The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1879-02-26
JACK FROST'S CROP.
How Ice Is Harvested In tho Hudson Rivel
-Facts and Figures,

How Ice IL Harvested In tho Hudson River
Facts and Figures,
There is now more ice taken from the
Hudson river than any other stream OF
body of water in the world perhaps. Its
proximity to New York city, with its
immense demand for home consumption
and general shipping purposes, renders
this product peculiarly valuable; and it
would be difficult to select more favor
able point for securing the desired sup
ply. The large amount OF help required
in the cutting season is readily at hand,
and would, indeed, be otherwise idle.
The total amount of capital invested in
docks, buildings, machinery, imple-
ments, barges, tugs and horses can
scarcely be estimated, but it must ag-
gregate very large amount. Between
Albany and Newburgh there are about
seventy different ice-houses, ranging in
capacity from 10000 to $4,000 tons.
These various houses are owned and
operated by seven regularly incorpor-
ated companies and some eighteen or
twenty private companies and individ-
uals. These figures do not include any
operations in the vicinity of Albany and
above, where it is estimated that some
250, 900 tons will be gathered this year.
One company alone employ over 4, 600
men and 500 horses in the gathering
season, and about !, 400 men in the sum-
,mer. In the transportation of their ice
they own and employ ffty-four barges,
with a carrying capacity of from 25O to
1900 tons each. They shipped 10000
tons to foreign ports last year, prinei-
pally to the East and West Indies and
China. The wages paid for gathering
this season ranged from seventy.five
cents to $1.50 per day. The total
amount of the Hudson river ice crop
gathered this season has been placed at
5000, 1000 tons; but these careful compu-
tations, made from official data, will
place the sum about half million less,
which is doubtless full estimate--90,-
900, 900 cubic feet, which, if arranged in
continuous line one foot wide, would
reach considerably more than half way
around the world.
The first step in the process of gather.
ing ice is called "staking out ponds, !"
and consists of careful examination of
the frozen surface by few practical ice
men as soon as it becomes thick enough
to walk upon. This is found necessary
from the fact that the ice varies in thick
ness and quality at different points, and
unless the best is marked out at once,
an intervening fall of snow would con-
ceal it's location. These "ponds" are
as near the ice-house as possible, and
yet it is frequently necessary to 60 miles
away in order to obtain suitable ice. 30
great is the strife between companies
having houses near each other, in mild
winters, to stake out their ponds first,
that the men push themselves around in
boats over the newly frozen ice. The
existing laws on the rights of ownership
to ice which forms on the waters of the
State are somewhat vague and indefinite;
and for years past the custom has been
to grant the priority of claim to that
company which first succeeds in stalking
out the pond by row of bushes; hence
the early rush for "ponds" at the first
closing OF the river. Ice is perhaps the
only staple crop or product in the coun-
try that forms and natures without the
aid of man. The fact of it's being thus
free crop frequently gives rise to bitter
controversy among the various ice COM
panies, especially in mild seasons; and
it would seem that some special legisla-
ton on the subject was necessary.
Having staked out these ponds to an
extent deemed sufficient to fill the
house, nothing further is done until
the ice attains thickness of five or six
inches, when, if snow has fallen, it is
either scraped off or "watered through;"
the latter being resorted to if additional
thickness is required, and this is done
by cutting a succession Of holes in the
ice at regular intervals. When it be.
comes eight or ten inches thick the pro-
cess OF cutting is usually commenced.
It is sometimes found necessary to plane
off portion of the upper surface, which
is done by machine made for the purr-
pose. A" marker" drawn by horse is
then run in straight line across the
pond; one side of this marker is sup.
piled with sharp cutting irons and the
other with fiat guide-bars which run in
the grooves made by the cutter at
previous cut. These marks are about
one inch deep and twenty-five by thirty
six inches apart. Following this is
regular ice plow, having q deeper
blade with series of similar chlsel
points or cutters, which sink the previ-
Gus mark from three to five inches, &C.
cording to the thickness of the ice,
which, however, is still left together.
When a sufficient quantity has been
plowed and intersected in this manner,
men with heavy ice chisels bar off
large raft of these blocks in such shape
as to admit of their free passage through
the main canal, which has been previ-
ously cut from the house to the pond,
and through which all the ice is either
towed by horses or pushed along by
men with long pike-poles. In it's pro.
eress through this canal men are sta
toned on bridges at various points near
the house with tridents or chisels, and
the whole is separated into single cakes
before it reaches the "apron" or eleva-
tor which carries it up into the house.
This canal is often O source Of trouble
and annoyance, especially where it
crosses the river channel; the tides force
the ice together, and it has to be firmly
braced by heavy timbers at intervals.
On arriving at the dock or "apron, the
cakes are caught by series of buckets
or cleats, which are secured to an end
less chain, and moved by steam power.
Thus the ice ascends this steep incline
in a continuous line to any height re-
quired, from which it is slid into the
various rooms on "runs," and slowed
away by men versed in the business.
In this process of slowing it is found
necessary to leave spaces between the
cakes for the circulation of air and the
escape OF water. Many of the larger
houses are provided with several Of
these endless chain elevators, which is
the greatest invention ever made in the
ice business. Previous to the adoption
of this device the ice was all hoisted
from the water cake by cake with horses,
system at once slow, laborious and
dangerous. Steam was scarcely thought
of twenty years ago in the ice business.
Various other improvements have been
made in ice machinery by which great
saving of time and labor has been effect
ed; and where it used to take most of
the winter to fill small house, the
largest is now filled in ten or twelve
working days. All has gone smoothly
and rapidly this year; the weather was
propitious, breakdowns and accidents