Anyone remember the ice box and ice man who made daily deliveries?

[helenbacque]

Did you ever wait for the ice man's truck to get a cool treat when the chips flew as he chipped big blocks apart? Wasn't it wonderful when life was so simple that a chip of ice was a treat?

 

[Aunt Bea]

I don't remember it but I have a pair of ice tongs and a couple of ice picks from one of our local ice companies, pictured below.

 

[Trade]

I can remember riding in the car to the Ice House with my parents to pick up a block of ice for my grandfather who had an ice box. I was about 3 years old so that would have been around 1950. But at home we had a refrigerator. Although back in those days almost everyone referred to their refrigerator as an Ice box.

 

[Lon]

I lived in a apartment with my mother from 1947 to 1953 and we had a icebox.

 

[jujube]

I don't remember anyone having an icebox but I do remember my grandparent's refrigerator. It was very small with a great big set of coils on top. There was a tiny little freezer compartment inside that would fit a couple of ice cube trays and not much else.

Growing up, we did make regular trips to the ice house to get blocks of ice when my mother was canning or when we wanted to cool down a couple of watermelons in a tin tub.

I've heard that people out in the country had kerosene-fueled refrigerators. Not sure how that worked.

The refrigerator in our RV can be switched over to operate on propane if electricity is not available.

 

[grannyjo]

Our ice delivery man used to deliver every second day. I remember my mother wrapping the blocks in newspaper. Was supposed to make them last longer.

 

[Falcon]

As kids, we used to grab little chunks off the back of the trucks to suck on during the hot weather.

The driver never seemed to mind.

 

[Ruth n Jersey]

I remember seeing the ice delivery truck but as far back as I can remember we always had a refrigerator. We had, of all things, a banana man, he only sold banana's.

 

[NancyNGA]

My family went on a fishing trip to northern Ontario, Canada, one summer and stayed a week on a lake in a cabin without electricity. It had an ice box. You got the ice blocks from a little building out back. They were buried in sawdust. The ice blocks were cut from the lake in the winter. It amazed me that the ice could stay frozen all summer.

 

[Falcon]

Nancy, I remember seeing that when I was vacationing in Wisconsin years ago.

The place was as big as a locomotive roundhouse with TONS of sawdust.

 

[Anomaly 73]

Did you ever wait for the ice man's truck to get a cool treat when the chips flew as he chipped big blocks apart? Wasn't it wonderful when life was so simple that a chip of ice was a treat?

I can't say I recall the iceman but I do remember begging chunks of ice from the milkman's truck on hot summer days. I've tried to retain some of that childhood simplicity and I encourage my grandkids to appreciate their status. I vividly see myself 40 years ago (at 33), saying to friends: "don't grow old...there's no future in it".

 

[dollie]

we didnt have an ice box or fridge but my sister and my self would get chips of ice from the iceman