Dairyman reunited with historic milk truck
Published: March 7, 2007
San Rafael resident Bob Grady probably thought he would never see that old thing again.
Grady, 96, the patriarch of Lucas Valley Dairy that once sat on land now owned by George Lucas at Big Rock ridge, watched in wonder Wednesday as generations of Gradys gathered at Villa Marin to present the dairyman with one of his original delivery trucks.
“It looks nice,” he said after viewing the shiny 1948 GMC truck with the original 248-cubic-inch engine and three-digit telephone number, 636, painted on the side. It took more than three years to restore the old truck, which still requires some final touches, said his nephew, Dixon resident Mike Merkley.
The fourth child of Irish immigrant Frank Patrick Grady, Bob Grady started in the dairy business as a helper at 16.
His dad’s first job was digging graves in an Oakland cemetery. He worked as a coachman, and dealt in hay, grain, wood and coal before entering the ice business around 1915.
Grady drove a truck, loaded with 300-pound blocks of ice covered with canvas and tied down with ropes, for his father’s ice business.
In 1922, his father bought Lucas Valley Ranch, a 2,200-acre spread, for $45,000. In 1925, the Gradys bought the cows from those leasing the land and began operating a dairy.
When Grady was 16, he rode along on the dairy trucks as a helper, loading and unloading dairy products. He drove trucks summers and holidays and got to know the other drivers well.
Grady graduated in 1933 from St. Mary’s College in Moraga and started driving a truck for $50 a month for the ice company. Within a year, he was managing the family’s ice business.
In 1938, Grady went to work for Lucas Valley Dairy, taking over for his ailing father after he had a stroke. The dairy prospered, expanding from four or five milk routes per day to about 30.
During World War II, the Gradys supplied milk and other dairy products to Hamilton Field. Secondhand trucks were purchased and refitted to carry milk.
Grady, who got an automatic deferment for his work feeding the nation during wartime, was given a C-designation ration coupon for gasoline, the highest available, to deliver milk. He was assigned as an area block warden and was required to check on neighbors to make sure everyone complied with blackout and air-raid drill rules.
The dairy was sold in 1962 to California Cooperative Creamery. Grady worked in the company’s Petaluma headquarters until he retired in 1969.
“I enjoyed working my whole life,” Grady said.
Emil Bettini was among those who gathered Wednesday to welcome back the delivery truck. A fellow resident of Villa Marin, Bettini, who worked for Bianco Motors, the auto dealership that sold the Gradys the delivery truck, said he thought the restoration work was top-notch.
“I love it,” he said. “They did a magnificent job.”
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