p
osTcards From The hop Fields
Jackie Gooding takes us down to Kent, hopping through times past
WhaT is a hop? Hop plants are trained to grow up strings in a hop field, hop garden or hop yard. It’s the flowers – picked and dried – that are used as a flavouring and stability agent in beer, to which they give a bitter, zesty, or citric flavour.
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For over 160 years, there was a tradition of East End families hop picking in Kent during the summer; the annual trip to bring in the hop harvest was an opportunity not only to earn much needed money but also to breathe fresh air for a couple of weeks. Hop picking was undertaken mainly by women and children – the men stayed at home to work – and most families went to the same farms each year and met old and new friends. Mike Tyrell – former CEO of Tower Hamlets Community Housing and himself a real ‘hopper’ – has compiled an extensive collection of photos and memories from East Enders’ hop-picking days. It’s thanks to him that we’re able to share many of these images. As farmers started to mechanise the hoppicking process, such working holidays began to decline until finally stopping in the 1980s.