The way of life in the village changed little over the centuries as the farming was always the mixed inbyland and open moors system. Village craftsmen such as blacksmiths and joiners provided for the needs of their own farming community and combined their specialist skills with subsistence farming. An 1823 trade directory lists 17 farmers, four shoemakers, three corn millers, two blacksmiths, two butchers, two victuallers (one also a tallow chandler), a tailor, a wheelwright, and a "blue, brown, and shop paper manufacturer" in Lealholm. The Industrial Revolution absorbed some of the local population as the nearby boom town of Middlesbrough expanded its iron and steel industry but essentially, in this remote area, the farming economy survived until after the Second World War and the mechanisation of agriculture.