It may not have been the fastest milkcart in the west, and it certainly wasn’t driven by Ernie, but this Mavisbank Milk Float played a big part in Palmerston North’s early home milk deliveries.
Mavisbank is named after the property of the late Graeme Rowan, where he and his family grew up, and milked cows on what had been his father’s property on Milson Line, Palmerston North. The farm was absorbed into the expected extension of Milson Airport runway.
This wagon was converted from a spring cart to give easy access to two milk cans carried in front of the axle.
From an early age Graeme, and his sisters helped their father with this vehicle delivering fresh milk to the homes and families of Milson, just down the road from their farm.
Milk deliveries changed over the years to include glass milk bottles, and then cardboard, and later replaced by milk pickups from dairies and supermarkets, making the milkman’s job redundant.
This milk float was presented to the museum by Graeme’s wife Sylvia Rowan, following the dispersal of her husband's horse-drawn vehicle collection in 2010.