Back then – and for centuries afterward – cheese would have been made in small individual dairies. But as a result of rationing during World War Two, most of the milk in Britain was used to make a single generic cheese dubbed ". This nearly wiped out local cheese production in Britain, slashing the number of farmhouse producers from more than 3,500 before World War One to barely 100 by the end of WW2, and, for years afterward, there was no-one making traditional cheddar in Cheddar.