noted as fast-maturing and excellent when fed turnips. Coke cross-bred the two, with the resulting sheep being highly tame and superior to the pure Norfolk breed. Coke also bred cattle and used oxen for ploughing rather than horses, being the first to use them harnessed rather than yoked and winning a prize for his oxen in 1837. Through sheep shearings, competitions and his contacts within the nobility, Coke soon spread his new ideas and breeds. Initially small events of local farmers, the shearings soon became 200-person formal dinners, rising to 300 people in 1821 and 700 soon after, with even the American ambassador Richard Rush attending in 1819, along with the French Consul and the Duke of Sussex. The Board of Agriculture was formed in 1793, with Coke sitting as one of the 30 "ordinary members" as a leading agriculturalist; he was made the Vice-President in 1805. The Board published a series of county reports for most of the United Kingdom, describing new farming measures being undertaken in various parts of the country. Coke has been described as "the real hero of Norfolk agriculture", despite the fact that his land was so poor one critic is said to have remarked that "the thin sandy soil must be ploughed by rabbits yoked to a pocket knife". However, academics and writers dispute his importance. 19th and early 20th century historians held him to be the crucial figure of the British Agricultural Revolution, crediting him with inventing four-crop rotation. Naomi Riches describes this as an "error", and R. A. C. Parker, writing in the Economic History Review, states that "many of the innovations he is supposed to have introduced should be attributed to his predecessors in Norfolk"; however that "is not to deny the substantial contribution of Coke himself to the advance of farming technique in England". Further Parliamentary career Coke was re-elected to Parliament in 1790, at a time of great political trouble. The French Revolution a year earlier had torn the Whig party in half, with Coke and Fox in the isolated minority who supported the revolutionaries as their acts became more brutal. With the declaration of war in 1793, an impact was finally felt in Britain with a rise in agricultural prices and rent. It also led to the establishment of local yeomanry forces to defend the country, something Coke opposed. This reduced his popularity in Norfolk and led to