Day 85. The Bakery.

Left: Richard Beavington. Right: his son Dick in 1956. Courtesy of Elizabeth Lyne, nee Beavington.

A purpose-built bakehouse was built in Preston behind No.50 in the early 19^th century, and this house became the home of Preston's bakers for over 150 years. The bakery supplied bread to Preston and other local villages, although domestic bread ovens (see Day 21) were still widely used.

The first recorded bakers in Preston are in 1813, although it is unclear whether they used the current bakehouse. In the 1830s, one Daniel Salmon was working as a baker; within a decade his son Henry, daughter Elizabeth and Elizabeth's husband William Davis were all working as bakers and living at No.50.

 

In the 1860s, widow Ann Hone from The Dell and her son James took over the bakery. It seems Ann started the grocer's shop which ran alongside the bakery for the next hundred years (see Day 84).

When James, a poor businessman, went bankrupt in 1887, the bakery was taken over by Richard Beavington, a farmer's son from Ebrington. Richard and his sons  Dick and Percy spent their working lives in the bakery.

The peel used by the Beavingtons to load the oven.

 

Freddie Herd outside the bakery, c.1930. Freddie (b.1920) was the son of Russell Herd and Gertrude, nee Horseman. The couple had met and married in London during the First World War, while Russell was on leave from the army, and subsequently settled in Preston. Freddie helped out at Preston bakery every day after school.

 

Percy (left) and Dick Beavington (right), outside the bakery. The identity of the second man in unknown.

The bakery closed in 1970 when Dick and Percy retired. The oven was never used again, but nearly fifty years after it closed, the Beavingtons' bread remains an iconic feature of Preston in people's memories.