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Date: |
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Description: | March 1967.
Image shows forced rhubarb being grown in the special, low-roofed, windowless sheds that were such a common feature of the market gardening area of West Yorkshire, south of Leeds. This shed belonged to Mr. Norman Cookson whose market garden was just off Rooms Lane, and the photograph was taken when the rhubarb had neared the end of the growing season. The rhubarb was grown in the dark to keep the stems a light colour, to keep the leaves yellow (without chlorophyll) and to prevent them growing too large. The plant was quite expensive to heat (grown during the coldest months) and the corms had to have a long period of recuperation outside after their use in the sheds. When there was little competition for the rhubarb from other fruits during the winter months it was still profitable to grow, but in the last quarter of the twentieth century conditions changed and supermarkets imported widely. Photograph from the David Atkinson Archive. | License: | http://www.leodis.net/article.aspx?id=12 | Rights holder: | Leeds Central Library | Subjects: | rhubarb Rooms Lane | Source: | Leodis - A photographic archive of Leeds | Identifier: | http://www.leodis.net/display.aspx?id=20... | Go to resource |
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