Things go better
with milk!!!
Family business leads to
a very personal collection

Tim English, of Port Perry, has been collecting for most of his life. In fact, he admits collecting is his passion. Among his most prized items is a collection of old milk and dairy products from Olive Farms Dairy, which was started by his grandfather in the early 1900s. Tim is seen at right with just a few of his prized possessions.

Like many collector’s, Tim English does not have just one collection that he focuses his time on, however, family history has shaped his biggest collection. Tim collects specific dairy related items from the company that his great grandfather started in Toronto in the late 1890s.

Tim and his wife Karen are new Port Perry residents, having moved to this area in June of last year. They came all the way from Uxbridge, where they lived for six years, after having spent nineteen years in Mount Albert.

Tim’s family goes a long way back in this area that he now calls home. His great-great grandfather resided in Seagrave, where he died in 1867. He had a son Thomas, and it was Thomas who is responsible for Tim’s lifelong passion for family history and family collectibles.

Thomas English and his wife Mary Blakely left this area in the 1890s, moved to Toronto and bought Green’s Dairy which, in a short time, became the T. English Dairy Company.
Tim comes alive when he starts talking about his great grandfather’s dairy company and how it led him to collect the remnants of a bygone era. He proudly states that the T.
English Dairy started with a one horse-drawn cart plying the streets of Toronto. This was before the days of pasteurization and people simply walked out their front doors to the cart and, ladle in hand, drew the fresh milk they needed.

In 1909 Thomas was kicked by a horse and died of complications. It was probably soon after this, Tim believes, that the company changed its name to Olive Farm. The Olive Farm slogan was “You can whip our cream, but you can’t beat our milk”.

Thomas’s wife Mary took the business over and built it to the point that Olive Farm, it was said, became the largest privately owned diary in Toronto.

Whether it could be argued that it was the biggest, there was no doubt it was successful. It’s success bought Mary, in 1931, a brand new Cadillac and, it must be pointed out, Mary never had a driver’s license. She loved everybody chauffeuring her around in her Caddy.
The dairy stayed in Tim’s immediate family until 1965 whereupon it was sold to another dairy. It was the end of an era; dairy home delivery was relegated to the pages of history. Olive Farm was eighty years old when progress ended its run.

Tim’s pride in his family history and re-connecting with his cousin Jennifer led the two of them to visit the old dairy in 1976, just before it was to be demolished. Ducking under ‘No Trespassing’ signs, Tim and Jennifer scavenged bits and pieces of family history. So began his collection.

The collection includes all manner of Olive Farm paraphernalia; old wooden milk cases, butter cartons, signs, milk bottles, old milk tickets and of course countless photos of the dairy in its heyday.

Over the years its been a slow treasure hunt that has led Tim and Karen all over southern Ontario, to antique shows, flea markets and any venue that deals in local Ontario artifacts. Of particular note were Moses Junkologist, vendors at the Barrie Automotive Flea Market.

The collection has grown slowly and now numbers about seventy- three dairy relics. With only so many items that relate to the long gone dairy out there, the search is slow but pleasurable for Tim, Karen and of course his cousin Jennifer.

While continuing his quest for dairy objects Tim also finds the time to collect old toasters, old cars, furniture, boats and outboard motors. Tim says, “If its old, I want it”.

His collecting mania has earned him some fond family ribbing. Years ago his son, who has always called him Tim, was with him on one of his many road trips and turned to him and said “You know Tim, you really are an odd little man”. Tim English appeared to be delighted with that appraisal.

Tim will continue to scour the countryside for family dairy related objects, as well as adding to his other collections.

His wife Karen seems game for the treasure hunting but did add dryly, “Thank God he doesn’t collect women”. I would imagine his family feels the same way.

By Marjorie Fleming
Focus on Scugog