Betty Pennington beamed as she was led down the stairs of the red house in Portsmouth in which she has lived for nearly all of her 88 years. It's not every day she sees the bright orange milk delivery truck that used to roam the Seacoast more than 30 years ago - one of a fleet that belonged to her family's company, Badger Farms Creameries. The truck belongs to Jack Grover. He and his father used to work for the creamery, and he said, there is more than 50 years of experience between the two of them.

That is why it was always a goal of Grover's to find a Badger Farms milk truck and restore it.

Restoring a Classic Work Truck

Three years ago, his dream came true when his daughter, who lived in Arizona, one day spotted a 1957 Model 374 milk truck. The 8-foot-tall truck had been sitting on the property since 1979 and was being used to store tires. Grover said the owner was just about to send it to the junk yard when Grover offered to purchase it.

The truck originally belonged to Shamrock Dairy, but Grover said all milk trucks at that time were manufactured by the same company, who would send the creameries the shells with just an undercoat of paint, according to seacostonline.com.

Companies would then paint and personalize the trucks. Badger Farms' trademark colors were black and bright orange.

After Grover got the truck back to New England, it took three years working with Commercial Collision in Hampstead and New England Auto Engineering in Tewksbury, Mass., to fully repair it. Every part on the truck is original except for the left rear door handle. This spring, he finally completed the project.

The truck is unique because it has a series of brakes and clutches that allows the driver to operate it sitting down or standing up. Grover said he has yet to drive sitting down and said his maiden voyage in the truck after 40 years made him feel like he had never left.

Grover has shown the truck in many car shows and won a slew of awards, including Best of Show in Salem, and in Rye, Kingston and York, Maine.

Badger Farms Creameries was established in 1877 and started out pasteurizing milk for local dairy farms in the area. Later, it was turned into a dairy food producer and milk delivery business. In the company's heyday, hundreds of trucks delivered along the Seacoast as far north as Kennebunk, Maine. Not only was there a plant in Portsmouth, but one also in Newbury, Mass., until the milk delivery business collapsed in the 1970s.

Grover said he practically grew up in the Portsmouth plant and worked for Badger Farms Creameries for around 12 years. When he was in high school, he worked in the plant washing bottles, packing trucks and making ice cream and cottage cheese.

Pennington also spent a lot of time in the plant and worked there until she was in her 30s doing various chores like making ice cream, Eskimo pies and brownies, along with decorating cakes and rolling up money. She even remembers a time when Badger Farms milk was delivered by horse and buggy.

She never personally knew Grover, but said his father's name was familiar.

Pennington is a hard-working woman who has been painting for more than 20 years, cuts her own grass, shovels her roof in the wintertime and recently even picked 80 pounds of grapes to turn into jam. She credits her early years at Badger Farms for her strong work ethic.

People are constantly stopping Grover when he's out to talk to him about what they remember about Badger Farms. In fact, before Grover reached Pennington's house, he was stopped by a man who handed him a small 5-cent, glass milk bottle from Badger Farms.

Grover doesn't consider the truck his own and instead called it the "Portsmouth people's truck." He will continue to bring it around to celebrate the 100 years of Badger Farms Creameries history.

"I want people to know Badger Farms is not dead," he said. "It's alive and well, and I've got the truck to prove it."