Mills’ staff c 1936

I started work in Mills two weeks after I left school. Mr. Mills himself taught me how to weigh out tea, sugar, raisins and currants, into paper bags, and then turn the top down. The weighing had to be done really accurately, with balance scales and weights, because you never knew when the Weights and Measures man would call in to check. Brown sugar was difficult because it used to dry out and the weight would change.

New Zealand butter came in large tins and had to be weighed out into blocks of 4oz. You had to be quick otherwise it went squidgy, ugh! We had marble counters to keep it cool.

Some customers would call in at quarter to eight, just before we shut, and want all their groceries delivered before we closed, even if they lived just opposite. Some of them had lists, others used to lean over the counter and whisper ‘2 oz of tea’ so no one knew they weren’t ordering much.

I learnt to drive the delivery van in 1940 – had to drive all round Cranmore Avenue and Hamstead. The first day I went out on my own, I had a puncture after I’d delivered up the lane at Lee Farm. By the time I’d changed the wheel, my hands were filthy and black, so I knocked on the door and asked Mrs. Stallard if I could wash my hands.
‘No you cant!’ she said, so I had to drive all the way back to Yarmouth to wash my hands.
 Eileen Smith nee Lansdowne b 1921