Street Vendors

For over 40 years we’ve had the privilege of having a ‘Johnny Onion’ man visit us here in Whitchurch, usually three times every year. Sadly, in the spring this year Patrick made his last visit to us selling his Breton onions and shallots, announcing he was retiring. What a loss, and the end of a long tradition!

As a boy, we had a Johnny Onion man (not the same man though) visit us in Cathays, with his bicycle almost lost with his strings of onions. Perhaps the sketch below will bring back memories. Patrick hasn’t used a bike for many years, preferring to sell his onions door-to-door from the back of a white Transit van. He did however, wear his French beret

All this made me think back to the other street vendors, providing our necessities and essential services. From memory (always dodgy now), they included:

The Knife Sharpener
With his sharpening wheel on the front of his bike. He’d pedal furiously to spin the grinding wheel

The Salt and Vinegar Man
He had a hand cart and sold block salt which he would saw off from an enormous chunk. The vinegar was dispensed from a wooden barrel with a tap at the bottom. Wonderful smells even now

The Coal Man
They would drive an open lorry with the heavy sacks of coal on the back. My mother always wanted ‘best’ Welsh coal. Chris remembers her mother would always count the sacks being carried through to avoid being caught out

The Insurance Man
Did everyone have a policy which would pay out a small sum in the case of death? The insurance man almost became part of the family with his weekly visits to collect a few pence

The Football Pools Agent
My dad religiously filled out his pools sheet every week, choosing which football teams might draw, just in time for the football pools man to call. Dad always dreamed of winning big; he never did, but once he won a few hundred pounds and we were all treated royally over the next few weeks

The Gas Man and the Electricity Man
My mother wouldn’t have gas in the house (because it was dangerous), but the electricity man called every few months, to read the meter and to empty the coins. I seem to remember that the electricity meter used to take the old one-penny, but that changed with inflation

The Newspaper Boy
Everyone seemed to have a paper delivered most evenings (it was the South Wales Echo, and the pink Football Echo on a Saturday). On a Sunday most everyone had at least two Sunday papers. When I was younger, I hated delivering the Sunday papers as they were so heavy!

Rag and Bone Man
In Cathays we had Harry Parfitt who would wind his way around the streets with his pony and cart collecting most anything. Who did this in Whitchurch? Does anyone know. Now its all done with a Transit pick-up and a loudspeaker calling out!

Road Sweeper
Oh! The road sweeper; remember them? Was it Bill who lived in Heol-y-Forlan who was our local sweeper. No one now of course. Just an occasional visit by the mechanical ‘hedgehog’ sweeping machine

The Dustman
Who can forget the dustman and the noisy metal bins, and the ‘slidey’ covers on the back of the lorry. All so different now!

The Milkman
‘Mustn’t forget to put out the empties last thing each night’. That was the call in our family. I can only remember the electric milk floats with their ‘whirrey’ motor as they whooshed up and down the street. Many here in Whitchurch tell stories of milk deliveries off a horse and cart with the milk ladled out from a churn

What about the others?
Sarah told me recently about the bread delivery man in Tyn-y-Pwll Road with his horse and cart, with all of the different types of bread in large wicker baskets. Can anyone else remember?

The window cleaner, obviously. We still have one every month, but no ladders any more. Only long poles and hoses. My mother always recalled being reminded by her mother about scrubbing the front doorstep (a garden path if you had one) and an arc of the pavement outside your front door. If this wasn’t done very regularly, the neighbours would talk!

I’m told there was a paraffin man too. Anyone remember him? And was there a ‘wet’ fish man?

In Cathays there was a ‘pop’ man who called once a week selling Tizer and Corona. Was this the case in Whitchurch too?

What happened to laundry? My mum seemed always to be washing, boiling, pegging out clothes and then ironing them. But in Cathays (again, sorry) there were Chinese laundreys, which always smelled of soap and had steam billowing. Was the Victoria in Llandaff North like that?

Then some really strange vendors. A swill man (if you donated you could get a discounted joint of pork at Christmas), and a stick man who sold kindling for the open fires

Ice cream was a real treat, sold by a man in a white uniform at Roath Park with his tricycle with a large icebox on the front. Nowadays, it’s the musical ice cream men and women driving their vans around the streets

And of course, there was the grocery boy on his big black bicycle with the huge wicker basket in front, delivering the goods ordered earlier at the shop. This is really strange how this has gone full circle, and he has returned as a Tesco, Asda (and all of the others) man delivering the groceries from their vans

I wonder what vendors our children and grandchildren will talk about in the future? Perhaps it’ll be the Amazon delivery van man, or the charity bag collector man

What do you think?

 

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