Got Milk?

I am not particularly fond of making New Year’s Resolutions but I have come to appreciate them as my mom includes a list of such things as the price of gas and milk with hers. It is interesting to watch how things change over the years. If you love milk, you are most likely painfully aware of the dramatic increase in price this past year. A gallon of skim milk, for example, has gone up more than a dollar. At the end of December 2006 the cost was $2.45 per gallon. By this past December, it had gone up to $3.59. Yikes! It is even more fun if you have the good fortune to work in a history museum and have direct access to similar information from even further in the past. Below is an excerpt from the Milk Report section of the Little Falls Public Schools Annual Report 1941-42. Be sure to note the cost of a bottle of milk. The report was donated to the Morrison County Historical Society by the family of JoAnn Mellor of Little Falls, Minnesota.

MILK REPORT

    Milk was available to students and faculty beginning October 1, 1942. It was bought from the Land O’Lakes Creamery at a cost of three cents per bottle of chocolate, and two and one half cents per bottle for plain and sold for each. Seventeen children worked for plain milk which they took the second hour or at noon. This plain milk was purchased by the P. T. A. Milk was served the last half of the second hour and at noon. A state aid student took charge of distributing the milk.

    Following is an account of the year’s expenditures for milk:

    5705 bottles chocolate @ 3 cents (¢) $171.15

    2323 bottles plain @ 2½ cents (¢) $58.75

    An average of sixty seven bottles per day was served up to May 8 when milk was discontinued.

Helen Winters