We had a refrigerator similar to this one. The freezing compartment was just large enough for a couple of aluminum ice cube trays and a half gallon of ice cream.
Remember your fingers sticking to those aluminum ice cube trays.
I remember, too. My mother defrosting with a knife!
I remember those ice-trays and that bottle of Gulden's mustard in the pic. I guess that family drank a lot of soda. I remember glass milk bottles delivered, but not paper tops, they were metal-covered cardboard and we had a special "opener".
Also, I think we had one or two of those white enameled fridge containers as well as some glass ones. My chocolate pudding was always in the blue glass container with the clear top,
I do and still have to do it in my old chest freezer that I have that my parents got when I was about 10. It still runs and Ireally don't mind doing it.. I found a rather unsafe method of doing it these days. I stand a plastic bucket upside down in the bottom of the freezer then stand a small electric heater on top. Shut the lid and and pug it in. Then in a little while I pull the plug and open the lid. If I'm not electrocuted by then I just have to mop up the water with a couple of rags.
Hey, I still have to do this. Our RV refrigerator's freezer gets quite iced up and about every six weeks, I have to defrost. What a mess. I use a hairdryer.
I learned the hard way back in the late 1970's why you're not supposed to use a sharp knife to pry the ice loose.....hisssssssssssss goes the sound of escaping Freon.
I remember having to defrost the refrigerator freezer every now and then, never used hot water though, just emptied it, left the door open for awhile and chiseled away, never was that bad though. Yes, I remember my fingers sticking to the ice cube tray, my mother used to make some tang orange juice in summer and pour it in there with toothpicks to give us kids a cooling treat.
My 2nd apt had a old thickly coated refrigerator with the box freezer. It was think with ice when I moved in and it was when I left and possibly is to this day.
I do recall my mom defrosting the old one in the house when I was little; it was very funny. Watch closely folks will the lady of the house triumph over the freezer or . . .well the floor needed washing too.
i rented a mobile home after my divorce and that freezer had to be defrosted every week---i put some plastic containers in there to catch the water and turned on a fan
I still have to do it in the freezer part of the upright fridge/freezer in my kitchen...The fridge part is self defrosting but the freezer part isn't ..it's a PITA...
I've also got a Chest freezer, and that has to be done every once in a while too...
I still have the original upright freezer in my garage that was purchased some thirty years ago. It's still running! Some things they made years ago were better made, less electronic gadgets and they lasted forever!
This one still needs defrosting once in a while!