Old Pond publishing days

Long Haul Pioneers book back in stock

The Long Haul Pioneers, Ashley Coghill's book about Astran's Middle East trucking, has been reprinted and is now back in stock at Old Pond.

Trucking DVDs from CP Productions and Roundoak available from Old Pond

Old Pond Publishing is now able to offer the trucking DVDs distributed by Nynehead books, originated by Roundoak and CP Productions.

Since the early 1990s Pete Connock and Martin Phippard of CP Productions have taken annual trips to see and film examples of the most powerful, exciting and unusual examples of trucking around the Western world. Their visits to Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the United States, Sweden and elsewhere have all produced footage of configurations and large-scale work unlikely to be found in the UK.

Pete Connock works as a full-time driver while Martin Phippard, semi-retired, is still in the transport industry. Both are privileged to join in with the activities they film, resulting in plenty of in-cab shots and drivers’ action. Their latest programme, Show Time!, takes us to Switzerland to look at the particular features of the Swiss trucking industry. The DVD includes the Interlaken truckers’ festival and a memorable session with a T-line Scania logger with independent trailer steering at work on steep hairpins in the Swiss mountains.

All CP Productions programmes are fully scripted with a clear narration.

These DVDs are available to order here. For further information please contact Heather Jarrold: [email protected], phone 01473 238200. A checklist of titles follows; a short catalogue will be available from 7 October.

CP Productions DVDs
Australian Adventures Volume 1 (2001), 60 minutes, £16.95
Australian Adventures Volume 2 (2002), 57 minutes, £16.95
B-Train Bonanza 1 (2007), 75 minutes, £16.95
B-Train Bonanza 2 (2008), 90 minutes, £16.95
Bulkhaul (2006), 83 minutes, £16.95
Bulkhaul 2 (2009), 70 minutes, £16.95
Cross Canada Haul (1997), 60 minutes, £16.95
Great Lakes Specials (1993), 60 minutes, £12.99
International Heavy Haul (2001), 57 minutes, £16.95
Loaded & Rollin' (2005), 70 minutes, £16.95
Pilgrim's Progress (2003), 60 minutes, £16.95
Quarries and Lorries (2004), 60 minutes, £16.95
Seeing Double  (1996), 60 minutes, £16.95
Show Time! (2010), 57 minutes, £12.99
Top Tipper Trio (2007), 53 minutes, £16.95
West Coast – Revisited (1999), 58 minutes, £16.95

Archive footage is the speciality of Roundoak programmes made by Nynehead’s Robin Pearson. Old Pond has been able to offer the popular Bedford DVD for a number of years. The other titles are new to Old Pond distribution.

Roundoak DVDs
Pickfords at Work (1997), 50 minutes, £16.95
Bedford: you saw them everywhere (2005), £16.95
Wynns 1 (1996), 28 minutes, £14.95
Wynns 2 (2002), 50 minutes, £16.95
Wynns 3 (2005), 45 minutes, £16.95

Roundoak trucking books available from Old Pond

For over twenty years, under the imprint of Roundoak, Robin Pearson of Nynehaed Books has been producing a steady flow of highly illustrated books on the history of trucking in Britain. They deal with manufacturers, operators, specialist vehicles and heavy transport.

In 2009 Roundoak published John Marsh's hardback, The History of Reed Transport, 215 detailed pages including a superb selection of 350 photographs.

These books are now available from Old Pond Publishing. Old Pond is publishing a short catalogue of these titles on 7 October. They are listed below for reference.

For further information please contact Heather Jarrold: [email protected], phone 01473 238200.

Books from Roundoak
AEC Lorries in the Post War Years, Graham Edge (1994), £18.50
AEC Reliance, Truran & Platt (1999), £7.50
Atkinson, Peter  Davies (1995), £16.95
Bedford Trucks & Vans in Colour, Peter Davies (2003), £19.95
Brewery Transport, Arthur Ingram (1991), £5.50
British Lorries of the 40s & 50s, Peter Davies (1989), £19.95
British Trucks at Work in the ’Sixties, Peter Davies (1988), £19.95
BRS: The Early Years 1948-1953, Ingram & Mustoe (1999), £24.95
BRS: Parcels Services and the Express Carriers, Mustoe, Ingram & Pearson (2008), £29.95
BRS, A Pictorial History, Nick Baldwin (1982/2008), £19.95
Bus Company Service Vehicles, Colin Wright (1980/2006), £9.95
Diamond T Type 980/981, Freathy & Pearson (2001), £24.95
Drawbar Outfits, Peter Davies (1992), £7.50
Eight Wheelers in Colour, Peter Davies (1995), £16.95
Fairground and Circus Transport, Colin Wright (1973/90), £6.50
Fairground Transport, Malcolm Slater (1970/90), £6.50
Family Affairs: haulage contractors from Somerset & Dorset, Michael Marshall (2004), £22.50
Fisher Renwick 1874-1972, Gordon Mustoe (1997), £19.95
Foden: a pictorial history, Peter Davies (2004), £24.95
Heavy Haulage & Abnormal Loads Volume 3, David Lee (1997), £14.95
Heavy Haulage & Abnormal Loads Volume 4, David Lee (2000), £14.95
Heavy Transport International, Jan Van Wees (2002), £16.50
High, Wide & Heavy, David Lee (2005), £26.95
Leyland Lorries: a celebration, Arthur Ingram (1996), £18.95
Lincoln's Excavators: Ruston 1875-1930, Peter Robinson (2003), £24.95
Lincoln's Excavators: Ruston Bucyrus 1930-1945, Peter Robinson (2006), £29.95
Lincoln's Excavators: Ruston Bucyrus 1945-1970, Peter Robinson (2010), £39.95, to be published November
London's Lorries, Arthur Ingram (1990), £19.95
Opencast Coal: plant & equipment, Bill Huxley (1993), £8.50
Petroleum Transport, A Century of, Graham Edge (1998), £19.95
Pickfords, The Story of, Arthur Ingram (1993), £9.50
Post Office Stores & Telephone Vehicles (1986/2006), £9.95
Recovery Vehicles, Mick White (1998), £8.50
Reed Transport, The History of, John Marsh (2009), £25.00
Scammell the Load Movers from Watford, Nick Georgano (1997), £24.95
Tankers, Colin Wright (1986), £4.50
Views from the North: photographs by Roger Kenney (2006), £14.95
Whitbread: 250 years of brewery transport, Arthur Ingram (1992), £8.50
Wynns Overseas, John Wynn (1998), £19.95

The Potato Files new DVD from Tractor Barn advance information

The Potato Files, Stephen Richmond & Jonathan Whitlam. DVD (Tractor Barn), approx 100 minutes. ISBN 978-1-906853-54-9. Now IN STOCK at £15.95.

In this packed DVD the Tractor Barn producers look at the past and present of potato mechanisation. They use a combination of archive footage and current filming that ranges from the Ferguson spinner to the Ploeger self-propelled tanker harvester. They bear witness to a revolution in potato production which has now reached the stage where just 4,000 UK producers are responsible for 90 per cent of our 6 million tonnes production.

Stephen Richmond and Jonathan Whitlam start with manure spreading (as it used to be), ploughing and preparing the soil, taking a look at traditional systems as well as minimum tillage. They cover ridging and bed-forming with particular emphasis on specialist de-stoners such as the Grimme Combi Star.

Their section on planting runs from the 1950s hand-planting to more modern machines from Grimme, Reekie, Keyag and Standen. The irrigation systems covered range from pipes and sprinklers to today’s hose reels, and there is footage of spraying for blight and topping.

The film-makers cover harvesting in detail, coming up to date with trailed harvesters but more particularly the monster 400-500 horsepower self-propelled 4-row machines. Manufacturers represented include Dewulf, Ploeger, Standen, Standen Pearson, Reekie and Agrifac. The producers have had access to the extensive Grimme film archive as well as their current footage.

Finally there is a section on potato handling – and gentleness – as well as grading and storing.

A Year on an Arable Farm DVD advance information

A Year on an Arable Farm, Andrew Lyle. DVD, 72 minutes released 2007 (by Game Keepers Diary). ISBN 978-1-906853-58-7. Now in stock at Old Pond at £15.95.

Seen through the eyes of farmer Andrew Lyle, this DVD charts a year’s progress on a 500-acre arable farm at the foot of the Lincolnshire Wolds. The project began as an educational aid suitable for schools, so at each stage it covers in some detail why and how the work is being done. The programme is written and narrated by Sean Sparling.

The farm grows wheat, oilseed rape, oats, potatoes, sugar beet and borage, and uses appropriate up-to-date machinery. Not seen, but part of the enterprise is a pig unit.

The programme begins in early autumn with ploughing, sub-soiling and manuring, then deals with preparing a seedbed for winter wheat. It covers seed protection, drilling, rolling and fertilising. A detailed feature shows the potato harvest.

Winter is dominated by sugar beet lifting. There are also sequences on crop-spraying, ditch maintenance and some work on hedges and in the woodland planting saplings and trimming older trees.

Spring brings the spreading of chicken manure, more drilling, potato planting, crop protection, fertilising and some tidying up in the woodland. The wood chips are taken to the farm biomass boiler which provides heating for the farmhouse and its water. The borage is precision-drilled.

Irrigation is one of the main themes of the summer, followed by machine maintence in preparation for the harvest. The oilseed rape is harvested after which oats, wheat and borage (swathed) are taken in turn. Straw is baled for the livestock unit and the farming year has run its course.

If you are looking for a programme that introduces newcomers to a variety of arable farm activities with clear explanations of what is going on, then this is an ideal DVD for you.

Seventy Years of Farm Machinery Pt 2: harvest, book advance information

Seventy Years of Farm Machinery Part Two: Harvest, Brian Bell MBE. Hardback book, 246 x 189 mm, 224 pages inc 314 photographs. ISBN 978-1-906853-50-1. Now in stock at Old Pond Publishing at £24.95.

In the twentieth century the machinery for harvesting cereals, grass and root crops changed beyond recognition. Brian Bell’s latest book charts this technical revolution from the 1930s to the 1990s.

He begins with the cereal crop, showing the progress from reapers, binders and threshers through the development of the combine to more recent models ‘bristling with electronic gadgetry’. He also includes a section on pea and bean harvesters.

In his second chapter the author turns to balers: from stationary balers and trussers to pick-up balers, big balers and bale handling. Under the heading ‘hay and silage machinery’ Brian Bell deals with cutter-bar mowers, mounted, mid-mounted and rotary mowers, hay making and loaders, silage machinery, green-crop loaders, forage wagons and forage harvesters. Brian is no stranger to grass farming. In the photograph (left) he is the young man further from the camera at work in the early 1960s.

Chapter 4 is devoted to sugar beet machinery: down-the-row thinners, harvesters, self-propelled sugar beet harvesters and cleaner loaders. Potato harvesting machinery follows: spinners and elevator diggers, complete harvesters and haulm pulverisers.

The final chapter covers hedging and ditching, post-hole diggers, ditching machinery, saws, chainsaws, machinery to aid lifting and carrying and farm trailers – all part of estate management machinery.

Throughout the book the Brian Bell uses a large number of photographs and other illustrations to show examples of the equipment. This is Brian’s 47th year as an author, with twenty-five books and DVDs in print. The current book is a sequel to his 2009 title Seventy Years of Farm machinery Pt 1: Seed time. Together these two books offer an absolutely unrivalled picture – with about 600 illustrations – of the transformation of farm technology in less than a human lifetime, a second agrarian revolution.

 

 

Working Tractors Part Three big power special DVD in stock

Working Tractors Part Three big power special, presented by Stephen Richmond, DVD approx 90 minutes, released by Tractor Barn is now in stock at Old Pond Publishing at £12.95.

The Truth Behind 'I Walked by Night' - new DVD

The Truth Behind 'I Walked by Night' by Peter Hodges and Charlotte Paton, DVD approx 60 minutes. Now in stock at Old Pond.

In her book The King of the Norfolk Poachers Charlotte Paton described the results of her search for Frederick Rolfe’s real life, comparing it with the account published in Lilias Rider Haggard's book I Walked by Night. In this companion DVD Charlotte shows how she went about her search and interviews people associated with Rolfe and his world. There are also memorable scenes of poaching skills.

Documentary-maker Peter Hodges is an award-winning sound designer with over 40 years experience working in television and Film. His programme has many memorable and beautiful scenes in which Rolfe's immersion in the countryside is evoked.

The King of the Norfolk Poachers was shortlisted in the biography and memoir section of the 2010 Eastern Daily Press-Jarrolds book awards. Also shortlisted was another of Old Pond's recent titles, the photograph book Bells Beneath the Sea.

The Gingerfold trucking books have changed hands

At the end of the 1990s the trucking journalist and author Graham Edge (right) began to publish a highly regarded list of books. At first his company, Gingerfold Publishing, was particularly noted for titles on AEC and Leyland. When it widened its field it published two exceptional works: Gardner, by Graham Edge himself and Volvo F88 & F89 at Work, the first book by Patrick W Dyer.

Although Graham will always be a trucking enthusiast, he has now retired from publishing and sold his stock and rights to Old Pond Publishing. Graham works in the transport industry in Bolton and is continuing to write about trucking. At the age of 62 he is getting married for the first time.

The Gingerfold titles Old Pond now has in stock are:
 

AEC Mammoth Major Mk III
AEC Mammoth Major Mk V and Ergomatic Cab Ranges
AEC Mandator
AEC Mercury
AEC Mustang and Marshal
From Moorlands to Highlands: the story of Brian Harris transport
Leyland Beaver
Leyland Octopus
Milled from Golden Fields: transport in the flour-milling industry
Volvo F88 and F89 at Work
W Clifford Watts: an illustrated history of the Yorkshire haulier
Where Do You want This Lot? (Bob Rust’s transport industry memories).

Gardner is out of stock. Old Pond will reprint this title in the spring.