Village life: roofing a barn, haymaking and the maypole, 1937
Men tile a new barn roof as women pass tiles up a ladder, farm women fork hay in a dusty yard, and a maypole with trade figures stands before an inn.
On the bare timber frame of a big barn a row of men sits astride the rafters laying tiles course by course, while women stand on a ladder and pass the tiles up from a horse-drawn wagon, and a man in a cap looks round from the battens. In a farmyard between whitewashed walls two women in headscarves fork hay onto a loaded wagon in a haze of dust, and a tall striped maypole hung with carved trade figures and small swastika pennants rises beside a whitewashed inn with flower boxes.
Neighbourly help at building and harvest was the custom of the southern villages. The party praised such work as the true community of the people and hung its own pennants on the maypoles.
