US2781965A - Milk delivery and storage container - Google Patents

Description

Feb. 19, 1957 N. DEMBS MILK DELIVERY AND STORAGE CONTAINER Filed 'April 11, 1955 INVENTOR. NELSON DEMBS United States Patent MILK DELIVERY AND STORAGE CONTAINER NelsonDembs, Detroit, Mich.

Application April 11, 1955, Serial No. 500,453

1 Claim. (Cl. 232-434) This. invention relates to a milk delivery and storage container and, more particularly, a container which is adaptedtobe mounted in an opening located in the outside wallof' a house and which is adapted to receive deliyeries' of milk and other similar articles through an access, door located'on the outside surface of a house wall and is provided withv an inner door through which the householder may remove these articles without going outside the house.

In, the construction of new dwelling houses, it is desirable to provide the purchaser of the house with a container' means. adapted to receive deliveries of milk and similar type groceries which are delivered periodically to the house. .Access to such a container must be provided on the outside of the house so that the delivery man may deliver his groceries into the container. Likewise, in order to-avoid the necessity of having the householder go outside the house to obtain'these deliveries, it is desirable to provide an access'door to the container on the inside of the house for the convenience of the householder.

In recent years such delivery containers have been provided-in the'form of an opening in the outside wall of the house, usually near the back door. Doors cover the opening and through these doors groceries, milk, etc., may be inserted and received within thehouse. However, one of the major objections to this type of delivery container is that it is easy for an unauthorized person to reach hishand or arm or a long stick or, rod through the outside door and then through the inside door of the container and thus reach around to the door knob of the back door to thereby open the door and permit access to the house. In recent years, numerous burglaries of houses have been performed in just this manner.

Accordingly, it is an object of my invention to provide a storage container for milk and the like which container is mounted Within an opening in the outside Wall of the house adjacent the back door or some such similar door but wherein it is not possible for an unauthorized person to reach through the container into the house to thereby open the house door or look. To accomplish my objective, I provide a container of a width equal to the width of the wall and which fits Within the wall and has cover plates which are positioned upon or slightly overlap the outside and inside surfaces of the house wall to cover the opening therein. Access doors are provided in these plates, but these doors are offset relative to each other so as to provide a tortuous passageway through the container to thereby make it extremely difficult if not impossible to reach through the container and thereby to the door knob.

In addition, I provide a container wherein opposite cover plates of the container are provided on the inside and on the outside of the house wall and wherein access openings which are covered by doors are provided in these cover plates. However, these passageways and related doors are ofifset relative to each other in a horizontal direction with the door nearest to the entrance door of the house being located on the outside surface of the wall and the container access door on the inside of the house being located remote from the door of the house. In addition, these access doors of the container are hingedly connected to the container cover plates so as to open in opposite directions to thereby make it extremely diflicult, if not impossible, for any unauthorized person to break into the house.

These and other objects and advantages of my invention will become apparent upon reading the following description of which the attached drawings form a part.

Referring to the drawings which illustrate one preferred modification of my invention:

Fig. 1 illustrates a front view of the outside of a house having my novel container mounted therein and located adjacent the entrance door of the house.

Fig. 2 is a view taken on line 22 of Fig. 1 with the wall in cross-section to show the container mounted within the opening in the wall.

Fig. 3 illustrates a cross-sectional view taken on line 3-3 of Fig. 1 with the access doors of the container partially open.

Fig. 4 is a cross-sectional View taken on line 44 of Fig. 3.

In the drawings, I illustrate the outside wall of a house 10, having an outside surface 11 and an inside surface 12 and a door 13 provided with a door knob and locking means (not shown) 14. At the time that this wall is constructed, an opening 15,.which may be rectangular in shape is provided in the wall in the vicinity of the door 13.

My novel container, generally designated as 20 fits within this opening 15 in the wall. The container may be in the form of a substantially rectangular box having a topwall 21, a bottom wall 22, and end walls 23 and 24. Cover plates25 and 26 cover the opening to the container on the outside and inside surfaces of the wall respectively. These walls and cover plates may be joined together in any conventional manner, as for example, by welding, riveting, etc.

In this specific modification, the cover plates are adapted to overlap the surfacesof the Walladjacent the opening for a slight distance in order to improve-the appearance of the point of connection of the container with the wall. Thus, each of the cover plates 25 and 26 are provided. with flanges 28 which are bent toward and contact the wall and which rigidly position and hold the box within the wall opening.

It is to be noted that the width of the container walls 21 and 24 inclusive is approximately the same or slightly more than the width of the house wall 10 so that the cover plates may each be positioned at the opposite surfaces of the house wall.

The cover plates 25 and 26 are each provided with passageways 30 and 31 for the purposes of permitting delivery of articles into the container and removing delivered articles from the container into the inside of the house. These passageways are offset relative to each other for reasons to be set forth below. Each of these passageways are covered with a swinging door 32 and 33 which are hinged by hinge means 34 to the respective cover plates. In addition, each of these doors are provided with handles 356 and fastening means located on the door and on the cover plate respectively. These fastening means may consist of a resilient clip 37a on the door and a knob 3Tb on the plate or on the box walls adapted to catch these resilient clips and hold the door closed until such time as they are pulled open. Since these clips are conventional, no further description thereof is deemed necessary.

As illustrated in Fig. 3 of the drawings, it can be seen that the doors 32 and 33 are hinged near the center of the respective cover plates and swing open in opposite directions. Thus, because the passageways in the cover plates are offset horizontally relative to each other and because the doorsopen in opposite directions, it is extremely difficult for an unauthorized person to reach through the container to reach the door knob 14 and thereby open the door 13 to gain access to the house.

The builder of a home, may purchase a container unit constructed in accordance with my invention, and then may position the box within a wall opening or in the alternative may construct the wall around the box to fit in beneath the flanges 28 and abut up against the walls 22 to 24 inclusive. Because of the difficulty in reaching through this container, the container may be positioned quite close to the door of the house'without fear of any unauthorized person being able to open such door.

Once the container is installed into a house wall, the delivery man need only open door 32 and insert his milk bottles 40 or some such similar articles and then close the door 32 which will then be retained in its closed position by means of the fasteners 37a and 37b. Thereafter, the householder who wishes to remove the articles from the container for use in the house has merely to open the inside door 33 and reach into the container to remove the articles.

The particular container illustrated in the drawings being particularly designed to receive milk bottles which are the most frequent deliveries to any house, is made of such a dimension as to receive a number of milk bottles and is high enough to accommodate the bottles within the container. in addition, the doors in the cover plate may be constructed so as to cover an opening which is approximately one half of the area of the cover platev Since the passageways are offset relative to each other, in this situation each passageway would begin at approximately the middle of the container and extend close to an end of the cover plate. Thus, each passageway opens into a blind wall on the opposite side of the cover plate.

The container itself may be constructed of a relatively stiff gage sheet metal by any suitable stamping or bending process and the various walls may be welded or riveted or otherwise secured together to form a unitary container structure. When inserted within a wall, because of the flanges 28 abutting against the wall surfaces, the builder may, if he wishes, eliminate any further support for the container and rely simply upon the flanges 28 abutting against the wall 10 to retain the box or container in its correct position.

In addition, this container may in special instances be mounted vertically, that is, with the opposite access doors being vertically oflset. However, in this situation it is somewhat less ditticult to insert a burglary tool through the doors to open the house door, than when the container is horizontally mounted.

This invention may be further developed within the scope of the following attached claim and therefore it is desired that the foregoing description be read as being merely an illustration of one operative embodiment of my invention and not in a strictly limiting sense.

Having fully described one operative embodiment of my invention, I new claim:

A unitary article of manufacture comprising three separate unitary sub-assemblies joined to one another as sub-assemblies to form the article, the first sub-assembly being a four sided sheet metal box having two vertical open ends with their edges transversely flanged outwardly, the other two sub-assemblies being identical sheet metal pans, each having a plate portion of greater area than that of an open box end with its flange, with the box flanges being welded to the plate portions, the plate portions having transverse flanges surrounding the box, each plate portion having a hole occupying approximately 50% of the area of the plate portion overlying the adjacent open end of the box, each hole containing and being closed by a hinged door fiush with the remainder of the plate portion, the hinge line for each cover being a vertical edge of the hole located approximately half way between the other vertical edge of that hole and that vertical side of the box most remote from such other vertical edge of that hole, the two plates being reversely positioned on the box so that the hole and cover of one are not in horizontal alignment with the hole and cover of the other but are as far removed horizontally from the hole and cover of the other as is possible, whereby the human arm to be passed through both holes must extend diagonally across the box and cannot extend through the box on an axis parallel to vertical box sides.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS

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