Laxton, last open-field village in England

On July 11th. the open fields of Laxton lay scorched under blistering sunshine.  Not the best day to explore this Nottinghamshire village that, by the vagaries of history escaped enclosure and today survives as the last functioning open-field village in England. It’s one of those fascinating rural anomalies that seems worthy of a pilgrimage even in the knowledge that it will yield little in the way of spectacular sights. What makes Laxton unique is best appreciated by looking at a map that shows how each field is divided into strips which are then allocated to local farms.  The origin of this system lay in the early medieval period when the small farms clustered in the village expanded their land use by clearing the woodland that surrounded them for cultivation.  In the interests of fairness the newly available land was divided into strips and distributed among the local farmers, all of whom were tenants of the Lord of the Manor, so that all received portions of good, average and poor quality land. Which is the reason that Laxton farmsteads are concentrated in the village centre rather than being dispersed through the surrounding countryside.

These egalitarian arrangements couldn’t survive the gradual erosion of tenants’ rights that began in the 13th. century when manorial lords acquired the right to consolidate the strips of land into single fields. For the open-field system it was a lingering death as the 18th. and 19th. century enclosure acts accelerated the process with the last examples being lost by 1850.  Elsewhere in Europe where various versions were  widely used it lasted a little longer.  In Russia it took Stalin’s policy of forced collectivisation to bring it to an end.

Among several explanations for the survival of Laxton are a lack of agreement on enclosure by local farmers and an impecunious Lord of the Manor (Earl Manvers of Thoresby Hall) lacking the funds to pay for the work. In 1952 the village land freehold was sold to the Ministry of Agriculture by Gervas Pierrepont, 6th Earl Manvers and then passed into the control of the Crown Estate both of whom favoured preserving the existing system as a historic survival. In 2018 the Crown Estate put the village of Laxton up for sale with the following classic, mealy mouthed excuse, “As a commercial real estate business, we recognise we may not be best placed to manage the estate moving forwards and have therefore reached a decision to sell.” They claim to be looking for an owner in the heritage sector who would honour the commitment to maintain the open-field system but the real reason must be a desire to be rid of an asset that can’t be endlessly sweated to maximise a financial return.  Since 2020 the new owner in an unusual circular move is The Thoresby Settlement, part of the Thoresby Estate, owner of Thoresby Hall, once the home of the impecunious Earl Manvers.

There’s a fascinating text online from 2010 when the resident of Thorseby, Hugh Matheson, delivered his thoughts on the past and future of Laxton.  To a layman it reads as an admirably objective assessment of the problems that flow from maintaining Laxton in its present state - elderly and difficult to replace tenants and the need to make farming small parcels of land financially viable.  At the same time there was a genuine desire to find a way forward that could secure Laxton’s future.  The conclusion was that the growing number of agencies and stakeholders involved required strong leadership and a willingness to invest in the future.  This would appear to be beyond the capacity of the Crown Estate, implying that a change of stewardship was essential. Twelve years on and Mr Matheson has his wish and it will be interesting to see what the future holds for Laxton as the Thoresby Estate exerts its influence. It will certainly be a challenge to develop Laxton as a heritage attraction with a wide appeal to the general public without compromising the features that make it a really special place.

 

Cotton Cultivation in pictures

Another set of 6 Liebig collectors’ cards – this time from 1909. Six panels describe the process beginning with the planting of seeds. In India, a plough is employed while in Africa, the ground is broken by a work gang of teenagers. Harvesting takes place in America’s Deep South and the crop is delivered to a Cotton Gin where the seeds and detritus are removed. Baling and weighing is next in the process before the finished bales are delivered to the waterfront on a horse drawn wagon to be loaded on to a steamship on the next stage of the journey. It’s a familiar subject for cards of this type – a simplified description of a staple product in a complex process that takes us behind the scenes to see what’s otherwise concealed. The distribution of tasks follows ethnic lines – Europeans get involved when machinery is required but all the hard labour is left to people of colour. It’s a sanitised version of a brutal reality. The working atmosphere is genially relaxed. An air of contentment prevails. No coercion, no armed overseers calling for more effort, no flogging of the indolent or disobedient. The illustrations possess a period charm but their studied avoidance of harsh economic realities was repeated in children’s books and annuals, in films and educational materials until relatively recently. Which is one reason why it’s so easy to find people today who believe that colonialism was basically a benevolent enterprise with a few isolated instances of cruelty and injustice.

Postcard of the Day No. 91 – Grain Elevators, Buffalo, NY

The city of Buffalo is the spiritual home of the grain elevator. At its height there were over 30 of these gargantuan storage facilities lining the river and harbour. Grain from the Midwest was shipped to Buffalo via the Great Lakes and stored prior to transhipment to the Atlantic seaboard and Europe. The end for the Buffalo grain trade came in 1969 with the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway – only two of the surviving 15 structures are still handling grain. Elevator Alley as it is known, is still an impressive sight and has been developed as a visitor attraction – a campaign exists to have it designated as a National Park.

The example shown on today's card appears to be an early wooden cribbed construction with multiple hipped roofs. Later elevators were built in concrete and formed of cylindrical silos. Other cards show examples from Canadian ports – the last card shows a prairie elevator. Cereal growers would transport their crops to the local elevator from where they would move on by rail. In wheat growing states every small town would have its elevator. It would normally be the largest building in town, visible for miles and much valued as a landmark.

For artists and photographers grain elevators have been perpetual objects of fascination. Their overwhelming physical scale and repetition of geometric form offered rich graphic possibilities to the Modernist sensibility. They lent themselves easily to simplification and abstraction and supported the popular pre-war idea of the industrial sublime. Painters who explored them include Charles Demuth, Charles Sheeler, Ralston Crawford and a host of amateur artists, mainly from Canada, whose work (of variable quality) can quickly be found online. John Vachon, David Plowden and Andreas Feininger all produced memorable photographs of elevators. And the great Düsseldorf taxonomists, Bernd and Hilla Becher published their definitive survey in 2006. Their impassive scrutiny is extended over 200 plates.