History of the Latteria Turnaria

In the early years of the last century, in order to help the local economy through difficult times, it was proposed to create a co-operative dairy so that even those with a small number of dairy animals could produce cheese.

So, on 1 May 1904 the the Anonymous Co-operative Society, the “Latteria Sociale di Tignale” was founded, to process the milk supplied by members and for the sale of dairy products.

The start of the operation meant that summer pastures were needed in the mountains and, overcoming competition from a private person who offered £ 6000, on February 9, 1907 the new co-operative dairy bought the mountains of Puria, Maranch and Garzera from the local authority for £3653, 25.

With the transfer of nearly 224 hectares of land obtained in this way by means of preferential treatment, the Co-operative was obliged to operate in a way to benefit the entire community.

After the initial adjustment period, the Co-operative began to prepare the pastures and the construction of shelters for the cattle, of the farmstead for the herdsmen and of water tanks.In the summer there were about 60 animals (of which only about half were dairy cattle) which pastured in Puria, situated at about 1000 metres above sea level.

The summer pastures in Puria were sold to the State Forestry Organization in 1966 and are now part of the West Gardesana Regional Forest managed by ERSAF, the largest in the whole of Lombardy. A new barn and farmstead house the “Life Vita Museum”.

In order to have a place to process the milk collected by members, in 1931 the Co-operative bought the building in the locality Rompala for £ 17,000. The figure was high, but the Board of Directors, recognizing the urgent need to have some premises, approved the transaction unanimously

On 23rd October 1949 the Società Anonima Cooperativa “Latteria Sociale di Tignale” changed its name and became “Latteria Turnaria di Tignale”.

In the fifties it was realized that it was necessary to improve the structure used to process the milk; having the possibility to obtain contributions and recovering more money from the sale of some plots, the Latteria Turnaria di Tignale proceeded to construct the new dairy.

By 1962, the Company had a new building for the processing of milk called Casèl.

In 1966, in view of the availability of a more suitable private mountain pasture, equipped with a better water source and higher quality pastures, the Company decided to sell the 247 hectares of the Puria mountain pasture and purchase the Angoi mountain pasture which covered 74 hectares.

With the purchase of the new area, improvements were started immediately and already in 1968  the barn was enlarged, and the farmhouse was built for the dairyman and herdsmen. The milk was kept on the ground floor together with the cheese store where the cheese was left to mature.

In the area of Angoi about 50 “four-legged” animals were pastured. The summer pastures were used for about 100 days, beginning in late May and ending in early September, with a production of 14-15 quintals of cheese and 3-4 quintals of butter.

In the eighties interest in the pastures in  Angoi declined with the abandonment of farming dairy cattle for several years.

Since 2010 the Angoi summer pasture is run by a member of the Co-operative Dall’Aglio, and his beef cattle pass the summer there, fed exclusively by grazing the grass, in complete freedom.