Bennett's of Ballinacurra Descriptive List (Ref. B609)

B609/

B609/7/B/9 Oats file, 1920-40 (1915-16). File mainly consisting of correspondence regarding oats distribution and experiments. Main correspondents are DoA and agricultural instructors with County Committees of Agriculture, although letters from farmers, businesses and laboratories are also present. The file also contains reports and statements regarding distribution and propagation, e.g., ‘List of persons who obtained Pure Seed White Oats from DATI Cereal Station, Ballinacurra, 1915, and summary of reply to inquiry re seeds and results’. There is also an ms copy of a report by Mr Hume on Black Oats grown in 1922. The file also contains advertisements and order forms for seed oats, 1939-40, and a printed DoA pamphlet regarding scholarships, 1925-26. B609/7/B/10 ‘Oats’ File, 1925-35. The file is in A-Z order, with headings such as Conferences, Departmental Experimental Plots, Variety Trials, Smut, Accounts, and various varieties of oats and barley. Mainly correspondence, but with some reports and scientific notes present. B609/7/B/11 Department Seed Orders, 1936. File mainly of letters from the secretary of section G3, DoA, requesting despatch of pedigree oats. Also includes letters from County Committees of Agriculture, requesting seed on behalf of named growers. A DoA letter of 8 February encloses a list of names and addresses of Instructors in Agriculture to whom seed for variety trials with oats are to be sent. B609/7/B/12 Flax file, 1911-13; 1919-25. The file contains correspondence with DATI, and with flax instructors and customers, 1919-25. A sub-file relates to the treatment of diseased or infected flax, 1911-13. Statements and reports on flax cultivation and experiments, including test results, 1920-25, are also present. B609/7/B/13 Flax (Empire Flax-growing Committee), 1918-40. Early letters and reports in this file relate to the Empire Flax-growing Committee, but subsequent items are from DoA. The file is arranged in sections: A. Evidence submitted to Flax-growing Committee; B. Conferences; C. Propagations (including experiments); D. Dressing experiments and seed tests; E. ‘J.W.S.’; F. General letters; G. Foreign letters. B609/7/B/14 Maize Drying, 1917. Small file regarding drying by JHB of damaged maize supplied by Messrs Mann & Bear Ltd. This drying was carried out by JHB and other companies to make the maize useable as a food stuff in a time of war-time shortage. Mr Mann writes ‘the patriotic action of these firms is appreciated by those who know the food position’.

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