And you thought you knew ice

 kw book reviews, nonfiction, sociology, ice, fads and fashions

In a canny plan quite the opposite of "carrying coals to Newcastle" (a coal mining district in England, for GenX and younger), Frederic Tudor carried ice to the tropics. Beginning in 1801, he persuaded first one of his brothers, and later another, to help him scope out Cuba and other locations at which to sell ice. As told in ICE: From Mixed Drinks to Skating Rinks—a Cool History of a Hot Commodity, by Amy Brady, things went badly, time and time again, until the Tudor brothers had a brainstorm: Bring ice to saloons in Havana and show bartenders how to produce really cold (and really cool) cocktails. Can you imagine a warm Martini or Old-fashioned? At the time, nobody in Cuba could imagine anything else. That would soon change.

Americans in the New England colonies had been harvesting ice from ponds for a few generations, and ice houses could keep some of it frozen well through the summer. The last century or so of the Little Ice Age helped. Thoreau wrote of ice harvesters working on Walden Pond in 1846. A century earlier, George Washington's favorite dessert was ice cream, made from ice kept in the Mount Vernon ice house after being harvested nearby. One cannot harvest ice in Virginia any more; the Little Ice Age ended about the time President Washington died. It's still possible to harvest ice in Massachusetts, in colder winters.

By 1806 the alcohol-fueled revolution in the use of New England ice in warmer climes, from the Caribbean to New Orleans to the mid-Atlantic, had triggered the Ice Trade. In 14 illuminating chapters, ICE details the development of the Ice Trade through several incarnations. Mechanical refrigeration using compression and expansion of gases and gas-liquid-gas phase transitions was the subject of experiments from about 1755 to 1850, and the first commercial ice-making machines were sold in about 1865. Fast-forward another century, and the households of America were well on their way to having, if not always "a chicken in every pot", a "Frigidaire in every kitchen".

Today manufactured coldness is a requirement. Ice in our drinks. Ice to skate on. Ice in a cloth bag to soothe sore muscles and tendons. Snow machines on ski slopes for dry winters. Supercold coolers to transfer vaccines. Dry ice (-109°F or -78.5°C) to make vapor for parties, chill organs being transferred between hospitals, and suffocate rats in their nests. Liquid helium (-452°F or -269°C) for the superconducting magnets in MRI machines and giant "colliders" (we used to call them atom smashers).

When I was a child we called refrigerators "ice boxes", and in some parts of the country people still had ice boxes and regular visits from the iceman to deliver a 50- or 100-lb block of manufactured ice. The last time I saw an ice box in use was in the 1950's. Reading ICE was a nostalgic indulgence for me.

Something the book doesn't touch on, but a fun fact nonetheless: from time to time we hear of the "ice death of the Universe." The actual background temperature of the Universe is 2.7K (-270°C or -455°F), colder than liquid helium. However, "stuff" is spread out so thin that there are still billions of galaxies full of billions of stars that harbor temperatures of millions of degrees, and innumerable planets with temperatures ranging from a couple of hundred degrees below zero (but still hundreds of degrees warmer than 2.7K) up to thousands of degrees, where matter begins to break down into plasma. We are a long way from all of it chilling. But, as the Norse predicted, if physics is allowed to have its way for a few more trillion or quadrillion years, ice will win. Then Ragnarok, the victory of the Ice Giants, will finally occur.

The ice arrives - whew!

kw: local events, current events, weather phenomena, ice

Considering that an inch of ice has blanketed the Dallas area, that close to a meter of snow has hit Chicago, the half-centimeter of ice we got overnight, where I live south of Philadelphia, is a huge relief. This pic shows the dogwood tree in my back yard, taken at 5:30 this morning.

I came in to work early to avoid traffic on the road, but found that the roads were still warm enough to be wet rather than slick. Whew! The last time there was ice in this area that stuck to the roads was, I am told, the year before we moved here, in 1994.

The worst ice I've seen was in 1984 when I lived in South Dakota. There was an inch on almost everything. Tree branches that managed to stay on the trees looked like two-inch (5cm) silvery sausages. It was too slick to walk—I practically crawled to the car—but I drove anyway and of course got in a crash. At 10 mph I still did $1,000 damage to my car.

Today, the temperature is supposed to reach 40°F (4°C) or more, and as the rain continues, wash all the ice away. Now that it is pushing 6:30 I'd better get some work done.

Snow day, sequel

kw: weather, snow, ice

The radio shows this morning are full of talk about the snowstorm yesterday morning. It seems the President's girls also had the day off, and people are echoing his "learn from Chicago" ribbing. I'd be tempted to join in, but really, this isn't New England. Washington, DC was built on a subtropical swamp. It is just far enough north that it gets at least some snow most winters.

I've been there a few times in winter, and the problem is just its mid-Atlantic location. It is cold enough to get snow, but not cold enough to keep snow in solid form. Snow in the mid-Atlantic region quickly turns to slush, which is much more treacherous. The icy rain that fell on yesterday's snow made it that much worse.

A couple hours north of DC, where I live, I could get around by taking it slow. I knew before I started that I'd be late at work, and decided that was OK. The troubles on the roads were caused by people's impatience. It seems the most impatient people have a blind spot about weather. They don't plan ahead so as to have extra time, so they get twice as impatient with the slower drivers (like me) who did. I'm glad I didn't get rear-ended, but then, I drove at a time with less traffic, on the better-kept roads.

A reminder to everyone driving a four-wheel-drive vehicle: it is easier to get into trouble, because you have a false sense of security. Every vehicle has four-wheel stopping, so you actually have no advantage, there.

Snow day

kw: weather, snow, ice

For the schoolkids in the area, today was a snow day. Only one or two companies called the day off, and a few others started late. The rest kept their usual schedules. People in this area mostly seem to do OK, but some need to learn how to drive on snow or ice.

In 1978 I moved from California to South Dakota, where I lived eight years. There, snow is treated as a sediment, like a slightly evil form of sand. Most places, the road surface is left a bit knobbly, and the snow bonds to it when it is warmer (above 0°F), and just loosely packs into the crevices when it is cold. When it is -20°F (-29°C) or colder, it is too cold to snow much, so the typical blizzard will blow in with a half inch (about a cm) of powder, which will blow from here to there until the next thaw.

When I moved to Oklahoma, I soon became the designated winter driver in my carpool. Now, in the Delaware Valley, I don't carpool, or I'd probably also be the main winter driver. There is something to be said for having this attitude: snow is something you pack down and drive on.

Now, Ice is another matter. I've had one auto accident since my teen years, and it was caused by ice. This morning's ice is a good deal more risky than the snow, but fortunately, the main roads I drive on to get to work are all free of ice. They had enough traffic during the overnight storm to keep them from icing up badly. My main problem was keeping fresh ice from forming on my windshield. It sure is nice living only three miles from work. I could just poke along without making myself too late. This hasn't been bad for the first real winter storm of the season.