Title	Ice Tongs
Subject	Business and Labor Ice industry Ice Equipment Daily Life
Place	Sandusky (Ohio) Erie County (Ohio)
Description	These ice tongs used to carry ice harvested from Lake Erie to ice houses, ice wagons, and customer's homes. They are approximately 24" (60.96 cm) tall. Before refrigeration, ice harvesting was a major industry in Sandusky. Its location on Lake Erie and Sandusky Bay made ice harvesting a fruitful occupation, despite the danger involved. Workers often suffered broken limbs from accidents on the ice, and some drowned after falling into the open channels that formed where the ice had been cut. As many as a thousand men spent their winters harvesting ice in Sandusky, providing a means of cold storage throughout the year. Icehouses, where harvested ice was stored, were common along the Lake Erie shoreline. Ice was shipped throughout the region, as far away as Cincinnati. There were about 25 ice harvesting businesses in Sandusky, shipping 200,000 tons of ice per season to southern locations. Among the more prominent ice business in Sandusky were Consumer's Ice, Wagner Ice, Sandusky Lake Ice, and People's Ice Company. Locally, ice was delivered by horse-drawn ice wagons to businesses and homes that had iceboxes.
Date of Original	1890s circa
Collection	Ice Industry Collection
Source	Historical object(s) or artifact(s);
Submitting Institution	Sandusky Library/Follett House Museum
Rights	Online access is provided for research purposes only. For rights and reproduction requests or more information, go to http://www.ohiohistory.org/images/information.
Type	StillImage
File Name	Om232_1026548_018.tif
Image Height	3008
Image Width	1960
File Size	505.718 KB
Searchable Date	1890; *
Format	picture objects

Ice Tongs

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