Lady Mostyn Discharging Grain at Irvine (c.1901)

Dock workers unload grain from a cargo ship in Edwardian North Ayrshire.

The job of an Edwardian stevedore was back-breaking, as this film, showing cargo ship Lady Mostyn unloading at Irvine docks, makes clear. A winch loads the grain into sacks, but they are carried down a gang plank to the waiting carts on broad shoulders. It's hard not to be impressed at this physical feat: the sacks' great weight is clear from the bending of the gang planks under the men's feet.