Green Milk

This is a curious photograph. It is a postcard, dated September 1972. I was 14 years old.
I attended St. John's National School from 1966 to 1970. I had a marvellous teacher in my final two years there. His name was Frank Mc Gill and I really thrived in his class. I remember him telling us one day in class that milk would soon, no longer be sold in one pint glass bottles, but in plastic containers . We all laughed at the daftness of such an idea and after much hilarity lessons resumed, with a number of us still shaking our heads in genuine disbelief.
At the time we had our milk delivered to the front door of our house. It didn't come in glass bottles. Instead we left out a metal container, on our doorstep, and the delivery boy would empty our measure of milk into it, from his metal can. His can was made from a heavier material. It had a lid, and a carrying handle and was always shining. Our milkman was Petie Harte and he supervised matters from the roadside. That's his delivery cart outside Peebles shop. The large churn can just be seen at the back of his "pony and trap".
Recently, my sister Marie told me that Petie used give her apples and oranges, and sometimes even a spin up as far as Gilmartin's shop, but no further.
My former teacher was proven right of course, but maybe in this age of Green policies, Frank Mc Gill would be foretelling of a return to this, more environmentally friendly way, of delivering local produce.