did your parents do this?

Question

they always gave a small token for christmas to the postman, the garbage collecters, the milkman, the baker, the "thunderbox" (outdoor toilet) emptiers.the green grocer. they all came to you, how things have changed.

Answer 1

This was a tradition that was done on Boxing day where I lived as a child. Mum gave to the coalman, the Esso parrafin man, rag and bone man and his horse, the milkman and to the man from Calor gas. We gave a Christmas box to our milkman and the paperboy when the kids were younger. The only people that come now are the refuse collectors every Tuesday but they aren't allowed to take anything from anyone. It's a shame that these traditions die out but that's progress we suppose.

Answer 2

No we lived out in the country on a farm. Nothing was delivered except the mailman at the end of a very long driveway so we never saw him. We always got something for the bus driver and the milkman.

Answer 3

I grew up on a farm in Indiana and we had a coal man, ice man, mailman, breadman, milkman, Watkins man, and the man that drove the Huckster wagon ( actually an old truck)
My grandparents gave a little bit to each of them.
Tc & BJ.....what is a " rag and bones man"? Is that like a trash man? Where was that?

Answer 4

Yes, I remember helping to put togeather little packages for all the Delivery people, and several neighbors.

Q within a Q...does anyone remember that for the last few weeks before Christmas, mail would get delivered on Sunday?

Answer 5

I remember my parents giving something to the milkman,
the mailman when I was a child living in the country, and the doorman when they had their New York apartment.

Answer 6

I remeber being a kid it was quite the same in both countrys I grew up France and Germany now I moved to a remote area in Bavaria here it still exist not in the measure it used to but some of the tradition is still alive.

Answer 7

Still do -- the Postman and the paper boy, the list is just shorter 'cause the 'personal touch' don't exist any more.

Answer 8

Can't remember whether my parents did this..but my grandparents did...and often it was in the form of baked goodies; a ham; a duck, etc. or something homemade.

I did it for years when I had folk like that in my daily life...even did it with my mail carrier up until two years ago.

Now I don't even know who that person is as I am never home when he/she arrives.

Answer 9

I remember their giving something to the postman, not sure about the trash collectors or the milk man, though.

Answer 10

I remember my parents doing this, the coal man used to leave an extra bag as a thank you, and the milk man an extra pint, the paper boy used to just say Ta and run off, bless him, I remember him well, he used to torment me all the time...lol....those were the nicer things of the past weren't they, shame it's gone....sigh!!