Local History

One of Guernsey Museum's many storehouses is the Baubigny arsenal in St Sampsons.

Eddie Parks got a look inside and among the various items which give glimpses into the island's industrial heritage was a tomato steam boiler.

Matt Harvey points out the steam boiler

In the years when the tomato was King in Guernsey the steam boiler was a common sight.

Looking like a traction engine but without the engine the boilers were too expensive for most growers to own their own.

As a result they were hired by the day or the job and towed from vinery to vinery accompanied by a team of men who would feed the furnace and tend the pipes which feed the steam into the glass houses to sterilise the soil.

Most of them have long since rotted away or lie unseen under a blanket of brambles on deserted sites.

Matt Harvey from the Guernsey Museum told Eddie about the boiler.