The G. Youlton Dairy, Sparry Farm, 1944-58

In the 1940s and 50s when milk was delivered daily to nearly every Carharrack household, it may well have come from the G. Youlton Dairy at Sparry Farm. Gordon and Jean Youlton ran the dairy between 1944 and 1958 with their children and herd of Guernsey and Jersey cows. At the height of their business they were bringing milk daily to nearly two hundred households plus three schools. Their round included not only Carharrack but also parts of St. Day and Lanner.

For the first four or five years the Youltons transported the milk in ten-gallon churns on a horse-pulled dairy float. The milk was drawn off the churns by a brass tap into a metal pan, and then measured into customer’s jugs using 1 or ½ pint measures. The measuring process wasn’t necessarily exact. Jugs were often topped up with a bit extra, which pleased the customers. Dairy farmers were required to have a retail license to sell milk, their cows were tested for TB, and the milk was sampled for cream and water content. Folks liked to joke that one unscrupulous farmer was fond of taking the lids off his milk churns on rainy days so rainwater would make his milk go further.

The Youltons delivered every day of the year, including Christmas. Running the dairy allowed for no time off since milk was needed daily and couldn’t be refrigerated until electricity came to the village in 1948. In those early days milk cost only about four pence a pint, and was free to pregnant women with government coupons. During the 1940s each household was officially registered with the Ministry of Food, but no one in the village was ever actually rationed. In practice milk supply was only limited by how much the cows gave, some days more than others. When their own cows couldn’t supply enough for the rounds the Youltons purchased extra milk from the West Cornwall Dairy in Hayle.

Gordon and Jean knew all their customers by name and would often stop for a bit of chat, and occasionally a cup of tea. Frequently they passed on messages from one household to another in the course of their daily rounds. Because the Youltons took a close interest in their customers they tended to be paid on time.

In the late 1940s Gordon started making delivery rounds by motorbike with a sidecar to carry the churns. This lasted until a mate took the motorbike for a ride and was picked up in Redruth for having no insurance. Though Gordon wasn’t at fault, his license was suspended for a year and he was forced to return to delivery by horse and float for a while. Then in 1950 the Youltons acquired an Austin A40 van, which made deliveries easier, except for one winter day when heavy snow fell and Jean had to deliver milk by wheelbarrow while the Austin was fitted with chains.

In the early 1950s the dairy industry changed considerably when farmers were no longer allowed to sell their milk from a churn but required to bottle it before delivery. The new bottles were unpopular with customers. Their milk could no longer be topped up with a bit extra, and delivery had become more impersonal. With the bottles came new standards for sterilization enforced by the sanitary inspector. All bottles had to be washed in “deosan” according to a set procedure. Periodically the official “Sampler” would come around to test the quality of the milk. Occasionally he would discover a farmer who had watered down his supply and would levy a fine.

Each day in the Youlton household began early with milking the cows and filling bottles. The Youlton children helped out before they headed for school. Often Jean would start deliveries about 7am while Gordon was still milking the cows. Deliveries were finished by 2:00pm, then followed by all the chores required to run a dairy farm, including washing milk bottles, as well as preparing meals and doing the laundry.

In the mid 1950s the dairy industry changed again when milk could no longer be sold directly to customers but was first transported to the Milk Marketing Board (M.M.B.) in Camborne to be pasteurised and homogenised. The M.M.B then sent it to bottling factories like the West Cornwall Milk Company in Hayle, which in turn transported bottles back to dairy farmers like the Youltons by 6.30am each day, in time for deliveries. Since homogenized milk no longer had luscious thick cream on top, factory bottles were even less popular with customers, but they were here to stay. With this major change the industry was not far from producing the familiar cartons that we pick up today in the local shop or supermarket.

After fourteen years of working long hours every day the Youltons were ready for a change and were glad to hand the business over when a villager made an offer in 1958. Gordon returned to carpentry work, his original livelihood, and Jean had her hands full bringing up five children. They sold Sparry Farm in 1963 and moved to a bungalow on United Road where they now enjoy retirement with frequent visits from children, grandchildren and great grandchildren.


By Hetty Tye, with Gordon and Jean Youlton