Harris Farm

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Please click on the play icon to view the Harris Family footage taken in the late 1960’s by Len Harris.  We thank the family for releasing the footage and allowing us to share it with you all on this website. Thank You.

Harris’s  Farm was at the  junction of the Drove and the road to Coombe. The map shown  here dates to about 1914; there is no sign of the farmyard buildings and the site is marked as allotments.   Their dairy unit and milking parlour was on the Everleigh Road just pass the junction with the road to Airfield Camp (Staple Cross Roads).

The leaseholder was John Alfred (or Alfred John) Harris (d.1978), father of Len and Ken Harris (shown in photos). The  sons both worked on the farm  until Len joined the RAF Bomber Command during World War 2 and subsequently moved away. Len Harris wrote about the farm  and took the lovely photos we have  here. Thanks to Tony Whitelock, Len’s  stepson, for making them available.  Len Harris researched the family tree and kept a scrapbook.

The Harris family were however yeoman farmers in Haxton  from earlier times, possibly based at  the  property the family lived in  during the C20th – Haxton Bridge House.  They were related to the Sheppards, also a long established farming family.

The sheaves of corn were carefully stacked
Ken Harris
Then the rick was thatched to keep it all dry. Ricks were usually round or oval
Threshing took pace later in the year. The threshing machine could be connected to a steam traction engine or to a tractor as pictured here
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