Powered by horses.
All in a dray’s work
The clip-clop of hooves on cobbles rang out daily across 19th-century Blackburn as heavy horses delivered Thwaites ale across town. Today four beautiful Shires remain members of our team, charming colleagues and customers alike. We absolutely love them (and don’t they know it?!)
A 220 year history
Thwaites’s Shires were put out to grass in the 1920s as steam wagons and then lorries replaced the horse-drawn drays. But in the late 1950s, when working heavy horse breeds had declined to the point of near extinction, a young manager (and future Thwaites managing director) called David Kay persuaded the board to bring Shires back into the business. Our four-legged team members became invaluable once more, not only delivering barrels of beer to local pubs but winning hearts – and prizes – all over the country. After meeting the Queen in 1978 when she presented them with trophy at the Shire Horse Society’s Centenary Show, they received the Freedom of Blackburn in 1985 for their service to the town – an honour bestowed on Daniel Thwaites’s granddaughter Elma Yerburgh 50 years earlier.
The Shires today
Today our handsome ambassadors epitomise the heritage and craftmanship at the heart of Thwaites. They’re out several times a week meeting our guests or going to community events, flying the flag for their endangered breed. Cared for and trained by head horseman Richard Green and his colleagues Jon Jones and Bev Holland, they’re always beautifully turned out and beautifully behaved. “It’s wonderful to see people’s faces when they hear the horses’ hooves on the road and turn round to see them pulling the dray in their traditional harnesses,” says Richard, who’s looked after our horses for quarter of a century and won many prizes beside them in the show ring. “There’s no better feeling than being in a grandstand full of people when your horses are going well.”
