ABSTRACT

This chapter seeks to reappraise Paterson's achievements by focusing on his background and early career, his contribution to dairy farming in the 1930s, the impact of the wartime food production campaign on his farms, and his post-war role as an agricultural innovator and pioneer of modern dairy farming. In particular it seeks to explain the paradox that, while his methods of food production were maligned during the Second World War, after the war he was hailed as a progressive farmer. A wide variety of national and local sources were studied, including official accounts, scientific papers, newspapers, contemporary personal accounts and Paterson's own correspondence and extensive personal records. Rex Paterson's career is an enigma. Unlike the vast majority of his farming contemporaries, he originated from a non-agricultural background. He embarked upon a career in dairy farming during the depressed conditions of the 1920s.