A Genealogically Led History of Cheddar Cheese (70 pages)

70 Page PDF File - My 3rd great grandfather, George Ridgley, was born in North Dorset circa 1804 and, in his early years, was a successful shoemaker working in the hamlet of Enmore Green, just outside Shaftesbury in Dorset. He was a staunch Wesleyan Methodist and was active in the church and local community. Around 1835 George became a cheese dealer, a move which seems to have elevated both his financial prospects and his community status. This paper explores the link between Methodism, Cheddar cheese and the man known as the father of Cheddar cheese, Joseph Harding (1805-1876). As it turned out, Cheddar cheese was to enrich George’s family for the next 60 years until foreign competition forced the price to an unprofitable level, by which time the family owned their own farms and were able to make their living as agriculturalists.