| Arrangement | The first series focuses on Ford’s work. This is subdivided into five subsections, beginning with her early years in the profession, including her studies at the Royal Veterinary College, her war work and subsequent employment. There follow papers from her investigations into disease and fertility in guinea pigs. The rest of this series consists of sections devoted to Ford’s later field and laboratory notebooks, her many research files as a Veterinary Investigation Officer and other veterinary projects, and finally a section on the promotional work Ford undertook – publishing papers and presenting her ideas at conferences.
The second series goes under the broad title of External Events. Papers here include Ford’s notebooks of events she attended as a delegate. Other subdivisions contain papers relating to Ford’s involvement as a member of groups such as the British Veterinary Association and the Society for the Study of Animal Breeding.
The third series, Secondary Sources, brings together the many conference papers, pamphlets and journal articles collected by Ford, which demonstrate the range of her interests across the profession. Much of this originated in a hefty Reports File maintained by Ford over many years.
Finally, section four consists of paper relating to Ford’s personal interests such as her poetry, music, socialism and her family. The majority of documents here date from after her retirement in 1972.
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| AdminHistory | Connie Ford was born in 1912 and studied at the Royal Veterinary College in the early 1930s, at a time when it was still relatively rare for a woman to do so. After graduating in September 1933, Ford established herself as a veterinary surgeon in southeast London. To achieve this, Ford required financial support and successfully applied to the Connolly Memorial Fund for a loan. Once established in her practice, Ford not only repaid the loan but, true to her socialist principles, gave additional monies to support the fund.
However, Ford’s main interest lay in agricultural veterinary work. She subsequently sold her practice in 1941, intending to begin a postgraduate diploma in Veterinary State Medicine as a stepping stone towards her interests. Unfortunately, the effects of World War Two meant that the course was subsequently cancelled. Instead, Ford volunteered on the Home Front, initially as an Air Raid Precautions ambulance driver. But Ford still had ambitions for a career in agriculture and successfully requested to be transferred to the Women’s Land Army. She later explained in a letter to a friend dated 12th May 1948 that her motivation in asking for this transfer was partly so that male veterinary surgeons “…could hardly complain that I was too fragile to handle a cow”.
For the later war years, Ford engaged in various short-term roles, including as a laboratory assistant for the Veterinary Investigation Service at Sutton Bonington, Leicestershire, and a research post at Harper Adams Agricultural College, Shropshire. Eventually, Ford undertook a training course as a Veterinary Investigation Officer (VIO) in Northumberland in 1948. Ford specialised in cattle diseases and hoped to maintain a career in bovine infertility. After further projects at Weybridge and in Bristol. Ford returned to Sutton Bonington in 1951, this time as a Veterinary Investigation Officer where she stayed until her retirement in 1972.
During her years as a VIO Ford undertook a great deal of field and laboratory research in the area of cattle infertility. She studied the calcium and phosphorus intake of cattle, and the variations in the mineral levels of hay and silage around the East Midlands, and their relation to the season of growth and geological origin. She also made observations on the effects of fluctuating levels of iron found in spring waters under certain geological conditions. Her numerous published papers include The Interaction of Climate and Geology on the Breeding Problems of Cattle (1958) and The Control of Brucellosis in Infected Herds (1971). In 1970 she was awarded an MBE for her services to veterinary science.
Alongside her studies, Ford was also active in various learning networks including the British Veterinary Association and the Society for the Study of Animal Breeding, and her papers show the breadth of her many interests across the profession. Even after her retirement in 1972 Ford continued to take an interest in veterinary sciences; attending conferences and lectures into her eighties. In 1990, Ford published her biography of Aleen Cust, another pioneering female veterinary surgeon. For this book Ford was awarded the JT Edwards Memorial Medal.
Connie Ford died on 12th February 1998, aged 85.
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