By Melissa Cole, Curator
“Cold mornings you’d open the door and frozen cream would be popping out the top of bottle.” – Oshawa Resident
Before the explosion of large grocery stores, the people of Oshawa enjoyed the home delivery of milk made locally. Some of these “mom and pop” dairies grew to become large and profitable businesses that incorporated the latest technology to produce their dairy products.
Small family dairies such as Gimblett’s Dairy and Henderson/Cedar Dale Diary began as an almost single person operation with milk being delivered straight from the farm to the local houses. Milk would be delivered to homes using horse drawn wagons.
Milk delivery started with the scoop and pail method. Milk would come directly from the cow and it was delivered to the customer. The delivery wagon carried large containers of milk, and the delivery man had a convenient carrying container and a quart and pint measure. In some cases these early dairies operated from a residence or farm of the delivery man. The milk man either bought the milk from the farmer or had his own cow. There were several small dairies that used the scoop and pail method. Dairies such as the Cedar Dale Dairy, Cameron Dairy and the Harmony Dairy are examples of scoop and pail dairies.
When bottled milk became the means of delivery, many houses had a small opening in the wall with a latched door on each side, and this is where the milkman left your order and also left with us an architectural reminder, “What Happened to the Milk Man.”
It wasn’t until the 1950s when many of Oshawa’s dairies made the switch from horse drawn wagons to trucks. However, some dairies began this move a bit earlier. Riordan’s Dairy appears to have had the earliest mechanized delivery service in Oshawa as it purchased three trucks to replace the horses in 1942.
When trucks replaced the horse one Oshawa resident said, a little “magic” left the neighbourhood because never again did we hear the refrain “Ha Don” or “Up prince.” No matter what was said to the truck, it would not respond. They also left no deposits on the road for the dogs to roll in and for the kids to play hockey with – it has also been said that these little pucks made great fertilizer for the garden.
The era of home delivery began to end in the 1960s. It was during this decade that the quintessential glass milk bottle was replaced with cardboard cartons. These cartons were only sold in stores. Many of dairies were bought out by one another until eventually the only remaining dairy in Oshawa was Beatrice Dairy Foods, who had taken over Ideal Dairy in 1970. The name Ideal Dairy Products Ltd. remained in use until 1975.
Oshawa Museum Blog 
I was born In England during WW2 and women did the job of men who went to war. My Aunt Winnie, a big strong lass, became the milkman with horse and cart. She did this for the duration of the war and lost her job when the men came home!
Thanks for sharing your stories!
I was Employed at Oshawa Dairy from 1955 to 1967. When Oshawa Dairy was sold to Ideal Dairy which was sold in turn to Beatrice Foods .
I in turn became employed with the Ministry of Agriculture and Food, Dairy Branch, and retired from it, and still lives in Oshawa.
Thank you for sharing these memories!