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known as to possible risks to health associated with ice and refrigerated foods, and have included
some notes on these points in this report. It appeared, moreover, desirable to give a short account
of the growth of the use of ice and cold storage, and this subject may with advantage be
considered in the first instance, as a study of it will serve to show that the other questions to be
later referred to are beginning to assume no little importance from a health point of view.
The Development of the Ice Industry.
Snow and ice were used by the Greeks and Romans for cooling purposes, and Nero is said to
have caused extensive storage vaults to be constructed for the reception of the refrigerating material
brought from the mountains to Rome. In England, until quite recent times, employment of ice
has been almost entirely confined to the wealthy; in many country houses it has been the practice
to store it in winter for use throughout the year, and the "ice-house" has even come to be
regarded by some authorities as one of the first necessaries in a well-ordered mansion, a fairly
capacious ice-well being, in some instances, constructed for storage purposes. In London there is
at a particular ice merchant's premises a well 40 ft. in diameter and 104 ft. deep, and practically
the whole available space is utilised at times. When the well is full it is, I was told, no uncommon
occurrence for a pickaxe, or other implement, to be lost in some crevice between the blocks of
ice; should this occur the missing article is not, as a rule, recovered until the contents of the well
are completely removed, and an interval of months or even years may thus elapse. The
exploration of the well when nearly empty is not a matter to be lightly undertaken, as may be
imagined; indeed, after examining it, I was not surprised to learn that writers of fiction have had
recourse to the "ice-well" as a means of providing an unanticipated denouement. I was shown
some of the books of the firm owning this particular "ice-well," and they yielded evidence that
ice has long been deemed indispensable in the town houses of the aristocracy; that the trade in
ice during "the season" is an extensive one may be judged by the fact that this one firm of London
ice merchants had supplied during 1903, four hundred "ice pyramids," consisting of columnar
masses of clear natural ice weighing from 20 to 400 lbs., to say nothing of the ordinary daily
routine supply for ice-safes, etc.
Before imported ice was available, suburban ponds and canals were relied upon, and
some of the ice-hammers, "snakes" and punts which were used, even up to twenty-years ago for
collecting the ice are still to be seen in London. Although as recently as 1895, when the winter was
very severe, the question was raised by more than one medical officer of health, as to the employment
of canal-ice, an increasingly large percentage of the total supply from "the seventies" onwards
has come from Norway, for as soon as it was found that ice 18 in. or more in thickness could be
brought here from abroad, it was no longer worth while, as a general practice, to attempt to store
the thin ice occasionally to hand in this country.
In Germany, ice has been used more largely than in England, and the employment of
refrigeration in connection with the numerous public slaughter houses in that country has no
doubt helped to increase the demand. According to Schmidt-Miilheim, scarcely any greater service
has been rendered to hygiene in connection with food supplies in that country, that has been
afforded by the construction of cooling rooms. In Italy ice has been greatly in request, and during
recent years rumours have reached this country concerning the disastrous effect of the ice famines
which have occurred in the middle of summer in such cities as Rome, Florence and Turin.
"The ice habit" has, however, been especially developed in the United States. Writing as
long ago as 1882, Herbert Spencer1 commented upon the " passion of the Americans for iced water."
He says, "not only does it come up at every meal, but even in the middle of the night it must be
made accessible, the habit being to place in the mouth of the jug a wedge-shaped piece of ice,
too large to go in and with its narrow end downwards, so that, thawing all night and dripping into
the jug, it ensures an ever-ready supply of water just above freezing point." He attributes the
custom to "the need for a sensation which in one form or another is universal,"and says," drinks
that have flavours sweet or bitter are preferred to tasteless drinks; and if a liquid not otherwise
attractive is taken, then it must be not tepid, but decidedly hot or decidedly cold." He further
notes a "prevalent disuse of alcoholic drinks" in America, and explains that "the sensation of
taste being ungratified, the sensation of temperature is as far as possible substituted for it." The
extremely wet summer of 1903 was somewhat inauspiciously chosen to inaugurate a new departure
by introducing American methods in London, and among other advantages offered by the "quick
lunch counter," it was stated that there a glass of iced water would be always available. The large
hotels patronised by Americans in London are, it appears, large consumers of ice, indeed, so much
a matter of course has the employment of ice become in the States that Americans are quite unable
to understand the want of appreciation of its usefulness here. The only comment made by an
American exploring "old London," who was taken to an inn famous on account of its having been
commonly frequented by Dr. Johnson, was that it was strange manufactured ice was not
obtainable there.
In order to supply the cities of America lakes, ponds and rivers have been freely drawn
upon. Boston obtained ice from Wenham Lake; New York in part from the Hudson river, which
consisted of about "1,100 parts of rather dirty river water from Troy and one part of Albany
sewage," in part from lakes and ponds adjacent thereto, and in part also from Maine. Large
ice-houses were constructed and already in 1887 there was storage capacity for three million
tons of ice on the banks of the Hudson from Troy to Poughkeepsie (Prudden, Medical
Record, 1887). In 1903 it was estimated that approximately forty million tons of ice were
provided for use during the year in the States, the aggregate amount of natural ice stored
being about thirty million tons, while the ice-factories provided some ten million tons in
addition. Many of the ponds originally resorted to were subject to serious risk of pollution.
1Autobiography. Vol. II., p. 399.