HOPS FOR ENGLISH BEER

King Country Chronicle, Volume XXVII, Issue 4461, 24 October 1933, Page 6

HOPS FOR ENGLISH BEER

GOOD CROP MEANS GOOD VINTAGE. Train after train left the East End of London filled with hop-pickers during the season. They left the drab streets in which they live to spend some weeks among the quiet hills of Kent, where the fields were covered with golden hops. Thousands of Englishmen were keen to hear what the hop crop is like, for upon its condition depend the subtle bitterness of the " bitter" and the seductive mildness of the " mild." The Kentish growers said: "Hops are plentiful. The crop is a good one, and therefore the beer vintage of 1933 should be good, too." \Some of the hop-pickers go down into Kent year after year. One woman, for instance, has now worked in the hop fields for forty-three seasons. In the days when she first went the hop-picker's life was often exceedingly rough. They thught themselves very fortunate if they could find a cowshed to sleep in. tfSfow they live in army huts; there are nurses in attendance, and the doctor is within call. There are even " hoppers' hospitals," which treat hundreds of pickers for minor complaints during the harvest. Hop-picking is one of the jobs that remain unchanged by mechanisation. Hops are delicate, and need careful and skilled handling. It is highly ijmprobable that any machine will ever replace these Cockneys who make a working holiday of the hop season.