Ice Harvesting: An Age-Old Tradition

A circular ice saw is maneuvered into place to cut a grid for the removal of ice from Squam Lake. (Courtesy Rockywold Deephaven Camps)

By Thomas P. Caldwell

In the days before refrigeration solved the problem of keeping foods from spoiling, people used to harvest frozen water from ponds and lakes and store it in insulated “iceboxes” or ice houses to keep it from melting. Old-timers still sometimes call a refrigerator an icebox, but the term is slipping away as people lose track of how important ice storage used to be. Entire businesses were built around the ice harvest, but today it is almost a lost art.

The Remick Country Doctor Museum and Farm in Tamworth, whose mission is to teach the values and significance of the country doctor’s medical practice and agricultural way of life, has held ice-harvesting demonstrations through the years, but recent warm winters have interfered with those plans and Dawne Gilpatrick, the museum’s marketing coordinator, said there will be no ice-harvesting this year.

One holdout is Rockywold Deephaven Camps in Holderness, where ice-harvesting remains an important tradition. In late January, ice-harvesting took place as it has every year since the late 1800s.

When Rockywold Deephaven Camps purchased seven refrigerators as the first step in phasing out its ice boxes in the late 1960s, camp guests objected. During an interview in 2015, Norm Lyford of Ashland, who had helped with the ice harvest for 72 years, recalled, “The campers objected. They didn’t want [refrigerators]. They liked being able to take an ice pick and chop the ice off, and they said they wouldn’t come back again unless they got the iceboxes back.”

That camp relented.

It takes 3,600 of the 15.5-inch by 19.5-inch by 12-inch-thick blocks of ice, each weighing about 115 pounds, to supply the cottage ice boxes in the summer. That is more than 200 tons of ice to be harvested, moved, and stored — 2,000 blocks in the Rockywold Ice House and about 1,600 blocks in the Deephaven Ice House. The ice is insulated by sawdust to keep it frozen until it is delivered to the antique iceboxes in each cottage. It is not unusual to have some ice still sitting in the ice houses after the last guests have left in September.

Cutting ice into cubes. (Courtesy Rockywold Deephaven Camps)

History of ice harvesting

Harvesting ice is a centuries-old tradition, but it turned into a business for enterprising people in the 19th century. By the 20th century, there were companies springing up to satisfy consumers’ needs for cold food storage both locally and around the world.

In Bristol, the Charles A. Carr Company formed as a coal and ice supplier in the greater Newfound Region. The family harvested ice from Newfound Lake and stored it lakeside in an ice house. As electrical refrigeration became common, the company evolved from coal and ice to home heating oil delivery.  In the mid-1980s, Dead River Company of Maine purchased the Carr Company, and David Carr, the founder’s son, built a lakeside retirement home on the old ice house property.

In Laconia, the Morrill-Atwood Ice Company of Wakefield, Massachusetts, maintained ice houses around Lake Paugus to help supply large hotels in Boston in the early 1900s. The ice houses were built adjacent to the railroad tracks, allowing the company to load the ice onto freight trains and ship it wherever it was needed. Later, the Rudzinski family opened the Laconia-Lakeport Ice Company which, although still in operation, now makes its own ice, rather than harvesting it from Lake Winnipesaukee.

The Gifford-Wood Company, which evolved from an ice tool manufacturing company started by William T. Wood in 1845 and consolidated operations with Gifford Brothers of Hudson, New York, in 1905, made most of the ice-harvesting equipment that Rockywold Deephaven Camps still uses today.

The growing demand for ice led Frederic Tudor (the “Ice King”), to develop international trade routes, shipping ice to the southern United States, the Caribbean, and as far away as India.

Moving those heavy blocks of ice used to be accomplished by a yolked steer team, and the Remick Museum’s demonstrations highlighted how they pulled wooden sleds to transport the ice for storage.

It is much easier today.

Blocks of ice are moved up a conveyor into a truck. (Tom Caldwell Photo)

The process

Judging the right time for the ice harvest is important. The ice has to be at least 8 to 12 inches thick to support the weight of workers and equipment. The ice used to get thick enough to harvest in December, but with warmer seasons in recent years, it has taken until late January or even February to have sufficiently thick ice for the harvest.

Rockywold Deephaven Camps aims for a 12-inch ice depth. If the ice gets too thick — more than 15 inches deep — it can have irregularities that spoil the blocks. Harvesting such blocks serves another purpose, however: They are placed around the perimeter of the ice-harvest area as a warning to snowmobilers and others out on Squam Lake that any ice forming over the hole may be unsafe.

Before harvesting the ice, the crews have to remove any snow from the surface. Not only does that provide access to the ice; it also ensures that the ice is sufficiently frozen. Snow can act as an insulator to slow down the freezing process and lead to thinner or uneven layers of ice.

In the early days, those cutting into the ice used hand saws and chisels; today, there are power tools to make the job much quicker and easier.

The process begins by scoring the ice to create a grid pattern on the surface of the lake or pond. Ice saws then cut along the lines to sever sections of ice. Ice-breaking tools or bars work at the ice to free the blocks and guide them along channels to the edge for removal.

Workers then use ice pikes and ice tongs to grab the blocks and get them out of the water where they are loaded onto sleds, wagons, or trucks. It is rare to see oxen or horses perform that task today. Instead, the blocks are loaded onto a powered conveyor belt that lifts them onto the waiting transport vehicle.

Once harvested and loaded, the ice is transported to the ice house where more labor is required to unload and stack the blocks before insulating them with sawdust or hay. The ice house itself is designed with thick walls, which may be made of wood, stone, or brick to help maintain the temperature and keep the ice from melting.

Rockywold Deephaven Camps created a manual that establishes the procedures to make sure the ice harvest is efficient and safe. It begins with spending the weeks prior to the harvest making sure that the equipment is ready for service. When it is time for the harvest, a tool shed and loading chute are brought onto the ice, with an ice ramp making sure the trucks can get onto and off the ice safely.

The manual also includes guidance on accessories such as ice cleats to prevent slippage on the ice, and there are signs to indicate areas of thin ice.

The camp uses power equipment, including a circular ice saw and chainsaws, and they make sure to have a spare engine for the circular saw, because, if they miss their window of opportunity, the ice conditions will change and make the harvest impossible.

Yesteryear: Belknap Mill Beginnings

The Belknap Mill in old-time Laconia, NH. (Courtesy Belknap Mill Society)

By Kathi Caldwell-Hopper

The early 1970s was a perilous time for the old mill buildings on Beacon Street near downtown Laconia. The buildings were no longer the site for production of textiles and other goods,  and the rooms were empty and dusty. If you were to walk through the mill buildings, you might fancy hearing the call of one former worker to another or the sound of the loud textile machines.

By 1969, the Belknap Mill was no longer in operation; thus began the struggle to save the building from the wrecking ball.

All around the downtown area, old buildings were being demolished as the trend for everything new took over. There seemed to be little regard for anything historical and this was especially true for old mill structures.

But not everyone agreed with that mindset, and a group of such citizens must have been distressed to see the former downtown Laconia they knew and in some cases, grew up with, being torn down to make way for a parking garage, parking lots, modern buildings and busy throughfares. roads. The group asked themselves if there might be a way to retain at least a few of the buildings, specifically the two former mill buildings, built in the early 1800s of brick.

Today, we would look at these buildings and recognize their architectural beauty. But in the early 1970s, many saw the mills as an eyesore, having no purpose to hold onto the structures or fix them for later use.

An article in the Laconia Evening Citizen seemed an ominous prediction to the demise of the mill buildings. Dated October 23, 1970, the headline read “Mill Disposal Deadline Set”. The Laconia Redevelopment and Housing Authority reported to the mayor and city council that unless funds and plans were forthcoming, the Seeburg and Belknap-Sulloway mills would be torn down by June 1, 1971.

It is worth noting that the article also mentioned the Belknap Mill was reserved for museum use. It was warned, however, that plans, and funds would be needed by March 1, 1971, or demolition would begin on June 1.

Luckily, there were those already meeting and working hard to save the old mill. At the first annual meeting of the Save the Mill Society, President Richard Davis reported that for the first time ever, the National Trust for Historic Preservation contributed toward the preservation of something other than a Presidential residence. The amount given was $500 to go toward the preservation of the Belknap Sulloway and Busiel mills.

It was hoped the buildings would be placed on the National Register in Washington, which would be impactful in the goal of saving the mills.

No matter what the efforts were to keep the mills from demolition, deadlines were looming. An article in the Laconia Evening Citizen dates December 26, 1970, reported that a firm deadline of June 1, 1971, was set by Laconia Housing and Redevelopment Authority to decide on the fate of the buildings.

In the efforts to save the mills, the buildings had been under consideration in the past year in connection with the Urban Renewal project. Ideas for the mills was restoration as a city hall, and the Belknap Mill specifically for use as a museum and cultural center.

Authority chairman Richard A. Messer said, “In essence, what the authority advised … was what steps will have to be taken to demolish the mills if no development proposals assuring their rehabilitation for private or public use are firmed up by next June 1.”

Whether one agreed with the feeling of saving the mills or tearing them down, all seemed to agree that there should be a good look at the structural condition of the buildings and the work required to bring the mills up to local code standards.

A report by the Save the Mill committee on December 21, 1970, told that the members were regularly meeting each Friday for a noon time working lunch. They kept up with current trends and other mill-related business. The committee was not about to give up in their intense efforts to see that the historic buildings were preserved.

One can only imagine the sense of urgency among the committee members when they were informed that the Planning Board of Laconia had altered the schedule to hear plans for the use of the Belknap Mill by March 1. The new plan was to demolish the mill buildings – immediately.

Swinging into action, the Mill committee decided to attend a meeting to be held that same evening in the Mayor’s office. At that meeting, they would protest and lay out their plans for Mill renovations.

They would also meet with the Chamber of Commerce that very afternoon.

In the same report, Dorothy Buley presented a report on a plan for a museum and restaurant for the Belknap Mill. She wrote that the museum would not be a tale of an early elegant home such as those found in Portsmouth’s Strawbery Banke or a display of local farming equipment. In capital letters she wrote that a Mill museum would be THE STORY OF THE LAKES REGION AND THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION.

A centerpiece for the proposed museum would be a display of the oldest, untouched brick mill building in the country. The story of weaving fabric for Civil War uniforms and the knitting of socks, both done at the mill, would be included in the displays.

A restaurant would be a possibility as well, according to Buley’s report. The dining establishment would make use of antique mill equipment and other items for decoration and even the dining tables would have lighted, locked displays on the tabletops.

It was a creative and worthy idea, but not all of it came to fruition; only the museum effort became part of the finished Belknap Mill.

There is no doubt that dedicated committee members at this time were totally committed to saving the mills. Their work was tireless, but they faced a long road with many meetings, trips to give reports and a constant effort to obtain funding for renovations to the buildings.

Today, it is worthwhile to look back on the early days of the Save the Mill effort. The early 1970s were a time of a desire to embrace the modern and new, while others wanted to move forward but preserve the history of the community. Eventually, both efforts were joined, and it is these herculean goals that created the brick mill buildings still gracing downtown Laconia to this day.

Due to its age (built in 1823), there are many things about the Mill that may be unknown to most people. The following is a list of facts the Belknap Mill, with some help from a former Belknap Mill board of directors member, and a former Mill executive director.

1. The original wooden mill burned in the early 1800s and was replaced by the brick mill that stands to this day, based on designs of an 1813 mill in Lowell, Massachusetts. It was listed in 1972 as one of the first buildings on the National Register of Historic Places.

2. A handmade stool was donated to the Belknap Mill by Gwendolyn and Rolland Gove and is a good example of the days of child labor in mills. This stool and others like it were used in mills as chairs for children as young as 10 years of age. The children wound bobbins and did other work. Their feet barely touched the floor as they sat at their tasks.

3. The historic Belknap Mill was nearly the victim of fire in 1860 when a huge blaze destroyed much of downtown Laconia. Luckily the Niagara Engine Company of Lake Village came to the rescue, and the brave men pushed into the area, showing the community “how fires were fought by real men!” as a newspaper reported at the time.

4. In 1973, members of the Belknap Mill Society had cast 150 replicas of the original Holbrook Bell. The number (150) was to reflect one bell for each year of the Mill’s existence until 1973.

5. When the Belknap Mill was built, fire was a frequent occurrence, and it took many buildings. To prevent a fire, the Belknap Mill was built mostly of brick and featured post-and-beam construction. The bricks were made at a brickyard in the Weirs area. The wooden beams of the Mill had shaved corners to make them fire resistant as much as possible. It is uncertain if these measures kept the Mill from burning but something went right, because the structure stands to this day.

6. Hollywood personality/TV host Jay Leno visited the Mill and signed the guest book around the year 2000. (Information from former Belknap Mill executive director Mary Rose Boswell.)

7. In 1977, a Proclamation was distributed to state that the American Revolution Bicentennial Administration regarded the Belknap Mill as a project of national scope with state focus and recognized it as an official program for the Bicentennial.

8. In the 1990s, the gallery at the Belknap Mill, had an exhibit featuring the work of Sandwich, NH artist Ted Sizemore. His detailed paintings were artwork for the covers of romance novels. The exhibit was one-of-a-kind, offering to the viewer a significant collection of unique and beautiful paintings.

9. The Belknap Mill’s summer outdoor concert series was started in the 1990s with the first band playing and making do with the back cement flat surface as a “stage” of sorts. The area is today the beautiful Rod & Gail Dyer Powerhouse Patio. Audience seating for the first concert was folding metal chairs placed in the former parking lot (now Rotary Park). What started as a one-evening concert morphed into the summertime ambitious lineup of outdoor concerts well attended by the public each year.

10. Politics, politics, politics! Before area citizens vote there is the campaign trail. That trail has led to the Belknap Mill on many occasions, from Bob Dole to Bill Clinton and many more. Over the last 45 years, visiting presidential candidates have included John Edwards, Marco Rubio, Newt Gingrich, Joe Biden, Edward “Ted” Kennedy and Jerry Brown. The candidates over the years stopped at the Mill to speak, meet voters and answer questions in their bid for the presidency and vice presidency. It is a true testament to the Belknap Mill’s title as the “Meetinghouse of New Hampshire.”

When the Theatre Came to Town

The Old Colonial Theatre, Bethlehem

By Kathi Caldwell-Hopper

The White Mountain region of New Hampshire is quiet in winter, and it was even more remote 100-plus years ago. In those days, when a concert or play came to town, it brightened long, cold winters. Such pastimes were few because bringing plays, movies and concerts north was a major production in the early to mid 1800s.

But all that was to change when outside producers and others set their sights on offering vaudeville and movies to the north country of New Hampshire.

This was a time when opera houses were springing up in cities and also in small towns. Some of the opera house buildings were part town halls with offices for local government and part theatre. Often, there was a meeting hall large enough – often with a stage – for performances.

In Conway, Bethlehem, Plymouth and Littleton, among other towns, opera houses brought the world of music and movies to the region.

North of the Conway area, Gorham was incorporated in 1836, but settlers lived there long before that date. At its start, Gorham was dubbed Shelburne Addition, according to “Some Highlights From Gorham’s History” by Guy Gosselin. It served as a stop-over spot for travelers headed elsewhere.

In the early days of Gorham the town was a small community of about 30 houses, a grist mill and a general store and inn. The community grew fast once the railroad arrived, and Gorham was a place to stop, rest, perhaps get something to eat at the inn and continue on to the northern White Mountain hotels that were the destination for tourists from the south.

As the 1900s began, electricity came to Gorham, and this attracted the many area millworkers to settle their. The area was thriving, with railroad travel, a high school and an ever-increasing population and many shops and businesses.

It seemed natural to provide entertainment and the Gorham Opera House was built in 1915. Locals must have been excited when work began on the Gorham Opera House. Construction was quick and by June or July, citizens flocked to the new theatre to see something they might have never experienced before: watching a motion picture. The thrilling first movies were “The Count of Monte Cristo” with James O’Neil and mega-star Mary Pickford in “The Eagles Mate.” The price to attend was ten cents for children and fifteen cents for adults.

Sadly, in 1917 the Opera House was destroyed by fire. A new building opened in 1918, and many vaudeville acts came to the stage at the time, as well as theatrical productions.

The Gorham Opera House featured thrilling acts brought to town via the railroad at the time. The building remains in our current day and offers concerts and musical acts and is now known as the Medallion Opera House.

The bustling Mt. Washington Valley town of Conway offered movies and theatricals for many years. In October of 1919, Leon Bolduc purchased a local Bijou Theatre and began to show movies in Conway village.

Bolduc made a business of showing films to others and he  had experience running a movie house.  He had worked for a few winters at the famed Rockefeller family estate, overseeing a private movie theatre. Bolduc also ran early movies in such small towns as Tamworth and Jackson as well, likely in town halls or other spaces.

When talking pictures arrived and took the country by storm, Bolduc offered “The Broadway Melody” in 1929, according to historical information at www.conwaymajestic.com (in an article by Adrian E. Hurd).

With movies becoming more and more desirable, the theatre must have been quite popular. In 1930 Bolduc purchased a vacant lot and built the Bolduc Block on Main Street in Conway village. The construction, according to Hurd’s historical article at www.conwaymajestic.com, included brick facing for the exterior of the building.

The Bolduc Block can be likened to an early mall of sorts long before malls came into vogue. The block offered not only the movie theater, but Frank Allard’s Grocery Store, Tony Labnon’s Store, W. Langlais the Jeweler, and the local post office. Residents had access to stores in one block within easy walking distance.

But the big excitement was the opening of the New Conway Theatre (or Majestic Theatre as it was later called) in the spring of 1931. On opening night, the Conway Band played in front of the theatre and moviegoers were treated to the main feature, “Stepping Out.”

With outdoor music before the show, it was like a Hollywood movie premiere right in the village. Guests must have thrilled to see the new, spacious theatre, the comfortable seats and the beautiful theatre curtain.

Bolduc stood on stage and welcomed the excited guests before the movie began. This was a time when going to a movie was a big event and great entertainment. Give-aways of fine China pleased many moviegoers and short films with cartoons and newsreels before the main feature were all part of a Saturday night (or afternoon) at the movies. Bolduc’s Conway theatre certainly fit the bill and was a popular place for locals to see their favorite actors and actresses on the big screen..

The theatre was the site of parties and other events as well, and during World War II a key drive was held to obtain metal for the war effort.

Eventually, it was renamed the Majestic Theatre, a fitting name for the elevated place the theatre held in the community. Movies were shown there for many years, and plays were performed as well.

On the other side of the region, a new theatre opened around 1915. It was built by Karl Abbott and “Doc” Clark, according to “Open for the Season” a memoir by K. Abbott. The new entertainment venue was called The Colonial Theatre. It was built on a vacant lot in Bethlehem and opened for business on July 1, 1915. The first feature shown was Cecil B. DeMille’s “The Girl of The Golden West.”

Bethlehem was a good choice for the new theatre due to the town’s booming summer population. The area had many fine hotels that attracted wealthy vacationers. Thus, Hollywood moguls saw the theatre as a good place to premier new movies. They could test  market films to a sophisticated audience far away from Hollywood and get a reaction for each movie. It also brought entertainment to the town at a time when it was much appreciated.

After changing hands it was purchased by The Friends of the Colonial.

The Littleton Opera House is a fine example of late Victorian architecture and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973. It is situated on Main Street.

Completed in 1895, according to information at www.littletonareachamber.com, the building was used as a police station, library and other town offices. Part of the building was used as an opera house. It boasted a multi-galleried auditorium and could seat a large audience. Concerts and plays were held in the theatre section of the building, much to the delight of townspeople.

The Flying Monkey Movie House and Performance Center has been a bit part of downtown Plymouth for many years. When first opened in the 1920s, it was known as the New Plymouth Theater. Like many other opera houses and theatres in the White Mountains, it presented vaudeville and silent films. Many of its shows and movies were sold out, attracting locals for a few hours of entertainment.

Technology was evolving fast in the 1930s, and entertainment houses like the New Plymouth Theatre enjoyed some of those new devices. It was a state-of-the-art facility, with modern amenities like the “only Western Electric Mirrophonic Sound System” in the region, “air-cooling” and an inclined floor, with 700 comfortable upholstered seats…just for the cost of a 25 cent admission.

With changing times, the theatre was empty for quite some time until The Common Man family in New Hampshire purchased and renovated the theater in 2010, re-launching it as The Flying Monkey Movie House & Performance Center. 

Old-time opera houses and movie theatres brought entertainment and a taste of the outside world to New Hampshire’s north country and changed each town when entertainment arrived.