Mobile and Home Deliveries

Those of us of a certain age will remember many, if not most things being delivered by horse and cart. Bread, milk, everyday, not bread on a Sunday, not 100% sure about milk. The vegetable man. The scrap man. We also had "the bagwash", because my mum was crippled, that was not by horse and cart though. The milkman, because he started very early, was also our window cleaner later in the day. The rent man, the Co-op insurance man, the provident cheque man (for school uniforms and the like). The gas and electric men had to come into the house to read the meters, often under the stairs. The coalman (as previously mentioned) delivered the coal around the back entry, up the garden to the coalhouse, the dustbin man did the same. Such wonderful service we had from all and sundry. No battles with the likes of e-on, BT etc. People were generally happy and wanted to serve you.

We had a chap called Eddie who came to us on a Saturday afternoon in Mile Lane, Cheylesmore, with fruit and veg and a few grocery items in a large van. He was always cheerful. This was in the late 1950s and well into the 1960s.

That's very true Slash1, in particular the bin men. They would enter your garden, remove the bin lid, lift the bin onto their shoulder and carry it out to the wagon to empty it before returning it to where they found it in your garden.... and put the lid back on! Now they seem to refuse to empty a wheelie-bin (that you have wheeled out to the kerbside for them) if the handle's facing the wrong way round!

I remember the local bread van that would deliver on a Saturday morning. I helped him out a couple of times by acting as his "runner". He would go door-to-door and as each person gave him their order, I would run to the van to fetch there items. The back of the van was kitted out with two racks of wooden pull-out trays, side-by-side. Bread in the right side, cakes in the left. There was no health-and-safety, or serving tongs for that matter, uncovered cakes were simply placed by my tender (unwashed!) hands into a paper bag and delivered to the door. Makes you shudder to think of it now!

One of the highlights of the week was on Saturday when the Co-op milkman came round we used to get a pint bottle of orange juice (although it wasn't juice really). It had a very distinct taste which I loved, but I suspect it was probably full of colours because it stained your mouth orange. It would probably be banned nowadays.

I remember those too. The high spot of the week. We were easily pleased back in the day, huh.

Didn't they also deliver third-pint bottles of orange to people on welfare? I remember being jealous that we didn't get any.

They certainly carried third-pint bottles dutchman I don't know who they were for but it would make sense if they were for that purpose, the equivalent of the third-pint milk bottles at school. Hi Mike H, they were our definition of luxury!

Slash! I delivered milk on Sundays, with pony and trap up until 1943, after that I left the job. Tins of Carnation milk was our biggest luxury item.

The Co-op's bagwash service was mentioned by Slash1. My mum began using this washing pick-up and delivery service when the weekly task of the heavy duty washing using dolly, tub and mangle became too much for her after suffering a debilitating stroke. I suspect that many women were also grateful for being relieved of the weekly drudgery by this service. Any people who spent their childhoods in the Stoke Heath area during the 1950s would also be familiar with the mobile greengrocery business operated by Fred Emney. In early morning Fred and his cart full of fresh fruit and vegetables pulled by his beautifully placid horse Bronco emerged from Busby's entry - as it was known - at the top of Watersmeet Road a couple of times each week. Fred had an allotment along the entry where he also raised pigs which were fed the boiled-up leftovers from the business, so little waste here. As they descended the street housewives arrived with their bags and purses, children with a stale bread crust came to feed Bronco and little old ladies watched surreptitiously from behind net curtains to see if Bronco relieved himself of a useful load of manure which, if it arrived, was quickly gathered with bucket and shovel then placed on the rhubarb patch in the back garden. Fred was a dapper chap wearing tweed cap, waistcoat and rolled sleeves during summer and was very courteous always addressing his customers as Mr. or Mrs. His passion was for horses, he was a member of a local hunt and Bronco usually won a First Rosette at the annual Walsgrave Show. I heard him confiding to a customer one day that he would never be able to afford to hunt in pink.

The greengrocery man in Aldermans Green Rd was named Rowley, he had lost an arm in WW1 but still managed his horse and cart round 1935-45. Favourite with us kids was the boxes of Sun-Pat chocolate raisins. Our coalman was Arthur Lote from Grange Road who had a flat dray lorry, he also ferried our carnival things. From 41 to 44 I was the milkman with pony and trap, my boss sold the business when I went in the forces. I had loads of photo's, but lost them - who in those days thought that people would one day want to see them. In the early years we did not even cool the milk. Milk the cows at 7am and deliver by 8am, still warm in the churn. I washed the bottles and churns by hand on the forecourt of the farmhouse when I returned from the round. Had to discard many bottles for people returned them after having put paraffin in them, but the war brought many changes, one being the limited roads you could use. Another was all cows had to be de-horned. The little pony knew where to stop at each customer's house, but got most confused when we had to swop roads and customers. Took her months to get adapted. I used to stop for a cup of tea at home on the way back, she was so used to it if I was more than ten minutes she would start to walk on. Yes, many memories.

I don't remember the Alpine pop man but I do remember the Corona pop man. He used a big lorry to deliver his pop to my neighbours opposite in Heathcote Street, Radford. They had 4 boys of various ages - I was a year older than the eldest and was very jealous, as I had to drink squash and really longed for the fizz. However, I couldn't bring myself to be friends with them, so as to try and be invited over for a glass - they were just too young!! Hubby says, do you remember getting money back on the empty bottles you returned to the shop. He had quite a business going, by nipping into the yard where the shopkeeper stored the returns, collecting a few and returning them for a second or even third time until he was caught! One of my favourite callers was the ice cream man D Di Mascio. I seem to have an early memory of a freezer tub on a tricycle or it could have been a handcart, until he was motorised and had a fleet of red and cream vans ding donging their way around the streets - where is he now!!!

The ice-cream tricycle was still being used in Pool Meadow in the mid 1960s. I remember asking how he kept the ice cream cold and he showed me the dry ice packed underneath.

I remember in the early 1930's Wall's had a thriving business with pork sausages, but they had two snags. One, there was no fridges, and two, people in those days would not eat pork unless there was an R in the month, so the four summer months the trade dropped. So they came up with Wall's ice-cream, sent the salesmen out on a tricycle with a large box between the front wheels and called 'Stop me and buy one'.

Toogoods worked around Tile Hill, Allesley, Coundon, Canley areas. Working very long hours, especially Christmas time. He did not have a mobile chip van.