THE ICE HARVEST IN AMERICA

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 6, Issue 1664, 19 April 1884, Page 2

THE ICE HARVEST IN AMERICA

The use of ice in the preservation of food is carried on in America to an extent quite unknown in tliis colintry. Not only is it employed in transporting articles of perishable nature over the long distance botween the fertile plains of the west and the populated districts of the eastern seaboard, but in every household the refrigerator plays a most important part during the summer months, and it is only by its aid that a convenient interval can be had between the purchase of milk, meat, and the. like, and their appearance at table. The climate itself lends great aid to the employment of ice. for while the summer is exceedingly hot, so that , the palate craves for the refreshing eflect of artificially cooled food, the'winter i 3 sufficiently severe to furuiah plentiful supplies of ico, which only require to be gathered and stored to provide 1 ' for the necessities of the hot month's,' Hence although there are majiyc'oun-' tries where the summer is as fervid as in the United States, yet the gathering and storing of ice on a large scale is an industry, peculiarly American; The business is there growing steadily from year to year, the annual product being counted in millions of tons,,and. requiring a large investment 'of coital.'ln New "York alone it is estimated that the yearly consumption of ice is upwards of 700,000 tons, with an annual increase' of 16 per cent; It is supplied from the Upper Hudson, upon which there are nearly 200 ice houses, with a storage capaoity of from 500 to: 60,0000 tons each, The total harvest of the last,winter was 3,000,000 tons, one of the largest ever gathered. The; Kdnnebec Eivei\in,.)tf(iihe is also a favorite region for harvesting ice. ■ It has the rigorous winters,and the supply rarely fails, while the deep inlets and ponds give easy excess to vessels and cheap transportation to domestic arid foreign markets.:. Considerable quantities of ice are' "gathered along the Penobscot, the Cathance rivers, and along the coast, last year's harvest from these four sourcss amounting to' 2,'364j500 tons.'' tlpbn ; the Pacific coast, ice is got at Alaska, partly, at Sitka, and partly at,Kodiak. ■some-idea of the' magnitude' of'Wicq. industry of' America, may be gathered from the fact that it supports a monthly trade paper, and that the total- annual ice crop' of the afc 20,000,'000 tons.