Before supermarkets and electric refrigerators were in widespread usage, fresh milk in glass bottles was home-delivered on a daily basis. In the United States, milk was delivered by horse-drawn carts until the 1950s, well after the advent of the automobile. The horses that pulled the milk wagons often knew their routes so well that the milkman could make deliveries to a number of houses and the horse would know exactly where to stop and wait for him. The Museum's Pevely milk wagon, #143, was retired from service by the St. Louis dairy in 1950. It original had iron-tired wooden wheels, which didn't work very well on paved roads. Eventually, iron tires gave way to solid rubber tires. They were finally replaced on many carts by pneumatic tires in the 1930s.