Marking Time

It's exam time and therefore it's marking time so earlier this week we went to Cambridge, as we did this time last year, for Paul's OCR examiner's meeting at the Gonville Hotel which is just by Parker's Piece. We actually set out the day before to visit friends in Spalding, where we used to live, and had a lovely lunch with them at the Swan Hotel in Moulton and then a visit to the Owl Centre at Weston. Here are some photos of our day.

The Market Place, Spalding - unfortunately it wasn't Market Day

The new footbridge over the River Welland in the centre of Spalding

The Mill at Moulton which is opposite the Swan Hotel

Walking by the Mill

Our next stop was The Owl Centre which is within the Baytree Garden Centre at nearby Weston. Paul took loads of photos - here

One of the owls at the centre - a Ural Owl called Titch

No, this isn't an owl - this is Chester and he is a Giant French Pappillion - well I did promise rabbits!

We were staying at the Travelodge at Alwalton just south of Peterborough and close to the East of England Showground. Our room was overlooking the fields of the showground and they were absolutely full of rabbits - they were enchanting to watch as we sat sipping a welcoming cup of tea.

More rabbits - wild ones this time.

The village itself is so pretty and we had an evening stroll around the centre with its thatched cottages and down to the river which was so still and peaceful in the evening air; we stood and watched the dragonflies skimming across the surface of the water. Henry Royce co-founder of the Rolls Royce Motor Car Company was born here and is buried at the church of St Andrews in the village.

The Cuckoo Hotel

Beautiful thatched cottages

Down by the River Nene

It was time to wander back as we had a long and busy time ahead of us the next day.

Photos as promised

In my post 'Tommy and the Tulips' I mentioned a project that I had done for the Museum Association's Diploma and that I would post some photos that I had used of women connected with the Bulb Industry around Spalding.

Apologies about the poor quality of the photo above which shows Elizabeth Quincey of Fulney Hall, Spalding. Elizabeth was one of the earliest recorded bulb growers. After her father's death she carried on his work of market gardening, experimenting with bulbs and flowers and she is listed in an 1885 Trade Directory as a 'wholesale fruiterer and bulb grower'. On the 1881 census her husband, Christmas Quincey, is listed as a 'gardener and seedsman'.

Below are a couple of photos of women workers in the tulip fields, the first one is a particular favourite of mine, probably taken around 1910, when the bulb and cut flower industry was at its height, all the women are tidy and spruced up ready for the photographer, stern gang master or farmer in the background. The second photo is slightly more natural, although again posed and all of the women except one wearing the regulation bonnets which were worn, both in agricultural and horticultural field work to shield the face and neck against the sun and to guard against sun stroke. These bonnets were worn well into the 1950s but were gradually replaced by hats and scarves.

The photographs are charming and make the work look clean and easy, but of course it wasn't, as we all know any land work can be a back breaking, thankless and sometimes extremely miserable task, especially in inclement weather conditions.