Agriculture and Breeding Heritage

The district of Sainte Mère Eglise is an agricultural region. Our green pastures are relatively recent as up until 1850 40% of this area was essentially cereal producing (wheat, buckwheat) as against 30% grass. Numerous mills and ruins of mills bear out this fact. The ruins of the oldest windmill in the western world can be found at Liesville-sur-Douve. They lie a few hundred metres from the church.

This tendancy to cereal farming was reversed around 1850. Farmers found it was more viable to be producing meat and dairy products in response to a huge demand from towns in the process of urbanisation. This was facilitated by the development of transport like the railway and the car. Joachim Lepelletier of Sainte-Mère-Eglise founded the first butter wholesale business there before setting up in Carentan in 1865. His great granddaughter, the writer Jacqueline Monsigny, has immortalised him in her book "Le Maître de Hautefort", one of the bestsellers of recent years.

The industrial dairy at Chef-du-Pont was founded in 1907 by Monsieur Loudun. Until the second world war production there was more varied than it is today with products including pasteurised or unpasteurised milk, cream or powdered milk, "Diploma" cheeses, camemberts and "Pont-L'évêque. In the 1950s it was taken over by the Claudel company which specialised in two specific products: powdered milk and "Mont Blanc" desserts. It must be pointed out here that the Chef-du-Pont site took preference another site at Sainte-Mère because of the proximity of the Paris-Cherbourg railway line which facilitated the dispatch to the Parisian markets.

The industrial dairy was purchased by the Nestlé group in 1985.
The Sainte-Mère-Eglise and Cotentin dairy opened on 15th June 1910 in Chef-du-Pont for the reasons mentioned above. The founding managing director Monsieur Lecouflet succeeded in raising, with 50 members, an authorized capital of 60,000 francs divided into 1,200 shares of 50 francs each. On the opening day 20 carts brought 11,000 litres of milk from 90 farms.

Production grew from 6 million litres of milk and 200 shareholders in 1911 to 34 million litres and 533 shareholders in 1982. The company extended its production from milk, cream and butter to cheese (Saint- Paulin in 1923, Livarot in 1930, Edam in 1938 and Camembert in 1953.

The turning point came in 1979 when it merged with the Isigny cooperative dairy to become known as I.S.I. (Isigny-Sainte-Mère). There are few today who have not heard of its speciality "le petit Sainte-Mère".

The famous trotters of the region came into existence in the region at the end of the 19th century with the Anglo Norman half-breed, a cross between Norman mares and English thoroughbreds. The breeders at that time did much to improve the stock and the Levesque stables in Beuzeville-la-Bastille is an example of the remarkable success in the promotion of the trotters of this region at international level. The Vivier stud at Houesville is also greatly renowned. We shouldn't forget either that "Bonne Fortune" a brood mare from Monsieur Lebrequier's stud in Ravenoville, was the dam of "Loudéac" one of the finest stallions of this Norman breed of trotters.

The aim of the Société Hippique founded in 1933 was to give young people some knowledge of equestrianism. Some excellent horsemen were trained there: A. Levavasseur, J. Fleury, G. and J. Brohier and the Savary brothers…

The saddle horse of the region is greatly favoured by riders. Every year the horse show at Sainte Mère attracts the best European horsemen.