An ‘Ice Man’, delivering a 25lb block of ice in 1928, Houston, Texas.

I bet those rubber boots cost a pretty penny in 1928 too.

He has a cool job

Since I was a child in the early 1950's I've lived in a small "resort town" in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Back then, all of the resorts had "Ice boxes" in their cottages. Every winter, a local guy would harvest ice from a nearby lake and store it in a huge wooden crib covered with saw dust and then sell it to the resort owners all summer long. He finally went out of business and all the resort owners had to buy gas or electric refrigerators.

notice where his daily smokes were held ?
yes I remember the ice houses, On hot days every country girl wanted to show you their cool collection when you visited, but it was dark in there when the door was closed

He has a Stone cold stare.

About 4 miles from our house is the roughly 80 acre lake that was used as the "ice lake" for the city of Kiel and surrounding area back in the day. There are a couple of buildings in the city that were the ice house storage buildings. Lots of sawdust and the ice would be good well past the time when the ice was not safe on the lake. Interesting to note that that lake today is very weedy and the organization has a weed cutter that cuts several times per year. Old folks talk about the days after the ice needs that farmers would spread manure on the frozen lake during the winter. Funny how things cycle around.

Bryce

The manure was evidently to fertilize the weeds ?
Then the weeds were harvested ..... like hay ? for feed ? What animals ?
Very interesting, thanks.

Makes me remember as a kid the flat bed truck that used to deliver blocks of ice to homeowners in our part of town. The ice was covered on the truck bed with a heavy canvas to slow down the melting. We used to run behind the truck and pick up chunks of ice that often fell off the truck and suck on them. Cool photo.

My grandfather delivered ice when he was a young man in Brooklyn. He had a leather/rubber patch covering one shoulder to help keep his clothes dry as the ice block rested on his shoulder as he carried it with tongs.

No there was no harvesting of the weeds for feed. I am told that in the early days the lake had very little vegetation and thus few fish, so the manure was looked upon as a positive. As things changed not so much. There are about 70-80 homes on this lake and most septics in the early days was probably ran into the lake. Manure got the bad name and was stopped. Today there is not waste going into the lake but the vegetation grows like crazy. Not hardly any natural vegetation along any of the shoreline and most lots slope to the lake so all the lawn fertilizer etc. contributes to the nutrients but the herbicides used on the lawns do not. Many lakes around us are getting overun with Eurasian Milfoil as boats were not cleaned very well in the past. There are 5 lakes wilthin 6 miles of our house with probably 300 plus houses and vegetation is an issue and concern for all of them.
Many of the associations have limitations on expansion or the places have been remodeled before and can't be again. That was to control growth but what it does is brings in the big money that tears down the existing place and goes up 2-3 stories and stays within the foot print.
Bryce

Wow ... we live and learn.
Thanks for the explanation !

When I was 10 we moved to a small country town along the Skunk river. T had the good fortunr to meet the local historian and trapper. He was closed mouth like all trappers back then. He would tell of life along the river and history of the area. He collected arrowheads along with a woman that moved there as well.

He taught her to trap coon in numbers back during the fur boom. My education from him came after the boom died out . One day when discussing the place I lived asked him why the south end of the barn was plastered over. He sad they did that to keep the ice that was cut during harvest. He said at times would be as many as 5 teams cutting ie there at a time. Across the river was also a grinding mill.

Wish had the chance to meet his grand father as he was the village black smith and his father ran a general store.

5 cents a block

My paternal, maternal great grandfather had an old ice box on his enclosed porch. When I was a kid he told me in great detail how the ice was collected, stored, delivered and used. I found it fascinating. I've since collected most of the old tools that were used to harvest ice blocks from ponds and lakes.

He told me about hobos too and showed me their pictographs on fences and buildings.

He was one of the very first professional football players in the US. He was the largest player on his team at 164 pounds.

Keith

I still have one of those old Ice Boxes and an Ice Saw also.

I have a set of tongs, wanna start up a biz? LOL

For a lot of years I have used an ice saw and a set of tongs to open a hole for my ice fishing shanty. However, this past winter we had almost no safe ice!

Great comment s

That guy looks like his night job is a gangsta!