Harvesting Maine's 'White Gold'

Frozen in Time: The Kennebec's Golden Age of Ice

Commercial ice harvesting in Maine lasted for over a century, with its greatest output between 1870 and 1920.

The painting below, Ice Harvest on the Kennebec River, represents a time when cutting and selling ice was becoming one of Maine’s largest industries.

Oil painting, Ice Harvest on the Kennebec River, about 1870, artist unknown, MSM 2006.18.1

The painting shows a laborer sawing ice with a hand saw while another ice worker uses a busting bar to break off cakes of ice. In the background, canalmen are “feeding the chain,” using pick poles to guide the floating ice cakes to the steam-powered ice elevator for storage inside the ice house.

Kennebec River ice was known for its quantity and quality. At a time when many rivers across the country were becoming polluted, Maine ice was marketed as the coldest and cleanest. The Kennebec River dominated the ice industry in Maine, providing more than half of the total statewide export.

By 1886, shipments of ice from the Kennebec topped the million-ton mark and stayed over a million for the next decade. Most of this ice was sold in cities along the U.S. Atlantic coast.

In the 20th century, the growth of electricity and new refrigeration technology contributed to the decline of commercial ice harvesting.

This photo from February 1899 shows the Great Falls ice house in South Gardiner and teams of “groovers” cutting gridlines in the river's ice. The giant ice house could hold 45,000 tons of ice, which would be stored until sailing vessels arrived in spring and summer to pick up the frozen cargo and deliver it to cities along the eastern seaboard. The Great Falls ice house burned down on June 22,1907. From a glass plate negative by Herman Bryant, MSM 96.38.182