Career paths for my fictional, young, non-academic gent in the 1920s/30s

[fictitiousfoibles]

I'm trying to flesh out one of the characters in my novel and am really stuck on a career path for him. Anyone up for taking part in a creative brainstorm?

He's grown up in on an English country estate owned by his mother's family (old money though, again, I haven't decided on how they made their fortunes). Mother lost her brother in WW1, inherited the house and lives their with her husband and their two children. This character is due to inherit it in time but is a dreamy non-academic, non-corporate type - what sort of job would his parents have nudged him into? Ideally it would be a reserved occupation so that his mother (traumatised by loss of brother) can justify his not joining up.

All ideas gratefully received!

10-15 acres isn't enough to generate income really and wouldn't need a manager.

I would say Banking. Uncle has a friend in Banking, gets him a spot.

Family could be relations who inherited mining or railway shares. Son could be a surveyor, auctioneer perhaps.

I think he’s a horse trainer!

What class is he?

10-15 acres - poor middle class. Not an estate, a house without a farm. So he’d maybe work in a shop and help with the veg garden at weekends.

An estate - family live off rents, investments and you’d be getting poorer in the 20s and 30s cos Lloyd George’s taxes and stock market crashes etc. don’t forget difficulty finding manual labour eg servants and farmhands.

Jobs: Eton, Sandhurst, Royal
Agricultural College (aka Cirencester), then a Guards regiment. You had a hefty private income. You married another one.

Off the top of my head:

BBC didn’t exist till 1930s.
Docs were lower middle class (badly paid).
Army path depends entirely on what class you’re in
Solicitors could make good money and were solidly middle class
Stockbroking was posh but banking not
Advertising new and slightly less class bound business
Teaching standards varied so he might get a gig there

OP, read:

Eric Hobsbawn The 1930s
George Orwell Keep the aspidistra flying

I'm coming round to the 'upper middle' line of thinking - his mother's family having perhaps done fairly well through business and brought a minor manor house,

OP, a buying minor Manor House didn’t make you posh a century ago - property cost pence compared to these days. That sort of house could well be the homestead of a farming family with 14 barefoot kids.

No one in business was posh anyway, hence the phrase landed gentry.

Your best bet is a successful country solicitor with a couple of branches doing farming law in a provincial
town buying the house without- that’s plausible. Middle class and aspirational, hopes pinned on young Master X.

Isn't this the storyline in Downton Abbey for Lady Mary's partner/husband?