Old Pond publishing days

Land girls on television

Old Pond Publishing has published three separate reminiscences by former Land Girls: Irene Grimwood, Joan Snelling and Sonia Kurta. Irene and Sonia have been interviewed today by different television channels. The interviews have been prompted by the issuing of a new medal to give belated recognition to the wartime women who worked so hard on the land.

85-year-old Irene Grimwood took a sentimental journey back to the Old Rectory, Halesworth, where she was billeted during the war. The ITV Anglia team of cameraman David Bush (left in the picture) and interviewer Malcolm Robertson drew out her memories. These included not just the hard work but also the fun that girls got up to: for instance, climbing out of a first-floor window to sneak off and kiss American airmen goodbye.

Irene's book, Land Girls at the Old Rectory, published by Old Pond, is a light-hearted account of days when a gang of girls who missed the last train could always find a safe refuge in which to spend the night. More ...

Meanwhile, Sonia Kurta was on her way back from London where BBC 1 Television had invited her on to their Breakfast Show. Sonia is author of Charismatic Cows and Beefcake Bulls, in which she recalls the farm work she undertook in the 1940s and early '50s. During much of this time she was a member of the Women's Land Army, and she was based in Cornwall, including a long stint on the Caerhays estate. More ...

Dale Starks ends his Yellow Trail from Texas

Anyone who remembers the 1976 BBC 'World About Us' documentary about custom harvesting in the United States and Canada will recall the contractor at the centre of it all: Dale Starks. We have been told that Dale passed peacefully away in Wichita hospital last Friday. He was in his 80s but almost to the end he was still harvesting corn.

The photograph (courtesy Robert White) shows Dale in Montana, 1983.

Old Pond has now released Yellow Trail from Texas as a DVD. See blog 25 June.

On the blog entry for 8 February 2009 there is a neat account by Tom Kirk of his time with Dale on the Yellow Trail.

Great Mistakes Airlines

In September we were in Wyoming and Maryland filming excavation machinery in open-cast coalmines. Our first base was Gillette, Wyoming. 'Great Mistakes Airlines' was the epithet that our cameraman bestowed on Great Lakes Airlines, the company that transported us from Denver to Gillette on Labor Day.

We loaded our luggage at Denver, eight bags for the three of us flying. At Gillette the tripod case was missing. This was a big item, maybe four feet long, and quite heavy.

What soon became apparent was that Great Lakes had no tracking system for luggage. They simply had no idea where it was. The staff were friendly, they worked hard (I wouldn't want my daughter hefting baggage the way these young women have to), and they earnestly wanted to help. But with no system they were lost - as were we.

It cost us a day without a tripod to film on; a day for me personally while I was sorting out a hired tripod; and excess on insurance. The tripod has never turned up and we've never received an apology, apart from those given by the harassed counter staff.

I understand that Gt Lakes has a code-sharing agreement with United Airlines. Well, my personal bag went missing on the UA flight we took later in the week from Denver to Pittsburgh. The treatment we received was totally different. The bag was immediately traced as delayed; we were offered compensatory flight vouchers and apologies; the bag was sent by courier to my hotel a couple of hours' drive away. Spot on.

The hired tripod at Belle Ayr mine, Wyoming. From the left, Keith Haddock (scriptwriter), Ken Kelly (Belle Ayr mines), Jonathan Theobald (director), Roger Wiltshire (cameraman and coiner of the epithet 'Great Mistakes Airlines').

One of the stars of the programme is in the background: P & H 4100 XPB shovel.