The electric perambulator belongs to A T Patterson who traded from the Albany Dairy at 108 Whitehorse Road. These premises were formally the Head Office of John Knight and Sons, Dairyman, who had vacated the premises in the early 1930s. In the 1930s electric perambulators became popular for street deliveries. It had a single front wheel and two wheels at the rear and fully enclosed. The flat roof was used as another shelf, mainly for empty milk bottles.

Our milkman is typical of his time. He wears an apron of blue and white horizontal stripes which formed part of a milkman’s working clothes. He has a cap that he wears tilted to the side, giving him a jack-the-lad appearance. Over his shoulder he carries a leather money bag, which he shakes violently up and down to get at the small change. In the money bag he also keeps his ledger and a pencil with which, after a suck on the lead, he records all his deliveries and daily sales. If customers wanted the milkman, they waited for the tell-tale clink of the milk bottles, or left a note with their instructions in an empty milk bottle on the doorstep. His was a regular round, seven days a week and always the first delivery of the day. Customer’s weekly bill was settled mainly on Saturday afternoon.

This was a time before refrigerators and milk had to be bought very day. How milk was sold started to change in the interwar years. It had moved away from selling milk from the churn and moved towards the sale of milk in bottles. However, in the 1930s many local Dairies still kept cows in a nearby stable where they were milked. These cows were brought to Stepney on a regular basis and returned to the countryside when dry. This was really fresh milk - straight from the cow to the churn. The milk was measured from the churn by a long metal ladle and poured straight into the customer’s own milk jug. This was then covered by a piece of muslin or cloth for the customer’s journey home. Even as late as the early 1950s, milk could still be bought, at the local Dairy, straight from the churn. 

Although we know he was a local milkman, we don't know who he is/was - nor where precisely he is in this picture. If you recognise him or the street, please let us know.