Among our more senior set, there are those of us who still remember home delivery of milk — the glass jugs with circular stiff paper lids set out on the porch in metal crates — a method of distribution from dairies that lasted up to the 1960s. Much in the same fashion, the ice man would come throughout the year, delivering cakes of ice to homes for domestic consumption. Folks inside the house would put a card in the window, indicating what size block of ice to leave, from 25 to 100 pounds. Because chilled air sinks, the ice cakes were placed in the top of a cabinet to chill the food items below. Today, the “ice box” is still often found on the top of the refrigerator to maximize efficiency. The press of a button now delivers in an instant what took many men many months and much material and space to deliver to the consumer. Modernization would ring the death knell for ice harvesting; refrigeration as we know it today killed the entire industry. Modern refrigerators were mass produced by the 1920s, turning ice ponds and storehouses into artifacts.
A turn-of-the-century ice harvest (top) and Ohio workers manufacturing the iceboxes that would use those “crops” all summer long. (Courtesy Ohio History Connection)
FEBRUARY 2019 • OHIO COOPERATIVE LIVING 27