Update: When ice was king

From the 1870s to the 1930s, creameries, cheese companies and local stores depended on Monroe’s lakes and ponds for a year round supply of ice. BY JAMES A. NELSON MONROE TOWN HISTORIAN MONROE - It might be a shock to many of today’s generation, but refrigerators have not always been apart of the kitchen. Prior to refrigerators we had “ice boxes, “a phrase that people continued to use when I was growing up, even long after the “icebox” was no longer in use. The icebox was what the name implied, an insulated box, which kept food cold with blocks of ice, inserted in the top of the box. The iceman would make delivery of ice in the community usually from their own storage buildings. Many of the farms and estates would have their own ponds and icehouses for their personal use through the summer. Ice was an important industry in Monroe, used by the Cheese Company, creameries, ice cream manufactures, local stores and households. The primary commercial users were located around the Mill Pond in Monroe. The users being the Alexander Campbell Milk Co., Beakes Creamery, the Monroe Dairy Association, the Monroe Cheese Co., the Reed Ice Cream and the Mountain Lakes Ice, which was owned by the Reid Ice Cream Corp. was located a mile south of the village. The art of ice harvesting has disappeared from our shores. It once flourished as an industry in our town from about 1870s into the 1930s, though it would be continued to be harvested to a much lesser degree in the 1940s for local consumption. Harvest in January and February A cold steady deep freeze would provide clearer and denser ice, but a thaw and a rainstorm could ruin the crop. Ice harvesting would usually take place in January or February, depending on the condition of ice crop. If the weather did not provide a sufficient crop, it would have to be imported from icehouses in New York State or Pennsylvania with locations on the Erie Railroad so transportation would be direct to Monroe and the costs could be kept under control. Harvesting the ice would require the ice blocks to be scored so it could be sawed into two-feet by three-feet blocks. In the early years the ice was sawed by hand, but later it would be separated by power saws. They would cut a 10-foot channel to end of the pond and move the ice from the far end to the icehouse through the channel. The larger icehouses would have a conveyor belt to carry the ice to the top of the icehouse and down chutes to be layered by the switchman. The most important tool to the men harvesting and layering was the pike. The pike was a long wooden pole with a iron pointed spike and sharp hook. The earliest information we have on the harvesting of ice in the area was February 1892 when it was reported that the Farmers Creamery (Monroe Dairy Association and the bottling creamery (Alexander Campbell) where filling its ice houses. While also reporting that Alexander Campbell was to fill its big ice house in Oxford Depot, which will take 50-car loads to complete the job. We all know how the Mill Pond looks by the middle of summer from the algae buildup on the pond. Much of today’s problems are caused by the shallowness of the pond due to years of silt buildup. Former Mayor Joseph Mancuso tried to alleviate those problems years ago when he wanted to have the pond dredged. But the N.Y.S. Department of Environmental Conservation put a stop to that putting up all kinds of environmental roadblocks. Prior to the time of sewers, an ample amount of raw sewerage from the downtown section of the village flowed into the pond. It appears that was also a big problem when ice was an important crop in the village. In January 1905 the state health inspector forbid the Campbell Creamery from removing of ice from the Mill Pond for creamery purposes because of their own and others sewage. The bringing ice from Round Lake was deemed too expensive for the creamery. So the emptying of sewage into the Mill Pond was forbidden, which was causing a great deal of inconvenience to several individuals. The fire of 1907 At the end of 1900 the Reid Ice Cream Corp. purchased 50 acres of land, mostly from Eugene Smith, and additional property from Peter Turner and William Sutherland. There they would build a icehouse to hold 20,000 tons of ice and construct a large pond next to their building. Shortly after the land purchase, 13 carloads of lumber would arrive by train for the construction of the large icehouse. The Mountain Lake Ice Company operated the icehouse, which was owned by the Reid Ice Cream Corp. Besides making ice cream, they also operated Reid’s Union Dairy. They were a major player in the ice and ice cream business in New York City, Long Island and New Jersey markets. On June 8, 1907, tragedy struck when Reid’s icehouse was destroyed by fire. It was at 7:30 a.m. with eight men at work when it was discovered that the roof of the building was on fire. The Mombasha Fire Co. responded to the alarm, but it was too late. The whole building was engulfed in flames when they arrived. They did not know what caused the fire, but at the time it was thought that a spark from a passing locomotive landed on the roof. Twenty-five tons of ice was in storage at the time of the fire. Work would commence shortly after the fire to replace the icehouse, as it was reported that Reid ice would have two elevators installed in their building, that they were shipping two train cars of ice to New York City daily. Because of the demand of ice in the city this summer, they decided to add one or two additional rooms to the building. About mid-January 1909 the harvesting of ice began with nine inches thick. Frank N. Reed, who owned the local ice cream company, gathered his ice and stored it in his building on the Mill Pond. George R. Brooks, who supplied ice to the local people and businesses, reported that he had 35 men working and would be housing 20,000 tons of ice. Egbert Mosher had some leisure time and the manager of the Alexander Creamery went into competition against Mr. Brooks when he bought ice from the Mt. Lakes Ice. Corp. to sell in Monroe and vicinity. The great ice harvest of 1909-10 It appears that the Reid Ice Cream Corp. did not gather enough ice in January, because in February they had received eight cars of ice from Sullivan County and expected an additional 100 cars of ice in the future. In the meantime, Beakes and Alexander Campbell creameries would import 30 carloads of ice from Susquehanna, Pa. The ice was of excellent quality, 16 to 18 inches thick. George W. Brooks, the village iceman, had the contract to transfer the ice from the railroad cars to the creameries. But by the end of December 1909 they had good news. The ice on the ponds had frozen early with the Mt. Lake Ice Company reporting that they expected to gather 30,000 tons of ice that season. By early January 1910 the harvest was well under way and they expected the harvest to take an additional three weeks to fill the five mammoth rooms in the icehouse, using 50 men for the job. In February 1913 the Mountain Lake Ice Co. hired 80 men to work in two shifts for the gathering of ice because of the lateness of the season. They did this work with the use of electric lights when they had contractor E. D. Brady wiring around the pond and icehouses in two days. This allowed the night crew to accomplish as much as the day crew in the harvesting of the ice. In the fall and winter the Mt. Lake Ice Co. would bring horses up from the city to various locations to recuperate from the long season of delivering ice in the city. The icehouse site in Monroe was one of those locations where they would pasture the horses. During the season the ice company had the use of 400 horses. A tragic event did happen October 1915 when the engineer of Erie Express #2 westbound through Monroe rounded a curve and saw a number of horses on and near the tracks passing near the icehouse. Workmen employed by the icehouse spotted the horses and were trying to drive them back when the train approached the engineer blew the whistle and tried to stop the train, but only two horses moved away from the tracks. Three horses were killed standing on the track and one horse on an adjacent track kicked at the train and caught one of his legs, which dragged him to his death. One horse was thrown 75 feet. No cars were derailed, but the passengers where shook up. After a short delay, the train continued to its destinations. The horses killed were valued at $1,000. In Feb. 1918 horses would again be loose on the railroad tracks when the train came around the corner near the icehouse. But this time there would not be a tragedy as the horses ran up the track in front of the train. When they got up to the village they turned off the tracks on to a wagon road and headed back to the icehouse. George Brooks would continue to harvest ice from his ice pond that once stood next to Route 17M, but was filled in a number of years ago for future commercial development. Mr. Brooks would also harvest his ice from Round Lake. At the beginning of February, the Mountain Lakes Ice Company had finished harvesting its ice. It was 22 inches thick and then scrapped down to 17 inches and proved to be exceptionally pure. The industry declines The creameries around Monroe pond where all closed prior to 1920; the first to go was the Monroe Dairy Association which was purchased by the Alexander Campbell Milk Co. in 1901. The Beakes Creamery would close in 1916 when it could no longer compete against the Monroe Cheese Co. for milk, which was willing to pay a premium. Then Alexander Campbell would shut down its Monroe plant shortly after Beakes for the same reason. The Borden Co. would purchase the Alexander Campbell Milk Co. in 1918. The value of the asset holdings of the natural ice industry at the start of the 1920s was in ninth place of all industries in the Untied States at that time. But it then went into a fast decline, as mechanical refrigeration was being used to manufacturer ice and refrigerators were starting to take over in the kitchen. Reports in the local paper showed that the Mountain Lakes Ice Co. was still harvesting ice on its pond in February 1923, and had 70 to 80 men working on that harvest and expected to store 16,000 tons of ice. In June 1938 the Reid Ice Cream Corp. sold this property to Samuel Brenner of the Bronx. The property would remain in the Brenner family for many years, until the death of Samuel’s son Milton, when the estate would sell the property to Kiryas Joel, which uses it to supply water to its community. The shell of this massive icehouse still stands as a testimony this once thriving business. The local ice business would be continued to be operated by the Brooks Brothers. About 1935 Louis Bocarelli would come to Monroe to work for the Brooks Brothers. Louis would purchase the business and continue to deliver the ice to homes and local businesses. He would also harvest ice from the lakes and ponds in the winter to be stored in the Ice House but he would later buy it from a supplier in New Jersey. Louis would continue to operate the business until 1949 at which time he retired from the ice business and operated his radiator repair shop on Elm Street which he started in 1945. His grandson Jim Cocks carried on this business at that address until he closed up shop. Jim now works for the Building Department of the Village of Monroe.