Bread and Milk Road & Street

Winter Storm Prep Central
Bread and Milk Road & Street, Coventry & Vernon

Please be sure to read the comment below that explains the names way better than I do.

We all love dumb street names. As I’ve slowly introduced my son to the wonderful world of CTMQ – despite his being an unwitting part of it his entire life – he really seems to enjoy the dumb street names I highlight on occasion. When we drove along Pumpkin Delight Road to Pumpkin Delight School in Milford, he was delighted. And when I pointed out Bread and Milk Street in Coventry one day while waiting at a red light on Route 44, he was fascinated.

And, it turns out, so are many of you. Bread and Milk Street always pops up whenever a Connecticutcentric outlet trolls for “engagement” by asking readers to name their favorite local street names. Fair enough. It is a ridiculously dumb road name. But, to me, the dumbness of Bread and Milk Street is ratcheted up to the next level for one reason…

Half a mile west, in Vernon, there’s also Bread and Milk Road. Street and Road are separated by several non-exciting road names like, Cedar Swamp Road, Bolton Road, and Hatch Hill Road. It’s as if the planning and zoning board in one town was jealous of its neighboring town’s exceedingly dumb street name and decided to match it.

I do not know which came first, nor am I inclined to do the required research to find out. I’m satisfied just knowing that Coventry has its Bread and Milk Street and Vernon has its Bread and Milk Road.

Record scratch

No. I’m not satisfied. Who am I kidding? If I were to guess, I’d say Vernon’s Road came first. But fortunately, I don’t have to guess. I’m going to implicitly trust commenter Mike Kingsbury below for some history:

Bread and Milk Street was named from our Kingsbury family farm, still on the road. It was established in 1850 and for a while it was Kingsbury Street, renamed in the 40s or 50s because as traveling ‘tramps’ came through town they would work for a short while and earned bread and milk as a wage before they moved on to the next town.

That takes care of Coventry’s Street, but not Vernon’s Road. I’m going to guess the reason was the same.

Street is a much longer and straighter road, with dozens of residences along its way north to Tolland. (Yes, it’s Route 31 if you were wondering.) And guess what? You can buy both bread and milk at the southern end of it. And I wondered…

Would the guy at the checkout say anything to me if I went into that Cumberland Farms on Bread and Milk Street if I only bought bread and milk? There were no snow storms in the forecast, so my purchase wouldn’t be the typical storm prep cliché. I entered and endured the new Cumby’s thing where some underpaid employee now yells “Good Afternoon, welcome!” Companies: people don’t like this. Your employees hate doing it and your customers aren’t looking for cheery conversation, they’re looking for things like bread and milk. Please stop this. Same to you, Moe’s and I forget which car rental place does it, but that one is the worst. Your company doesn’t need to be Disney, and no one will think less of you for doing away with this practice.

Sorry, I had to get that off my chest.

Anyway, I gathered up my bread and milk at the Cumby’s on Break and Milk Street and took it to the register.

The dude didn’t bat an eyelash and simply rang me up and told me to have a nice day.

I must admit, I was disappointed. I honestly thought there would be some sort of acknowledgement when a customer comes in and buys only bread and milk on Bread and Milk Street. I didn’t even need bread or milk. It was all for this bit. I dejectedly took my purchase out to my car, sullenly ignored the greeter-turned-dismisser urging me to have a nice day, and went home.

The French toast the next morning was pretty good though.

CTMQ’s Highways, Roads & Tunnels