Just a thought - before milk was delivered in bottles I believe the milkman had a cart containing a container from which you filled your jug of milk. I wonder if the cowman was literally a keeper of cows which were kept in the city to provide milk. Not that I can remember it - the earliest I do remember was United Dairies horsedrawn milk floats which delivered milk in a bottle with a carboartd top. That was in the late 1940s in Kensington when the roads were still paved with wood blocks to reduce noise - but they were lethal when wet. Christopher Richards ----- Original Message ----- From: <emagar@hotkey.net.au> To: <OLD-ENGLISH-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Tuesday, March 30, 2004 10:58 PM Subject: Re: [OEL] unusual occupation reprised > Greetings all, > > A cowkeeper was a dairyman I believe and not necessarily rural. There's a picture > of a cow-keeper's establishment in London on the Sainsbury museum site at > http://www.j-sainsbury.co.uk/museum/1869.htm > Click on the image to enlarge. > > Cheers, > > Liz > > snip > > > ==== OLD-ENGLISH Mailing List ==== > OLD-ENGLISH Web Page > http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~oel/ > > >

That's quite true - our milk was delivered - in bottles - by a Liverpool city cowkeeper in the mid 1960's. It was quite a sight to see cows being taken to pasture about half a mile away along city streets. In the winter they were kept in stalls. Now, in Chester, we garage our car in a yard once owned by such a cowkeeper. .. Elizabeth Atherton I wonder if the cowman was literally a keeper of cows which were kept in the city to provide milk. Christopher Richards

hello Elizabeth, I grew up on a farm int the thirties and the man in charge of the cattle was always the cowman. Several of my Drewells in the 19th century called themselves COWKEEPERS, but later upgraded themselves to DAIRYMEN. A bit of social climbing, I guess! ..... John Drewell in Vancouver BC (searching all DREWELL mentions) ======================== ----- Original Message ----- From: "Elizabeth Atherton" <elizabeth.atherton@tesco.net> To: <OLD-ENGLISH-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Wednesday, March 31, 2004 1:44 AM Subject: [OEL] Re: Cowkeepers > That's quite true - our milk was delivered - in bottles - by a Liverpool > city cowkeeper in the mid 1960's. It was quite a sight to see cows being > taken to pasture about half a mile away along city streets. In the winter > they were kept in stalls. > Now, in Chester, we garage our car in a yard once owned by such a cowkeeper. > .. Elizabeth Atherton > > I wonder if the cowman was literally a keeper of cows which were kept in > the > city to provide milk. > Christopher Richards > > > ==== OLD-ENGLISH Mailing List ==== > SEARCHABLE archives for OLD-ENGLISH: > http://listsearches.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/listsearch.pl?list=OLD-ENGLISH > >