In 1928, an ice delivery man in Houston, Texas was photographed carrying a 25-pound block of ice.
Back in the 1800s and early 1900s, selling ice was a big business. Ice was cut from frozen ponds and rivers, then shipped by train or boat to other places around the world. Once it arrived, it was delivered to homes and businesses by horse-drawn wagons.
A man named Frederic Tudor, later known as the “Ice King,” started this ice trade in 1806. He began by sending ice from New England to wealthy customers in the Caribbean.
As his business grew, he started shipping ice to Cuba, the southern parts of the U.S., and even as far away as India, Australia, China, and South America.
At its busiest, the ice trade gave jobs to about 90,000 people and used 25,000 horses across the United States. Ice was especially needed during World War I. But after the war ended, the trade started to fade because of new refrigerators.
By the 1930s, many homes had fridges that didn’t need ice blocks. And by the 1950s, almost every house in the U.S. and Europe had one.