End of an era after 48 years doing the rounds.Byline: KAREN FAUGHEYA HARD-WORKING milkman has proved he's got a lotta bottle after nearly 50 years of cold winters and early mornings. George Dohring, 65, is finally putting his feet up after 48 years of service with the company now known as Dairy Farmers Dairy Farmers is one of Australia's largest and oldest dairy manufacturers, established in 1900, supplying products to local and international markets such as eastern Europe, the Middle East and Asia. . George, from Ingleby Barwick Coordinates: Ingleby Barwick [bA.ɹɪk] is a large private residential estate built on what was the southern perimeter of Thornaby airfield[1] , was just 17 years old when he was offered the job, but his happiness quickly soured when he was told to start at 4.30am the following day - Good Friday Good Friday, anniversary of Jesus' death on the cross. According to the Gospels, Jesus was put to death on the Friday before Easter Day. Since the early church Good Friday has been observed by fasting and penance. , 1961. In what would be most teenagers' worst nightmare, George would have to leave his house in Park End at 4am to cycle all the way over to Linthorpe. George, who is married to Irene, 62, said: "I turned 65 on Wednesday, and that was it. I always said to the wife that when I woke up in the morning and I didn't want to go to work - then I'd pack it in. "The last couple of weeks I haven't really wanted to go in, so I decided that now is the right time to retire. "It's been a great job and I've never been out of work. I left school at 15 and I've worked all my life. In those days it was a very secure job. "You got out and had a good time, and if you were finished by 9am, you were allowed to go home." George, who is a grandfather-of-two, spent much of his later working life delivering milk to big companies such as British Steel and ICI (language) ICI - An extensible, interpretated language by Tim Long with syntax similar to C. ICI adds high-level garbage-collected associative data structures, exception handling, sets, regular expressions, and dynamic arrays. , and to hospitals and schools. "The job has changed a heck of a lot since then," he said. "When I first started the company was known as Northern Dairies and most of my work used to be Cannon Street Cannon Street is a road in the south of the City of London. It runs roughly parallel with the River Thames, and about 250 metres north of it. It is the site of the ancient London Stone. and Newport Road, but those houses don't exist any more. It's all shops and businesses now. "The winters are easier now. It used to be winter from October to May, but they're not half as bad nowadays. We'd get well wrapped up and once you got moving you were all right." Dairy Farmers' district manager Mick Doyle said: "George has worked for us for 48 years and he has been a total credit to the company. "He's well respected by his customers and colleagues and he'll be sorely missed. In this day and age with the economic downturn, to have 48 years with one company is a fantastic achievement."The winters are easier now. It used to be winter from October to May, but they're not half as bad nowadays - Milkman George Dohring, right , and with colleagues after his last delivery, left Pictures by DOUG MOODY |
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