Stocken Farm with R M West & Son
From Lacey Green History
Research by Joan West
......continued from 1948-1960 Stocken Farm with Dick & Hilda West.
R M West & Son was a farming partnership formed in 1960 the homestead being at Stocken Farm.
Summary in 2010
The partners were Dick & Hilda West and their son John who had come home after agricultural college in 1958.
John married Joan in 1961 and she became a fourth partner.
Hilda died in 1978 and Dick died in 1983.
In 1991 Richard, the son of John & Joan joined the Partnership on leaving agricultural University
Richard married Maxine Phillips and she too became a partner, making the number back up to four.
John died in July 2010. The partnership continues with Joan, Richard & Maxine.
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DICK, HILDA & JOHN the partners of R M West & Son
In 1954, Dick and Hilda's son John, who had a love of chemistry, decided to take up farming – much to their relief! A year’s practical at home and two years at Harper Adams Agricultural College brought him back to the farm in 1957.
By this time Dick had increased the cows to 26, his sheep to about 60 and had established a good name for commercial breeding pigs. They prepared a few cockerels and turkeys for Christmas and had more hens.
The horses were replaced by two tractors, their first (second-hand) combine had been purchased in 1956 and they owned their farm.
Farming about this time changed dramatically. Until now it had been a profession handed down from father to son with a ‘don’t put all your eggs in one basket’ attitude, learnt from bitter experience. Often, sons were expected to work at home with no pay but the knowledge “It will be all yours one day lad”. Now, students were coming from the colleges – more professional, machines became more specialised but were expensive, crop breeding advanced, everything became easier and yet more difficult. The old style farming had to change – or else!
Dick and John were very lucky. Dick, steeped in farming experience, John, trained to look at things in a new light. Together, with tremendous affection and respect for each other they took Stocken Farm forward into the 1960’s.
In 1958 extra land was rented. click Walters Ash Farm
1960 the partnership R M West & Son was formed
CONCRETE
John started by waging war on the mud. The earth yards (often just mud) and drive were gradually concreted, a bit every year, until machines, animals and men could get around more easily. Psychologically good then and now (1990) essential for the huge lorries that come for grain and milk.
MILKING PARLOUR/ GOOD BYE SHEEP
In 1963 the first milking parlour was installed. It was a big breakthrough. Now one man could milk 60 cows, whereas before there was a considerable amount of physical labour involved in chaining cows, carting churns, cleaning equipment and cooling the milk. Now all that was automated. To justify the outlay more cows had been reared and some were purchased in order to use the parlour to an economic capacity. More land was needed for the extra cows, so sadly, the flock of sheep was sold. They had needed new fences, races and dip anyway and it was not possible to run to everything.
INCREASED MILK YIELDS
In 1957 the cows were giving an average of 700 gallons of milk per year. In 1984 they were giving an average of 1,400 gallons. How? With improved nutrition, better housing and AI. Now the services of the very best proven bulls in the country are available, at a price, for every cow. Even the ‘bull of the day’, the cheapest on the AI list, is way, way above the standard of the average farm-owned bull.
BULLS
I’m sure Hilda was very relieved when the dairy bulls went. One that lived in the fields with the cows had tossed both Alf, the cowman, and Dick. Bulls in fields were required to wear a metal face mask. He had rubbed it off and at the time was being brought home. Another bull was kept in a strong, brick-built bull pen right outside the back door of the house. The bulls gone and nothing to be wasted, Dick then kept pigs in the pen. The smell was very ‘rural’ when the wind was the wrong way. Hilda found these pigs handy when she had the occasional baking disaster. Men have a nasty habit of asking “Why did you do it” if you do not dispose of the evidence!
A SAD GOOD BYE TO PIGS
Big changes were happening in the pig world. Fat bacon, beloved by our forefathers, was no longer wanted, so specialised hybrid pigs were bred to cater for the public’s new lean taste. They needed much more particular husbandry than the old breeds. The decision to stop producing pigs, no longer popular, was made for Dick and John when Reading pig sales finished. The monthly trips to Reading Market had been a very happy part of Dick’s farming life. The last sale there consisted largely of his herd and a sad day it was too.
GREAT MOSELY FARM at Naphill was Purchased in ???? the house was sold off.
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KINGSWOOD FARM in Highwood Bottom was purchased on 17th Oct 1963 Conveyance. Frank Malcolm Allen-Armitage sold Kingswood Farm to R M West & Son of Stocken Farmfor £8,000, comprising 51.379 acres. click Kingswood Farm for the history of the farm
PROPERTIES BUILT
In 1965 two more houses were built as the staff increased and in 1970 a bungalow for Hilda and Dick. This was built to be easy for Hilda. Dick, to his surprise got used to it, although he spent all day at the farm and would soon put anyone right if they called it a ‘retirement’ home.
A TON OF GRAIN TO AFRICA
Summer 1984 was superb weather for the grain harvest and as all the world must know there were record crops. When drilling, no one can foretell if it will be a good or bad season and naturally everyone sets out to grow as good a crop as possible. We were glad the crops were good. John had sent a ton of grain to Africa in August, long before the media brought all those starving people into our sitting rooms. So we have a surplus! Surely that is preferable to going short.
THE FARM PARTNERSHIP LOSES HILDA & DICK
Sadly we had lost both Hilda and Dick from our farming partnership, Hilda in 1979 and Dick in 1983.
Click Stocken Farm (R M West & Son) with John & Joan to continue the story of Stocken Farm
Dick and Hilda lived in Stocken Farmhouse from October 1934 to January 1970
In 1970 a new bungalow was built in Kiln Lane for Dick and Hilda. They called it Cotswold.
John and Joan, who had been living in Coronation Cottage no 2 in Kiln Lane, needed a bigger house for their growing family. A bungalow would also be much better for Hilda, who had a weak heart. Dick, Hilda, Harry Floyd and Hilda’s father Fred Thomas Crook moved into the bungalow. John, Joan and their children Patricia, Caroline and Richard moved into Stocken Farmhouse. Dick had not retired and still came every day to the farm.
John and Joan lived in no 2 Coronation Cottages (later renamed no 1 Stocken Cottages) in Kiln Lane, from September 1961 to January 1970 when they moved into Stocken Farmhouse.
Sadly the huge Horse Chestnut tree at the entrance to the farm drive was hit by lightening and had to be immediately felled. Another on the opposite side of the drive, although younger and not damaged was then so lop-sided that it too had to go.
John and Joan moved out of the farmhouse in February 2006 to a new house across the front field which they called Arcadia.
JOHN WEST DOES NOT RETIRE
In 2005 it became obvious that Richard and Maxine, with two children, needed more bedrooms than the ’Cowshed’ could provide. Application was made and passed for a new house to be built on the Main Road for John and Joan. They moved out of the farmhouse in February 2006, and Richard and Maxine moved into the farmhouse. Maxine’s parents, Liz and Ed Phillips, moved into the ‘Cowshed’.
John did not retire and still came every day to the farm.
When Richard & Maxine married they lived in a converted farm building which they called The Cowshed. They moved into the farmhouse in 2006.
DEATH OF JOHN WEST
John West died in July 2010. The partnership, R. M. West and Son, continued with Richard, Maxine and Joan.