Existing comment:
The Icehouses & Dairy Cellar:
The idea for storing ice became a part of North American life as early at 1665 when Sir William Betheley, the Governor of Virginia, secured a patent to father, make and take snow and ice... and to preserve and keep the same in such pits, caves, and cool places as he should think fit." The icehouse resulted from this forward thinking. Icehouses differed in form and appearance from state to state and region to region. Some shared nothing more than a gabled roof resting on the ground; others were small square buildings with brick walls. Generally, the icehouse was a hole varying in depth from fifteen to thirty feet deep, its sides fortified by bricks, with a brick or wooden roof. A layer of straw or sawdust insulated the bottom and the walls of the icehouse. it would then be filled with large cakes of ice and covered with another layer of straw or sawdust. As the ice melted, it consolidated into one large mass. A drain at the bottom of the pit carried away melting ice water and condensation that collected on the convex roof and tunneled down the sides of the pit. Ice placed in an icehouse in January and February could last until the following October and November.
Ashland's icehouses are deep barrel shaped pits about sixteen feet deep with conical roofs. They were constructed after Clay had lived at Ashland for more than twenty years. In a letter dated October 1830, Clay wrote to his son Henry Clay Jr that he was "building of brick a new conical ice house." By this time, the use of ice to preserve food was becoming commonplace in the United States. Fresh fruit and vegetables could be placed on the ice and preserved for weeks.
The McDowell family continued to use the icehouses for their farm at Ashland after the turn of the century. In February 1913, Henry McDowell Jr wrote to his mother, Anne Clay McDowell, Henry Clay's granddaughter that he "was glad to learn... that both the ice houses are partly filled. There is still time for ice enough to finish them unless this winter is [to] break all records." |