Cold, hard cash

During 19th-century Lancaster County winters, farmers could sometimes be found plowing the Susquehanna River.

That's right. Plowing the river.

Ice was the dominant crop in January, when Lancaster County's fertile fields lay fallow and the farmers had idle time.

And, while New England boasted numerous lakes and ponds from which to draw its ice, Lancaster County's primary source was the Susquehanna — a major producer, so much so that it helped Pennsylvania rank third in the nation for ice production, behind Maine and New York.

Local historian Lynne Smoker will offer a free presentation on Lancaster County's ice farming tradition at 8 p.m. Tuesday at Elizabethtown Historical Society, 57 S. Poplar St.

Ice, Smoker said, was big business in the 1800s, and in Lancaster County "it was mostly farmers who did it. It was their off-season, and it gave them some work when things were slow."

It was a cold, laborious job, Smoker said, and a fair share of men and their specially cleated horses ended up in the chilly waters. Rescues, he said, were quick and  simple for teams accustomed to working on the ice.

Mid-January was the prime time for ice harvesting, Smoker said. Harvesting season often lasted only two or three weeks.

Unlike Maine, Lancaster County didn't have the luxury of waiting for floes to thicken to 10 or 12 inches, he said. Here, the winter deep freeze was short and uncertain.

"When ice reached a thickness of about 6 inches, they started to harvest," he said. "It's like making hay while the sun shines, because you never know — in a week, it could be down to nothing."

Farmers would use surveying tools to lay out a square or a rectangle on the ice, he said. They removed snow from the surface with a horse-drawn wooden plow, then criss-crossed the ice field, making a checkerboard pattern with an ice scorer.

"Then they'd plow over those lines, back and forth, back and forth, until they were down to within 2 or 3 inches of the bottom," Smoker said. "They'd use an ice saw to finish the job."

Some farmers cut small blocks, while others cut large sheets to be chopped down later. Either way, he said, they'd float the ice down the river, guiding the mini-bergs with special pikes to an icehouse for storage.

"There were a lot of icehouses at the time," Smoker said. "In Columbia alone, there were at least three. They dotted the river shores. ... Most of your communities up and down the river had an icehouse."

Icehouses preserved ice by packing blocks in sawdust, a natural insulator, he said. Well-insulated ice could last through the next November.

In good years, the ice would be exported south — or even overseas. In the 19th century, Smoker said, ice was the nation's second-biggest export, behind cotton.

"But some seasons were very grim," he said. "Sometimes, the ice didn't come at all. Other years, there was 3 or 4 inches and that was it."

That meant residents had to rely on suppliers from upriver, he said — which doubled, or sometimes tripled, the cost.

Ice, Smoker said, wasn't used much in those days to keep one's iced tea properly chilled.

"It was for keeping meats cold, for transporting beverages like beer and milk. It was spread out in market houses to keep the produce fresh," he said. "It was mostly for food preservation."

River ice, Smoker said, is naturally cloudy, and it was anyone's guess what contaminants might have come downriver with the flow.

"People didn't even think about it," he said.

At least, not until technology advanced to the point that allowed for pristine artificial ice, he said. "Crystal-clear ice was a big selling point."

The industry collapsed in the 1920s, when artificially made ice was on the upswing and in-house refrigerators were finally affordable, Smoker said.