and other major steamship lines operating out of Southampton.

During the second world war Chippenham and Staverton packed ‘iron rations’ on a large scale. Salisbury made dehydrated soups used extensively by the fighting services in the Mediterranean.

The Co-operative Wholesale Society estab- lished their Wiltshire manufacturing facility at Cricklade in 1927 to balance liquid milk supplies by the manufacture of tinned evap- orated milk: it was further extended in 1936 and the milk supply rationalized in 1940. By 1956 they employed about 139 people, with half the milk going to the liquid market and the remainder for evaporated milk. By 1960 this had terminated, and for a short while cream and yogurt were manufactured, after which the creamery was closed down and

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today is the location for bulk milk collection in that area.

A firm that has its origins outside Wiltshire but nevertheless established an unrivalled reputation in the technical field of cheesemak- ing was Aplin and Barrett, which in 1925 took over some buildings erected by the Air Ministry in the first world war at the Ham, Westbury and established their Wiltshire creamery. Designed to expand their pro- cessed cheese manufacture, staff numbers rose steadily from 42 employees to a total of around 155 at the outbreak of war. The main product was Chedlet processed cheeses for which they imported large quantities of cheese from Canada in addition to home supplies from their Somerset creameries.

In the technical field they developed Nis- aplin, a product which destroyed gas-forming bacteria, a major contribution to processed cheese manufacture. Emergency rations were also packed during the late war. Between 1948 and 1954 ice cream was also made on the premises.

As a member of Unigate (after amalgama- tion), they continued to expand and develop a UK market for film-wrapped cheese and subsequently imported Continental cheeses for repacking to the exacting standards laid down by major supermarket chains. Within the last two years this operation has been closed down.

WILTS UNITED DAIRIES

In the Victoria County History for Wiltshire, Volume 4 (1959), the following statement is made: . . . thus the firm which has most raaally affected the organisation of wholesale milk distribution and, to a lesser extent, of the manufacture of dairy products not only in Wiltshire but also through south-west England was of purely Wiltshire origin. Its history reflects the interaction of the London milk trade with the growth of factories in Wiltshire and repays a detailed study.

In 1886-87, the Anglo-Swiss Company at Chippenham decided not to renew the con- tracts of a number of farmers in the Melksham area. Greatly perturbed, the farmers pre- vailed upon one of their number, Charles Maggs, to set up a collecting depot and butter factory for their milk. This business grew rapidly and was transferred to the old dye works at New Broughton Road, Melksham in 1888 (Maggs, 1950).

In 1889, Reginald Butler of the North Wilts Dairy Company set up a small factory at Pans Lane, Devizes, for the manufacture of butter and soft cheese. Eventually both companies joined forces in 1897 as Wilts United Dairies. Under the able management of Joseph Maggs and Reginald Butler the company expanded rapidly; a London wholesale milk company was bought in 1901. Joseph Maggs transferred

to London to manage this, and by 1915, through a series of mergers, Wilts United Dairies and three other partners set up United Dairies Limited, which came to control a large part of London’s liquid milk market.

Melksham creamery expanded steadily into condensed milk manufacture, butter, roller drying and cream manufacture. Indeed, a thriving export for ‘Diploma’ condensed milk set up in 1920 had by 1939 increased to some 320 OOO cases a year, much of this for export to Malaya. A wide range of other products was also made until, with the inevitable rational- ization of manufacture, Melksham closed recently .

The head office of the company was trans- ferred to Trowbridge in 1913 where a butter- making factory was established close by and was active until 1939 when this activity was transferred to Chard in Somerset. The cream- ery at Devizes continued to make butter and Bondon soft cheeses until 1941 when it finally was closed.

By 1956 Wilts United Dairies had some 60 creameries in England, Scotland and Wales, all managed from Trowbridge, the largest dairy manufacturing company in Great Bri- tain. Developments in the company over this period included the Lewis System for bulk starter protection from bacteriophage attack, which helped clear the way for the massive daily throughputs in cheesemaking that are now common in the industry.

ESTABLISHMENT OF UNIGATE

In 1959 it was announced that a merger would take place between Cow and Gate and United Dairies, which, together with the acquisition of Aplin and Barrett, would make the new company Unigate, the largest dairy manufac- turing company in Europe. By this time the new company was buying one-third of all liquid milk produced in England and Wales and accounted for about one-half of the cheese and butter produced in the UK. Interests were also maintained in Canada, the United States, Africa, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and the Antipodes (Unigate Annual Report, 1960).

Over the next 20 years the long-term future of the company was continually being appraised in the light of changing market conditions, and in 1979 the strategic decision was taken to sell 16 of its creameries to the English Milk Marketing Board, to adopt the brand name St Ivel and to play an increasing role in the marketing of dairy foods-in particular fresh dairy products. Under that banner, the company remains a major sup- plier in this field today.

MILK MARKETING BOARDS

In 1933, after due consultation with dairy farmers and the dairy trade in general, the government of the day set up the Milk

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Marketing Board for England and Wales and the Scottish Milk Marketing Board (covering central and southern Scotland). The following year two separate Boards were formed, the Aberdeen and District Board and North of Scotland Board, the latter based at Inverness. The objective was: - to provide an orderly marketing system

for the sale of milk from the farm; - to safegurd supplies to the liquid milk

market; - to ensure that milk surplus to the needs

of the liquid milk market should secure the best return against competition from overseas dairy products.

These measures, together with emphasis on improving both the national dairy herd and the chemical and bacteriological quality of ex- farm supplies by way of penalty and bonus payments, have made our milk supplies today among the safest in the world. In so doing they have secured, to date, that unique feature- day to day doorstep delivery at a small premium. Within the last few years the English Milk Marketing Board has set up its own manufacturing arm, Dairy Crest Limited, now the largest bulk dairy product manufac- turer in Britain.

The many technical and commercial devel- opments pioneered by the Milk Boards in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland have made a major contribution to the quality and commercial viaiblity of the nation’s milk supply. Whether the operation of the Milk Board and its manufacturing arm can continue under the aegis of European Community legislation remains to be seen.

I950-I9go It is perhaps ironic that the London liquid milk market, having played a major role in the creation of Wiltshire-based dairy manufac- ture, was ultimately largely responsible for its demise. The postwar urbanization in the south and west of London and developments at Reading and demand for throughout the

Basingstoke all created a liquid milk. Increasingly, 1960s to the 1980s the liquid

milk field moved further and further west at the expense of manufacturing facilities in East Wiltshire, Hampshire and Dorset.

Rail-based supplies gave way to the direct supply of milk from country bulk collection depots by 3000 gallon articulated road tankers using motorways from the south and west. The old established creameries in Wiltshire, Hampshire and Dorset could no longer be expanded effectively and were closed down to be replaced by relatively few but massive new production units further west and (hopefully) beyond the operational reach of the liquid market. Today’s units, such as the Severnside creamery operated by Dairy Crest, provide maximum flexibility to the changing needs of manufacture and liquid milk demand.

Wiltshire milk today is destined largely for the liquid milk market in London o r for fresh dairy products, which attract premium prices for the raw milk available, being made at a small number of locations. The role played by Wiltshire farmers, entrepreneurs and manu- facturers, though little known, is a long and honourable one and has contributed markedly to Great Britain’s dairy industry in its com- plexity, flexibility of choice and ability to cope with worldwide competition.

Acknowledgements to the late Mr J G Hutchinson and to R J Warren.

REFERENCES Maggs J H (1950) Dairying History No 1 . Journal of the

Society of Dairy Technology 3 158-159. Selitzer R (1976) The Doiry Industry in America, p 135. New

York: Dairy and Ice Cream Field and Books for Industry. Unigate (1960) Annual Report, p 14. London: Palace Court. Victoria County History (1959) Wiltshire, vol 4. pp 224 and

226. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Whetham E H (1964) The London Milk Trade: 1860-1900.

Economic Historical Review, 2nd Series. xvii, pp 369-380. Whetham E H (1970) The London Milk Trade: 1 r n 1 9 3 0 ,

p 4. Reading, Berks: Reading University (Institute of Agricultural History Research Paper No 3).

FURTHER READING Capstick E (1950) The past 100 years. Journal ofthe Sock9 of

Strauss E (1972) Milk marketing in Britain. Dairy Indusrries Dairy Technology 3 151-161.

(Jan) 11-16.

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