1940s Farm, Beamish Museum

Our last stop of the day was to visit the 1940s farm. This exhibit depicts life on the Home Front during the Second World War.

Farms had a very important role to play during the war. In 1939, 70% of Britain's food was imported from overseas. There were fears that German submarines could create a blockade, cutting off supplies. Therefore, there needed to be a major campaign to produce home-grown food. This meant that British farms had a new purpose and energy after years of agricultural depression.

Much of the farmstead here is original to the site. It opened to visitors in 1983.

The farmhouse showcases life during the war. Farmers were often exempt from being called up, so there would still be men around the farm, although many of them were involved in the Home Guard or volunteered as air raid wardens.

Many families at the time invested in a wireless which provided vital updates on the war. People kept up morale with games and musical entertainment. Cooking was still done on a traditional range. Women had to be inventive in a time of harsh rationing, coming up with replacements for ingredients that were in short supply. Parsnips were used as a substitute for bananas, for example!

The farm office, off the main farmhouse kitchen, was used for paperwork sent by the War Agricultural Executive and also as the local Home Guard office.

Two of the original farm cottages have been repurposed to show different aspects of rural life during the war. One is set up to show the home of a family of evacuees who would have been moved from a town or city, where they faced the risk of bombing raids, to the relative safety of the countryside. The other represents accommodation for Women's Land Army members, or 'Land Girls', close to their work on the farm. Land Girls provided agricultural labour, recruited initially as volunteers before conscription for women was introduced in 1941. More than 80,000 women were Land Girls by 1943.Read more