Hot days and cold ice cream

The building – once a house as well - was demolished early Dec. 11 for the upcoming Queens Place Recreation and Community Centre development area.

Glennie Whynot, who purchased the business 24 years ago, says he doesn’t want to discuss the circumstances surrounding the closing of the long time business to make room for the development area. Overall, he says, “There have been good times and bad times just like in anything.” He says he wants to thank his customers for their patronage over the years.

The businessman continues to remain busy operating a tanning salon out of his home at 78 West St., Milton and making special occasion cakes. “I’ve got a few irons in the fire,” he says. His number is 354-5422.

The construction date of the house/restaurant couldn’t be found.

Businessman Jim Sapp owned and leased the building for most years of the business, but not all. He sold the property to the Region of Queens but, in the end, donated about half of the proceeds back to the project.

Ivan Higgins, of Cosby’s Garden Centre and Greenhouses in Brooklyn, says he believes a businessperson owned the building for less than a year before his family purchased the restaurant in 1976. The large dairy, also torn down for the new development earlier this year, was part of the property. “We flung a lot of ice cream out of the place,” he says with a laugh. He remembers line-ups on many days.

For a short period, the Cosby company turned it into a Tote-a-Meal restaurant, which sold chicken and ribs and other dishes. “There was a craft gift store in back of the Dairy Treat. It was quite a going concern at one time. It was back in the days on a summer night the thing to do was to buy ice cream. It was like 35 cents once and the staff was quite large. Five people would be working on a busy night.”

He adds, “I actually lived in that house. When we first set it up the upstairs was an apartment.”

He continues with another laugh. “Those were the good old days, but only because I was so much younger.”

The family quickly went into the garden centre business, which moved to its present location further up Sandy Cove Road in 1981.

Higgins remembers the packed, but closed dairy building as well. He says it was filled with old milk bottles and crates, steel sinks and other materials and equipment. “I think we sold a dozen bottles in a crate for a dollar just to get rid of some of them.”

Harold Deveau of Liverpool was the last person to live in The Dairy Treat when it was a house most often used as a home for dairy managers. He arrived in 1961 to manage Superior Ice Cream and Dairy. “When I moved up here from the valley we still used horse and wagons. I got rid of them as soon as we could.” He laughs. “In about 1963 or 1964, we went to motorized vehicles.”

Twin Cities Coop Dairy purchased the business but later moved it to Hammonds Plains. The building later became Ron’s Chainsaw and Trophies and, at one point, Wa Su Wek Ltd.

Murray Kirkpatrick and his business partner, Melissa Gallant purchased the dairy treat business from the Cosby’s company and changed the name to Magnolia’s Grill, although the ice cream continued to flow.

Gallant later opened a Magnolia’s Grill in the Town of Lunenburg, which is still operating today.

About half way though the period, the dairy and The Liverpool Dairy Treat changed hands from the garden centre company to The Rocca Group out of New Brunswick and eventually to Jim Sapp.

Sapp lived next door to the property in the 1950s, when, he says, “the dairy was a going concern, with horses and carriages then.”

He says the wealthy development company purchased the property and all but one of the fronting houses at the time.

Sapp says, “They had a design for a shopping mall at that point and actually had a footing in.”

However, the company was developing the Saint John, New Brunswick waterfront and ran into financial problems. Therefore, the company sold many of its holding throughout the Maritimes, including the dairy/Dairy Treat property to him.

Sapp says he always “thought it would be developed eventually,” adding the buildings were not in great shape.

Kirkpatrick says he has fond memories of the business. “It certainly gave me some good experiences in running a business; it probably made me better at what I’m doing today. The experience was fabulous.”

He says it was open from March to Oct. then. They bought a charcoal grill and served homemade dinners and desserts.

But, as with the other owners, he says, “We did the ice cream; that was the big one.”

Dick and Carolyn Henneberry then purchased the business and ran it until about 1984, when Whynot took it over.

Dick Henneberry says business was booming, although he spent much of his time on the road as a salesman. His deceased sister, Bonnie Huskins managed it for him. “That was before Mcdonalds (Restaurant); that was before anything. I remember we used to open up around the first of April every year. There was snow on the ground lots of times and they’d be lined up on the pavement trying to get the soft ice cream. Now-a-days you can get it anywhere.”

They also expanded the menu to include clams and other meals but “It was Glennie who expanded it into a full-fledged restaurant,” Henneberry says.

He jokes about selling the business. “Working the fryer. I just couldn’t take that kind of pressure.” He says he is amazed with how many former employees – possibly 30 or 40 – that still live in the area. “It’s part of a whole scene that is gone. Times change. Dairy Treats are not what they used to be and there’s too much competition from when the big boys take over. It’s not as it should be but it’s the way it is. It was just fun when people waited for spring so they could get their ice cream.”

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