History

George Pearson and his sons Sam, Fred, Frank and Arthur (my father) came to Totley, Sheffield around 1900. They first became tenants of Birchin Lee Nurseries at Dronfield Woodhouse around 1910 and purchased the property in three separate lots between 1925 and 1931.

They had two other nurseries at Totley, Sheffield. One of two acres on the Baslow Road was used mainly for retail sales and consisted of three greenhouses, a packing shed and cold frames. The second nursery at St. Georges Farm, comprising twelve acres, had seven greenhouses and cold frames and was used for the propagation of bedding plants, trees and shrubs in the spring and tomatoes and cucumbers in the summer, while here at Birchin Lee, which has an area of about forty acres, they grew all the outside vegetables.

In this photo, taken around 1930, is a dray load of lettuce and one of cauliflower ready for market. They would set off for Sheffield’s wholesale market at 4am and get back home about lunch time.

In 1960 my uncle Tom decided to retire, and in 1962 father and my other two uncles Fred and Frank also decided to go their own separate ways, so we retained the property here at Birchin Lee. I took over from father about 1970 and, together with my mother, concentrated on growing fruit, flowers and vegetables for the wholesale market.

In the hot summer of 1976, when the fruit was ripening faster than we could get it picked, we decided to try Pick Your Own (PYO) with great success. Since then we have concentrated more on retail sales of fruit in the summer, vegetables in summer and autumn and bedding plants in the spring.

Read more on our Our History page. Browse the other pages on our website or contact us for more information.