A Special Commodity, Ice 1990
With living today, it seems ice is taken for granted. Why, all we have to do is open the refrigerator door (or in many cases that don’t even have to be done) and out comes the ice. Not so in days gone by. Ice was special in my growing up days and we only had it to enjoy on a part-time basis – and a very sparse part-time at that. To say we protected it and savored it would be somewhat of an understatement.
At this house we had an icebox. One compartment was insulated (somewhat) and would hold a 50-pound block of ice which cost 50 cents. Another compartment was just below the ice section where small items could be stored. The big door side held milk and larger containers of whatever. When we were fortunate enough to have ice in the house, it would be on the week end and that big block was wrapped with layer after layer of newspaper to try to keep it as long as possible. We only opened the doors when we had to and they were closed in a hurry. Having the ice meant we could enjoy cold milk (and milk that wasn’t spoiled from heat) and iced tea.
One chore that demanded oft-paid attention was the emptying of the pan under the icebox. The pan caught the water as the ice block melted and it made a mess in the floor when it ran over – so we had to remember to pay special attention to that detail. Usually, that was my job.
Sometimes the ice truck would come by our house, but most times we would have to buy ice from the ice house in Crossville (4 miles away), or Collinsville (12 miles away) and bring it home. We didn’t have a car most of the time and we could only get the ice if we were riding with somebody with a car. What did an ice house look like? John and I surmise it would have been maybe 8’x10’ with very thick walls that were filled with sawdust for insulation. The ice was shipped to Crossville and Collinsville from an ice plant in Albertville (15 miles to our west). We still remember the tools used when handling ice – ice picks, large tongs and ice hooks. Perhaps the ice would be delivered to ice houses in 50 and 100 pound blocks. When have you ever seen an ice pick? In our vast collection of stuff there is an ice pick. – a necessity back in those days.
The ice pick was used to chip smaller ice from the large block for adding to iced tea. Even after people on this mountain got electricity and refrigeration, I remember hearing it said that the tea cooled with block ice tasted much better. Another time the ice pick was used was to chip off ice for making ice cream. Some of my fondest memories are those of time spent under that large tree in my Uncle Blake’s yard. It would be on a Sunday afternoon with the family gathered around and somebody would be turning the crank on the ice cream freezer. I don’t remember the size of the freezer, but it must have been larger than one gallon, as there were lots of mouths to feed. That old freezer would squeak and groan and the ice would get hung as the turning took place. Lots of coarse salt would be added to the ice in the freezer to speed up the freezing and, of course, the freezer would be covered with a tow sack or two. It was helpful, too, for a child to sit atop the freezer to help hold it still for the turning process. The ice cream was thought to be better if it were allowed to “set” a while after it was frozen, but that seldom happened with that crowd of hungry folks.
John and I also remember when the old Crossville picnic took place on a Saturday in July and drinks would be iced down with chunks of ice in wash tubs or maybe special drink boxes. Back then drinks were a nickel and many times they were called “dopes.” Coca Cola came in 6 oz bottles, but the RC was larger; however, it still cost five cents. That old picnic also had lemonade (made with real lemons) which had been made in wash tubs and was dipped out into the paper cups (before the days of Styrofoam) with a long handled dipper and cooled with ice chunks.
As you enjoy ice on one of these hot days, take time to remember what a special commodity ice was in days of long ago.