The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Insights into life on the vans
Craigie is delighted to report a colourful contribution from just outside the city of Perth to our ongoing conversation about the lemonade deliveries of yesteryear.
Almondbank-based reader Arthur Bruce is keen to share his well-preserved knowledge of the local produce dependables that operated in and around his home village in his youth. Over to you, sir!
“I have been following the stories about the lemonade suppliers and was quite taken aback that no one had mentioned Campbells of Perth, who had a sweetie factory and also made lemonade,” says Arthur.
“They (Campbells) were in Feus Road where the Post Office sorting office is now. I don’t know when they closed but think it would be in the 1960s.
“The other thing I have been reading is about the bakers vans and other vans that went round all the villages. Years ago in Almondbank we had a baker’s shop and it was run by Jimmy Howie and his two sisters, Nellie and Bella.
“Jimmy was the baker – the bakehouse is still there – but after Jimmy had done the baking, he and Bella had vans and they went round the area selling bread and cakes. Nellie, the other sister, ran the bakery shop in the village. One of the things I remember when the van came to us was that my mother would always buy two fresh loaves and two cutting loaves.
“Cutting loaves were ones that were a day old, making them easier to cut. Also, in those days a loaf of bread was not what we call a loaf now, that would be a half loaf with us back then. It is like a lot of things that have changed.
“For example, a bag of tatties back then would have been a hundredweight, where nowadays a bag of tatties is the equivalent of half a hundredweight, and so on.
“When I left school my first job was an assistant grocer in the Co-op in the village. After I got my licence I then went on to drive the grocery vans and went all round the different villages all around Perth.
“Back then people had no need to go to the town because there were vans that sold
everything – butchers, bakers, fish vans and companies like Co-op, Lipton’s, Shepherds Dairies and probably many more. A different way of life altogether!”
On the same subject, Angus native William Smith has a great anecdote to share from his own time spent dropping off lemonade for thirsty customers in Dundee.
He emails: “I was reading about the delivery lorries of Robb Brothers, Arbroath. When I was 10 I stayed in St Vigean Road and my downstairs neighbour was a man called Pearson Hall and he was a driver with Robb Brothers. Myself and another boy went with him around the Fintry area, I think, delivering lemonade.
“One Saturday I dropped a two shilling bit and it went down the drain. It was taken off my wages of four shillings, but I made up with tips! Happy days.”