# Who remembers home-delivered milk? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [October 17, 2004, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611 "2004-10-17T02:28:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![OxyMoron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/e9a140/32.png) [@OxyMoron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OxyMoron)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2004, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/101 "2004-10-19T04:06:54Z")
> [@t-bonham@scc.net](#): > > As a kid, I remember home delivery of milk, & other dairy products. They were put in an insulated metal box at the back door. (I think my mother just threw the box away recently – she had continued to use it for storage for about 25 years after they stopped delivering milk.) > > But recently, on business travel, I was in Fargo, ND. And discovered that they still have home delivery in the Fargo, ND/Moorhead, MN area. Plus they deliver cheese, orange juice, etc. All from the local farmer-owned co-op dairy: [Cass-Clay Co-op](http://www.cassclay.com/about.html) Oh, I am glad to see that Cass-Clay still delivers. I spent ten summers in Fargo, visiting my grandparents, and I remember how convenient it was to have delivery - even though my Grampa worked for Nash Finch/Piggly Wiggly (now Sun Mart). ---
**Author:** ![calm\_kiwi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9fc348/32.png) [@calm\_kiwi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/calm_kiwi)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2004, 10:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/102 "2004-10-19T10:12:48Z")
> [@Middlecase](#): > > That’s because I am. I remember them as aniseed balls, though, and I loved 'em: my brother and I used to dissolve a bag of them overnight in a bottle of water to make aniseed juice. Oh, and Jet Planes. And Milk Bottles. And those little cigarettes with the red dye at one end to simulate the burning ash, before the health Nazis got hold of them. Sorry, this is turning into another thread. My Dad used to use aniseed balls as bait when fishing. He caught every dog in the neighbourhood 😃 Oh and DAMN them pretendy ciggies 😃 Nice to see another Kiwi, I’m sure you will run into the rest of them 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Philster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/13edae/32.png) [@Philster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Philster)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2004, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/103 "2004-10-22T01:09:23Z")
[QUOTE=Cartooniverse] [QUOTE=Philster] I grew up in a row home in Philadelphia. … Our milk was delivered until about 1977. As kids, we loved those boxes. They were good to site on and great for army men, or to keep ‘pimple balls’ in (if you grew up in the northeast, you know what a pimple ball is). > [@](#): > > Damn, skippy !!! You find yourself at the Solly playground at Bustleton and Solly with a pimple ball and a gang of your best fellahs and we can have a game, jack !!! Afterwards of course, some Italian ices and a few pretzels with mustard. > > 😉 > > Cartooniverse You are legit, son. Italian ice with the pretzel…with the mustard…all made complete by the latexish smell of the pimple ball and a hint of playground crust on the edge of your mouth. Box ball, chink…etc. – Don’t know what you guys from Northeast Philly play, but us boys from SW Philly and South Philly are open to suggestions. ---
**Author:** ![LouisB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@LouisB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LouisB)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2004, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/104 "2004-10-22T14:54:55Z")
Back in 1954 thru 1956, I worked part time for a dairy in Dallas–Metzger’s, if anyone remembers it. My job consisted of assisting various door-to-door delivery guys—it was a hell of an education. Later, long about 1962 or so, I had my own door-to-door bread delivery route for Manor Bread, if anyone remembers that one. ---
**Author:** ![ouryL](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ouryl/32/6067_2.png) [@ouryL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ouryL)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2004, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/105 "2004-10-22T16:45:48Z")
Ah yes I remember milkmen. They use to put milk in the \*icebox \* for us automatically. This icebox was kept on the back porch, having come from Gramma, who moved into a senior complex. I also remember coming home from a one month vacation, camping at the beach and finding 2 spoiled half-gallons of milk in it when we got back. Our old milkman went on vacation the same time we did and the new one had mistakenly delivered one and when the old one returned, he did so also. My mother was po’d and that’s rare; nothing fazes her usually. :eek: :eek: 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Katriona](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/katriona/32/113_2.png) [@Katriona](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katriona)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2004, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/106 "2004-10-22T21:38:12Z")
> [@MsRobyn](#): > > Tonight, **twickster** and I were reminiscing about the milkman. (No, not in _that_ way, ya pervs. :D) Heh - I remember that we had to stop joking about my brother’s height coming from ‘the milkman’ when our real milkman broke up several neighborhood marriages. ---
**Author:** ![Cartooniverse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cartooniverse/32/3084_2.png) [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2004, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/107 "2004-11-04T19:29:53Z")
> [@Philster](#): > > You are legit, son. Italian ice with the pretzel…with the mustard…all made complete by the latexish smell of the pimple ball and a hint of playground crust on the edge of your mouth. Box ball, chink…etc. – Don’t know what you guys from Northeast Philly play, but us boys from SW Philly and South Philly are open to suggestions. Oh gosh, I didn’t grow up in the Northeast. My best friend in the world lived on Benson St. I grew up in West Oak Lane, then LaMott, then Elkins Park… But heck yeah, we played chink ball but I dunno what box ball is. ??? Of course, pure stickball and half-ball are the best. Whiffle Ball was also a heavy-duty favorite around 19th and Cheltenham. Play some Whiffle, run across to what I am told is the **original** [Lee’s Hoagie House](http://www.leeshoagiehouse.com/) for a half a Cheltenham with extra mayo. God, I miss being a kid… ---
**Author:** ![sunstone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunstone/32/3372_2.png) [@sunstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sunstone)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2004, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/108 "2004-11-06T04:17:41Z")
Well, MsRobyn, I do remember when we got our milk delivered from Alta Dena by a man in a truck…but I also remember getting ice from the iceman in large blocks. They were brought from his truck to our back door on tongs and we begged for chips of ice; how things have changed. I grew up in Alta Loma (now part of Rancho Cucamonga)…although I don’t live there now. Were you anywhere near there in your childhood? ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2004, 10:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/109 "2004-11-06T10:31:47Z")
> [@don't ask](#): > > We used to have milk in school in Australia when I was a kid. At recess everyone guzzled down a little bottle of milk (a third of a pint IIRC) before going about their normal activities. There were several spots around the school with crates of these little bottles. Hah! I used to be a milk monitor at school carrying all those crates of little milk. And we still get doctors to house call here, if you aren’t in a hurry. But who remembers the night soil carters? Those gentlemen who carried away human waste before sewerage? ---
**Author:** ![Stephanie\_Ireland](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Stephanie\_Ireland](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stephanie_Ireland)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2010, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/110 "2010-10-11T00:55:19Z")
I remember milk delivery. We had two dairies–Chestnut Farms and Thompson’s. We had the old tin box on our front porch and we got milk, cream, cottage cheese (including cottage cheese with pineapple,) orange juice, and eggs. I’ve been trying to buy up old milk bottles on ebay. I make George Washington’s egg nog and give it away in the antique bottles at Christmas. So far, I think I’ve got six bottles coming. I love the cream separater bottles. Thompson’s used them. Chestnut Farms had the bottles that were slim on the top. Someone on ebay is also offering the cardboard caps. I’ll need to get those, too.🙂 ---
**Author:** ![MsRobyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/90ced4/32.png) [@MsRobyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsRobyn)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2010, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/111 "2010-10-11T02:06:18Z")
Since this thread has been resurrected from the dead, I’ll post about something I found not too long ago. In Pennsylvania, it is absolutely against the law to sell raw (unpasteurized) milk. People who want it can find out where and how to get it – I think it involves code phrases and sooper sekrit door knocks – but it’s possible. However, I found a dairy that sells non-homogenized milk. It’s still pasteurized, but it’s not the homogenized stuff at the supermarket. The dairy sells both white and chocolate milks. The chocolate milk is made with actual cocoa and cane sugar. This stuff is the milk of the gods. If I could afford it, this would be all I’d drink. It is that good. ---
**Author:** ![BaneSidhe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c5a1d2/32.png) [@BaneSidhe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BaneSidhe)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2010, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/112 "2010-10-11T02:39:21Z")
I can remember getting milk delivered at our house when I was around 5 or 6, and this was in the middle 70’s. ---
**Author:** ![HelenGawn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a88e4f/32.png) [@HelenGawn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HelenGawn)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2010, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/113 "2010-10-11T04:12:51Z")
Our milkman used to knock and then walk in (doors were never locked), announce himself (“Milkman!”), and go straight to the fridge. I remember him shaking hands with my brother when the latter came home from Viet Nam. That was practically the same as a hug between men in those days. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2010, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/114 "2010-10-11T04:24:10Z")
Portland, Oregon, 1950’s. Glass bottles with little round cardboard plug sort of cap, with a tab that you had to get your fingernail under to lift up the cap. Not homogenized, you had to shake it (my sister liked the cream, I seem to remember, but I didn’t). The bottles were delivered into the metal can with a lid so they would stay colder. I can’t swear to it, but I don’t remember the milk coming in the early morning, I think it came during the day and we would take it in when we got home from school (latchkey kids). I don’t remember the dairy’s name, but I remember that they advertised that they had only Guernsey cows. I still don’t know why that was important. Roddy ---
**Author:** ![Fried\_Dough\_Ho](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a88e57/32.png) [@Fried\_Dough\_Ho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fried_Dough_Ho)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2010, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/115 "2010-10-11T04:28:06Z")
My parents had dark hair and brown eyes while I am fair-haired and blue-eyed. I am also 9 and 12 years younger than my sisters. AND my father was in Japan when I was born - 1964 - and I don’t know if he was home nine months before I arrived. We always had milk delivery and I always wondered if I wasn’t part of the delivery service… ---
**Author:** ![Disheavel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@Disheavel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Disheavel)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2010, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/116 "2010-10-11T04:54:39Z")
This is my first zombie thread that I’ve participated in. But I just wanted to put out there that milk delivery is still available. [Smith Brothers](http://www.smithbrothersfarms.com/) delivers milk (eggs, OJ, yogurt, and other dairy products) throughout the Seattle area. There is a fair premium (probably 30-50% markup), but it is so nice to be able to have guaranteed milk and eggs every week saves a grocery store trip every week. Greatest invention since Wonder Bread! ---
**Author:** ![Bam\_Boo\_Gut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8c91f0/32.png) [@Bam\_Boo\_Gut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bam_Boo_Gut)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2010, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/117 "2010-10-11T05:13:02Z")
> [@Cicero](#): > > But who remembers the night soil carters? Those gentlemen who carried away human waste before sewerage? We still have them here in the sunny West Indies! Back to my English childhood: I never rose to the lofty ranks of milk monitor, but we saved all our silver tops from our third pints at school and pints at home, washed them out and gave them to the nurse, they were recycled and the hospital got a kidney machine. What kind of tit drinks milk? Blue tits. A primary school joke. You had to get the bottles in as soon as you heard the clinking. We used to leave a saucer of milk out for the hedgehogs though. Mum used to just leave the money on the ground at the end of the week, everyone did. I spotted a strand of glass - not broken - inside a bottle once and the milkman gave me a free pint for it. ---
**Author:** ![BMalion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e274bd/32.png) [@BMalion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BMalion)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2010, 10:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/118 "2010-10-11T10:35:14Z")
> [@SteveG1](#): > > We had milk delivered in glass bottles with paper caps. I always made sure to get the first rich creamy gulp, every chance I had. We even had a special little metal box with a lid, that the bottles went into. Yes, I remember that box! We also got cheese and butter, I think it was Lawsons. Also a doctor that made house calls and a bakery truck that delivered bread and rolls and such. Plus a weird thing I remember called the Jewel-T(?) guy, he’d drive by once a month or so with _everything_ on that truck. Clothes, shoes, cleaning products, toys. It was like a rolling department store. ---
**Author:** ![overlyverbose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9dc877/32.png) [@overlyverbose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/overlyverbose)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2010, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/119 "2010-10-11T15:55:12Z")
We had our milk delivered up until about a year and a half ago. We had been getting it at the supermarket, but the delivered variety turned out to be what we wanted (organic, hormone free, blah blah) and it actually cost about $1 per gallon _less_ than the grocery variety. And our son was going through so much milk, we saved money…until the dairy increased their delivery fee so it no longer saved us anything. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2010, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611/120 "2010-10-11T16:20:03Z")
We had milk delivery at home. We had the iceman come and deliver 50 lb blocks of ice. We had a coal chute and a truck delivered coal and it loudly poured down the chute. We had orange juice delivered to the door. We had the newspaper delivered to our door every day. We had a sheeny man with a horse come through the alleys and collect metal and aluminum discards. We had people walk the streets with a pony and he would take a picture ,for money, of your kid on its back. When an airplane came over to the airport, people ran out and looked at it. They were rare. We had dogs get rabies . The police would come and shoot them. They had foam all over their mouths. Your own dog would turn on you. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers-home-delivered-milk/269611.md?page=7)