Remembering Kingsville’s Hillside Dairy

By Stephen Wuerch

Taken from notes after meeting Herbie and Ernie MacPherson in 1994.

After receiving a Hillside Dairy Kingsville milk bottle in a trade with another collector over 30 years ago, I was both fascinated and curious because I had never heard of such a dairy.

In fact, at the time, no other collectors, dealers or antique shop owners had ever heard of Hillside Dairy from Kingsville.

However, after much research and persistence, I received a phone call from Norman and Margerite Fuller, who told me the dairy was located west of Kingsville, just off the highway at Wigle Creek. Soon after, I was sitting down at the kitchen table at the home of Herbie McPherson — along with his younger brother Ernie — to talk about the dairy.

The McPherson family moved to the area in 1924 after purchasing the farm from Frank Hall, who operated Halls Dairy/Hillside Dairy from 1920- 1923. Frank Hall left the dairy business during hard times and opened up a photography shop on Pearl Street in Kingsville.

After introducing myself to the MacPherson brothers, I showed Ernie and Herbie the Hillside Dairy milk bottle that I had received.

It didn’t take long for a smile to appear on Herbie’s face as he immediately identified the bottle as being from the family farm. Herbie and Ernie then proceeded to tell me that the dairy had about 50 of these bottles, and then took me down to the basement to where the dairy operation was located. As a young lad, Herbie recalls going into the basement in the late ’40s and throwing away all the advertising, flyers, price lists, log books andevery piece of dairy paraphernalia he could find, and it was taken to the dump. The Hillside milk bottles were then smashed against the wall with the shards thrown into a wooden bin and tossed over into the Wigle Creek ravine.

“There was no use for these bottles anymore,” Herbie explained. “So we just broke them and dumped them.”

Herbie then pointed out where the milk tank was located, the bottle racks, milk can storage area, and talked about how the bottles were loaded onto the horse and wagon for the day’s delivery through the big basement door.

Both Herbie and Ernie remembered the layout of the farm as they reflected on their childhood years growing up and playing in the buildings.

There was the ‘ice barn’ for storing ice, the barns that housed the livestock, the maintenance shed and the ‘boothouse’ where empty bottles and cans were stored. Both Herbie and Ernie also remember the wooden sign with the words ‘Hillside Dairy’ hanging on the side of the barn, which was removed a few years later after the farm purchase.

So the next time you’re driving west of Kingsville on the highway, look to the right just past Wigle Creek and in your mind picture one of Kingsville’s first registered dairies — one that existed back in the early 1920s – Halls/ Hillside Dairy. And who knows? Perhaps there are still a few dairy related treasures still lying in the Wigle Creek ravine somewhere.

If there is any other historical information, photos or contacts regarding Frank Halls Dairy/Hillside Dairy Kingsville that can be noted for permanent record, please email sewuerch@hotmail.com.

For more information on Windsor/ Essex County dairies, please visit Ontario Dairy Collectables and History Facebook page.