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Saturday Night Science: The Frozen Water Trade


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Saturday Night Science: The Frozen Water Trade

John Walker / June 18, 2016 / 47 COMMENTS

In the summer of 1805, two brothers, Frederic and William Tudor, both living in the Boston area, came up with an idea for a new business which would surely make their fortune. Every winter, fresh water ponds in Massachusetts froze solid, often to a depth of a foot or more. Come spring, the ice would melt.

 

This cycle had repeated endlessly since before humans came to North America, unremarked upon by anybody. But the Tudor brothers, in the best spirit of Yankee ingenuity, looked upon the ice as an untapped and endlessly renewable natural resource. What if this commodity, considered worthless, could be cut from the ponds and rivers, stored in a way that would preserve it over the summer, and shipped to southern states and the West Indies, where plantation owners and prosperous city dwellers would pay a premium for this luxury in times of sweltering heat?

 

In an age when artificial refrigeration did not exist, that “what if” would have seemed so daunting as to deter most people from entertaining the notion for more than a moment. Scissors-32x32.png

https://ricochet.com/saturday-night-science-frozen-water-trade/

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