Cow Appreciation: Andrew Dairy

July 9th is Cow Appreciation Day and summer student Chloe Oesch has been exploring the museum’s collection for stories about cows and delicious local dairy products from Huron County’s past! If you are interested in finding more cow-related artifacts, you can search our online collections database from home!

Andrew Dairy was a Goderich dairy company from 1949 to 1977, run out of “The Andrew Dairy Bar” located at 45 West St. Operated by Amos Andrew, Andrew Dairy provided fresh milk to many Goderich locals through their delivery service.

The dairy bar on West Street also had its own separate storefront that operated much like a café. On one of their matchbooks the Museum has in its collection, they advertise “Neilsons Ice cream” and “Light lunches”. We can also see that they accepted bottle returns from customers, as they advertise the phrase “Drink up, we need the empties.”

Their operation was completely local as well, their milk being “supplied by your local neighbors” as seen in their 1959 newspaper advertisement. The Huron County Museum is in possession of many items from this local business. In addition to several glass milk bottles, the Museum was able to preserve one of Andrew Dairy’s milk delivery wagons.

This red and white milk wagon, pictured below, was used for deliveries by Andrew Dairy until 1961. The wagon was possibly built by John Pedersen, a blacksmith from London from about 1939. This wagon was the last of the horse-drawn milk wagons to be used in this part of Huron County. The wagon was pulled by a single horse and had a 20 lb tethering weight used to stop the wagon and horse when delivering milk to customer’s homes.

Although the days of the milk man have long gone past, the Huron County Museum will still be celebrating our local dairy industry on Tuesday, July 9, for Cow Appreciation Day in 2024! The museum will have a local dairy educator from the Dairy Farmers of Ontario, and several dairy and cow related items on display from our collection. And, as always, our iconic two headed calves will be on display at the museum for you to visit!

Red and white van with open sides. Text on side reads "The Andrew Dairy, Phone 104"

The Andrews Dairy delivery wagon

M963.0005.001. This artifact is stored at the museums offsite storage.
Black and white clipping of a newspaper ad. "June is Dairy Month" image of glass of milk, plate of food and cartoon girl's face.

Ad for dairy month in 1959

Goderich Signal-Star, 1959-06-25, Page 14. Find more via the museum’s digitzed newspaper collection!

Green matchbook, unfoldeed. Top half (upside down) image of hamburger on a plate. "Hamburgers you'll love." Bottom half, location and phone number for Andrew Dairy Bar, 45 West St. Goderich Ontario.

Andrew Dairy matchbook

2020.0027.029.  Advertising the milk bar in Goderich.

 

Join the Canada Historic Places Selfie Contest for a chance to win $1,000

Join the Canada Historic Places Selfie Contest for a chance to win $1,000

The Huron County Museum & Historic Gaol invites you to join the Canada Historic Places Days Selfie Contest for your chance to win $1,000 for yourself as well as $1,000 for the Museum and Gaol. The contest runs July 3-31, 2021.

Huron Historic Gaol selfie station

Go behind bars at the Huron Historic Gaol’s Selfie Station

Canada Historic Places Days are a national celebration of our country’s historic places hosted each year by the National Trust of Canada. While historic sites, including the Museum and Gaol, remain temporarily closed, you can still celebrate and support these sites by getting creative with your digital selfie. Simply visit historicplacesdays.ca/places, find the Museum or Gaol, and upload your selfie which will be placed on virtual backgrounds from each of the sites. You can also have fun recreating a historic photo from the Museum’s collection, or share a throwback from one of your pre-pandemic visits to our sites! Of course, you can also visit the Huron Historic Gaol to take a selfie at our new selfie station – it is found outside the Gloucester Terrace entrance and is open all the time! To find inspiration for your selfies from the Museum’s virtual collection and historic photos, visit https://www.huroncountymuseum.ca/virtual-services/ or visit Selfie Contest – Historic Places Days .

To enter the contest: