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The Promotion of Agricultural Education for Adults: The Lancashire Federation of Women's Institutes, 1919–45

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 October 2008

Lynne Thompson
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Extract

A recent article in Rural History illustrated how the Women's Institutes between the wars Were influenced by contemporary feminism. The argument of the article was that in seeking to change the material condition and status of countrywomen, and in effect, emulating craft trades union strategies, the WI movement sought to alter perceptions of women's labour in the home by enhancing their skills, encouraging co-operative endeavour and promoting an ‘active domesticity’. Furthermore, the domestic arena was extended to cover all aspects of rural life related to the home, garden, farm or allotment.

However, as time passed between the wars, less interest was shown in agricultural work outside the home, and, as Morgan states elsewhere, the agricultural ‘side’ of the movement became ‘severely diminished’. Whilst one might not seriously quarrel with this statement with reference to some periods of WI history, it is, nevertheless, a somewhat reductive approach to have taken when considering the interwar period. During that time, there is evidence to suggest that in some regions at least, WI members maintained more than a passing interest in agriculture per se. This was not simply in relation to the production and preservation of food, but rather as a means of maintaining the influence of women in rural policy making. This interest can be best detected in the educational sphere, from the promotion of classes in a wide range of agricultural activities and demonstrations at agricultural and horticultural shows, to WI membership of local agricultural education committees. Furthermore, the National Federation of Women's Institutes (NFWI) fought in many ways to maintain the agricultural ‘side’ of the movement because it was an integral part of its wider mission to educate countrywomen, particularly those who were destined to live and work in the Empire

Type
Research Article
Information
Rural History , Volume 10 , Issue 2 , October 1999 , pp. 217 - 234
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1999

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References

Notes

1. Morgan, M., ‘Jam making, Cuthbert Rabbit and Cakes: Redefining Domestic Labour in the Women's Institute 1915–1960’, Rural History, 7:2 (1996), 207–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2. ibid. p. 208.

3. Morgan, M., ‘The Acceptable Face of Feminism: Women's Institutes 1915–60’, PhD thesis, University of Sussex, 1993, p 151.Google Scholar

4. Jenkins, I., The History of the Women's Institute Movement in England and Wales (Oxford, 1953), p. 109.Google Scholar

5. Lancashire Record Office: Women's Institutes: Lancashire Federation WILF files; Lancashire County Council Education (Agriculture) Sub-Committee Minutes EAM files; Lancashire County Council (Agriculture) Smallholdings and Allotments Sub-Committee CHM files; Lancashire County Federation of Women's Institutes, Queen's Road, Fulwood, Preston, Lancashire, PR2 3EA for Annual Reports 1920–45.

6. Report by the Inter-Departmental Committee on the Practical Education of Women in Rural Life, HMSO, 1928, chaired by Lady Denman, the LFWI President.

7. Mrs. Assheton was the wife of Ralph Assheton, JP, County Alderman and High Sheriff of Lancashire, and member of the Carlton Club. Their son, Ralph, became the first Lord Clitheroe due to his services as Conservative Party Chairman, 1944–6. Mrs. Assheton was also President and founder of the Clitheroe Division of women Conservatives in the Clitheroe Division 1911–30. She joined her husband on Lancashire County Council in 1928 and served on various sub-committees during the interwar period, including the Public Assistance Board.

8. WILF 1/2; 28/2/23.

9. Public Questions (NFWI, 1934), p. 5.Google Scholar

10. CHM 1 7/12/25 quoting circular LS4121 from the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries.

11. Thompson, Lynne, ‘“The Golden Thread of Empire”: Women's Popular Education in the Lancashire Federation of Women's Institutes 1920–1939’, Journal of Educational Administration and History, 28:1 (1996), 42–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

12. Home and Country (April, 1920), 6–7.Google Scholar

13. Ministry of Reconstruction, Adult Education Committee Final Report, CMD 321, HMSO.

14. Home and Country (December, 1927), 535.Google Scholar

15. Goodenough, S.. Jam and Jerusalem (London, 1977), p. 27Google Scholar for information on Lady Denman. Miss Cardwell, President and Chairman of the Lancashire County Federation immediately after the Second World War was a market gardener in her own right. See also, Morgan, Acceptable Face, p. 58.Google Scholar

16. The NFWI received an initial grant of £10,000 from the Development Commission under the auspices of the Treasury. In wartime it was originally funded by the Board of Agriculture. The NFWI became self financing in 1927.

17. By 1938, the last peacetime LFWI Annual Report showed that the total of Lancashire membership was 5665 representing 75 WIs as compared with the NFWI total of 327, 857 members representing 4841 WIs.

18. For example, Miss Pratt, Mr A.T.A. Dobson and Lady Trevelyan represented the Ministry of Agriculture on the NFWI Executive Committee in 1937, as did Miss Cox, from the Board of Education, Miss Healey from the Land Settlement Association and Mr. G. North from the Ministry of Health.

19. Jenkins, , History, p. 110.Google Scholar

20. EAM 13/1/30.

21. Oral testimony of Mrs. Cowell, Longton WI, September 1989. Author's private files.

22. WILF 1/3 26/11/24.

23. WILF 2/1 23/4/24.

24. Thompson, , ‘Golden Thread’, p. 57.Google Scholar

25. The LFWI received a grant from the West Riding County Council for Lancashire WIs adjacent to its border from 1932.

26. Thompson, , ‘Golden Thread’, pp. 54–55.Google Scholar

27. Presumably because the LCC began to describe all its free lectures under the heading of ‘education’.

28. WILF 2/1 21/6/29.

29. EAM 16/6/24.

30. Hostettler, E., ‘Women's Work in the Nineteenth Century Countryside’, Society for the Study of Labour History Bulletin, 31:2 (1976), 10.Google Scholar

31. EAM 14/6/26.

32. WILF 2/2 18/1/35.

33. Home and Country (January 1927), 3.Google Scholar

34. EAM 14/1/27.

35. LFWI Eighth Annual Report 1927.

36. EAM 14/3/38.

37. LFWI Nineteenth Annual Report 1938.

38. The LFWI won the National Mark Inter County Trophy during 1934–5.

39. Thompson, , ‘Golden Thread’, p. 55.Google Scholar

40. EAM 11/4/32.

41. There were 8 Agricultural Discussion Societies in Lancashire in 1938, covering the whole county from Ulverston to Bolton EAM 9/5/38.

42. Thompson, , ‘Golden Thread’, p. 44.Google Scholar

43. EAM 13/1/30.

44. EAM 4/11/32.

45. EAM 17/1/27.

46. Churchill, R. S., Lord Derby: King of Lancashire (1959), p. 527.Google Scholar

47. Home and Country (July 1927), 286.Google Scholar

48. Devon County Council Agriculture Committee Minutes 11/9/1929.

49. Devon County Council Agriculture Committee Minutes 26/9/1935.

50. There were many Quakers in the interwar WI movement and the NFWI had to acknowledge their views.

51. WILF 10/1 31/7/40. Lady Mary Taylor was by then Vice-President of the NFWI.