Today we take ice for granted as we go to the refrigerator and stick a glass under the chute of the automatic ice cube maker. It wasn’t, of course, always so easy. Some of us old-timers remember having to actually jerk the lever on a metal tray to break loose the cubes.
Before the days of mechanical icemaking machines, folks had to rely on Mother Nature for ice. Archaeologists have determined that the early Greeks, Romans and Chinese stored ice and snow in caves to use during warm weather. These early people even discovered that ice helped preserve food.
In northern climates where winters are cold enoughduring the 1870s. How were they to be kept supplied with ice when they needed to be refilled every 250 to 400 miles?
