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Description: | The Library has about 40,000 books, pamphlets and periodical volumes covering the whole range of agricultural history and rural life with particular strengths in farming techniques and equipment and dairying. Periodicals include major runs of journals in agricultural history, agricultural economics and agricultural engineering.
Agricultural Surveys and British Agrarian History: Printed material includes sets of Arthur Young's farming tours and William Marshall's county and regional surveys, and the "General Views", the county agricultural surveys of the Board of Agriculture, published 1793-1817. Partial sets of the 19th and 20th century government blue books on agricultural depression on women and children in agriculture and on the farm labourer, and the county reports of the First Land Utilisation Survey of Britain (1936-50). Printed secondary sources cover prehistoric and medieval farming, the agricultural revolution through to the present day, including the subjects of field systems, enclosures and land use and land management. The Library holds all published volumes of the Cambridge 'Agrarian History of England and Wales'.
Agricultural Science and Practice: Books and journals on practical farming range from 18th century treatises on husbandry through 19th century encyclopaedias on farming practice to the successive editions of 20th century textbooks. There are farming journals and newspapers, including complete sets of the Journal of the Royal Agricultural Society of England and of the Farmers Weekly, sections on crop and livestock husbandry; especially cattle and dairying, sheep, horses and veterinary history. Garden and horticultural history, forestry and woodland history are also represented. Large deposits of literature (principally from the former National Institute for Research in Dairying and Milk Marketing Board) are being merged together to form an historical dairy collection.
Agricultural Technology and the Agricultural Engineering Industry: complement the agricultural engineering company archives and publicity and servicing literature. Primary printed sources include sets of farm machinery journals and the Royal Show implement catalogues; motive power in agriculture, horse, steam and ICE engines, is well covered.
Agricultural Economics and Policy: 20th century literature is now covered in some depth and includes many of the university departments of agricultural economics publications from the 1920s. Edgar Thomas collection is particularly strong in this area.
Agricultural and Environmental Conservation: covers literature on historic agricultural landscapes; the environmental impact of modern farming on the countryside and recent debates on the present role of the farming industry as well as earlier writings of an agricultural reformist nature on the topics of rural decline, organic farming and soil conservation.
Overseas Agriculture and Agrarian History: European farming and on tropical and plantation agriculture and special collection acquired from the Nitrate Corporation of Chile provides a basic collection of African and Asian literature from the 1940s to the 1960s; European ethnology journals and of the various journals on agrarian history from France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Hungary, the USA, etc.
The History of Food and Diet: includes the milling, malting, brewing and other food processing and manufacturing industries, including company histories with academic studies on the history of diet, cookery, food marketing and retailing. A special collection is being formed out of deposits received from the Flour Milling and Bakery Research Association at Chorleywood.
Rural Industries and Crafts: 20th century literature concerned with the non-agricultural activities of the countryside, especially industries using clay (bricks and pottery), metal (blacksmithing and hand tool manufacture), textiles, leather (saddlery and harness making) and wood (wheelwrighting, carpentry, turnery and basketry). There is a particular coverage of the important underwood industry (based on the harvesting of coppice woods) of central southern England.
Rural Life and Literature: one of the most accessible national collections of books relating to the social history of the countryside, including rural communities and social groups, especially landowners, farmers and labourers and the reminiscences of farming and rural life in addition to novels and essays based on these themes.
A representative collection of local history studies includes accounts of villages and country towns.
Other Subjects; include literature on transport, household fittings and equipment, rural costume, vernacular architecture, sport and recreation and customs and folklore. Also museology, with some works on picture research and photograph conservation.
Special Collections:-
Dairy Collection: comprises large deposits from the disbanded libraries of the former Milk Marketing Board and the former National Institute for Research in Dairying. 4,000 items including a large proportion of unusual literature, such as reports, pamphlets and overseas publications.
Milling and Baking Collection: from the Flour Milling and Baking Research Association transferred to Reading when the association was merged with the Campden & Chorleywood Food Research Association. About 500 items from the 19th and 20th centuries including runs of primary trade journals, such as The Miller, pamphlets and reports.
Edgar Thomas Collection; professor of agricultural economics in the University of Reading, includes many of the major texts and pamphlets published on agricultural economics and related subjects during the first half of the 20th century.
The collection comprises over 750,000 images of farming and country life from 1840s to present including the picture libraries of Farmers Weekly, Farmer and Stockbreeder and topographical work of some professional photographers in the Thames Valley in the early 20th century. Over 1 million images are available from the
Commercial Photo Services.
The Collection includes: Local collections : Reading, Berkshire and surrounding counties; Press collections: from the farming press, photo agencies, and professional photographers; Countryside and environment collections: covers the history of environmental change and protection in the United Kingdom; Farm machinery and engineering collections: records and photographs of Britain's leading agricultural engineering firms; Film and video collections: from agricultural engineering firms and show machines, products and processes from as early as the 1920s; Index to Places: covered by some of photograph collection.
Archives and Business Records.
A major national repository for archives of agriculture and rural life. Collections include; Trade Records: Business records of firms in agricultural engineering, processing, and farm and garden seed production from John Allen & Sons (Oxford) Ltd, engineers, Bomford & Evershed Ltd, engineers, Clayton & Shuttleworth, engineers, John Fowler & Co (Leeds) Ltd, R Hunt & Co Ltd, Earls Colne, engineers,
International Harvester Company of Great Britain, Lawes Chemical Company, McHattie & Co Ltd, seedsmen, Marshall, Sons & Co, Nalder & Nalder Ltd, Ranks Hovis McDougall Ltd, Ransomes, Sims & Jefferies Ltd, Suttons Seeds, Wallis & Steevens Ltd, engineers, Wantage Engineering Co Ltd;
Society Records: Records of major organisations connected with agriculture and the countryside including Council for the Protection of Rural England, Country Landowners Association, National Union of Agricultural and Allied Workers, National Farmers' Union, Royal Agricultural Benevolent Institution, Royal Agricultural Society of England, Co-operative Records, Records of agricultural trading co-operatives,;
Other Records: The Centre holds a wide range of other archives covering such subjects as crafts and rural industries; literary papers; research papers; scientific papers including: Research papers of E.S.Beaven on barley and malt, Research papers of J.R.Bellerby, agricultural economist, Papers of Herbert Hunter, agricultural scientist, Papers of H.D.Parry, agricultural biologist, on scrapie, Papers of Sir George Stapledon, on grassland development;
The Archives collection also includes Farm records and a Document collection. | Source: | Cornucopia - Discovering UK Collections | Address: | Abbotts Road
Winchester Hampshire United Kingdom,
S023 7EZ | Identifier: | oai:www.cornucopia.org.uk:4524 | Go to resource |
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