The Ice Man

The Ice Man is Coming

It was a hot summer in 1940. Our family lived on the western edge of Decatur, Illinois, in what was then called a village. I was five years old and anxious to stand at the edge of the front ditch to watch for John, the ice man. My twin sisters Darlene and Marlene waited with me, as did my younger brother Danny and my baby sister Trudy.

            It was during the early days of electric refrigeration, and since our family was extremely poor, we didn’t have one of the new fangled contraptions. Mom had a wooden icebox that held a block of ice in the top. It was vented to the bottom of the box in such a way so as to keep food and milk partially cool, but never really cold. Milk would last only a couple of days in the icebox before it would spoil. Once it spoiled, Mom had to make clabbered milk biscuits with it, which Dad dearly loved.

            Ice man John worked for the Polar Ice Company down on Van Dyke Street. He drove a flatbed, horse-drawn wagon with huge rectangular chunks of ice on it. Mac was his big brown horse, and we loved old Mac almost as much as we loved John.

            Mom had a square, four-colored sign with a number facing up in the window for the size of the ice block she needed each time John delivered, which I believe was twice each week in our neighborhood. Each side of the sign was a different color so John could read it easily from the street. Mom could order a twenty-five, fifty, seventy-five, or one hundred pound block of ice from John, depending on how much ice in our ice box was still left that hadn’t melted yet. Most of the time Mom would order fifty pounds.

            As John and Mac pulled up next to our front yard, John would yell, “Whoa there Mac,” and Mac would stop still while John tended to his ice business. We waited anxiously as Mac pulled back the big canvas cover from the ice. Then he would look at us kids and say, “Does anybody here want a big chunk of ice to suck on?”

            We would all raise our hands and yell, “Yes,” as we gleefully danced around.

            John would pick off a large chunk for each of us kids with his big old ice pick, and then he would climb down from the wagon and hand the ice to us. He would then throw a big rubber cape over his back and pick up a big black set of ice tongs. He would grab the big chunk of ice that Mom had ordered with the tongs and sling it over his back and deliver Mom’s ice order into the house and place it in our icebox. The rubber cape kept the ice from getting John’s shirt wet. As he delivered the ice inside, we would all stand and talk with Mac, his big beautiful brown horse. John had cut ear holes in a large straw hat and fitted it to Mac’s big head to keep him cool while he stood and waited in the hot sun for his master to return.

            Once John had delivered Mom’s ice inside, he always asked us kids if we would like to pet old Mac. “Yes,” we all yelled in unison, and John would tell us to go ahead.

            One day John told us the next time he delivered to our house it would be Mac’s birthday. I ran in the house and begged Mom to bake Mac a birthday cake. Reluctantly she did bake a cake for us two days later, cutting off a large slice for us to feed to Mac when he came again. “You must ask John if Mac can have cake. It may not be good for him,” she warned.

            Sure enough, we stood at the edge of the ditch in our front yard and watched Mac and John come down the street. When John said, “Whoa there Mac,” I ran out and asked if we could give Mac a piece of his birthday cake. I held it in my hands on a napkin. John looked at it for a minute, and then he said, “Sure, why not? It is Mac’s birthday today. Sure. He would love the cake.” I held it out to Mac and he slurped it up and swallowed it whole. Danny, Marlene, Darlene, Trudy and I all sang “Happy Birthday” to Mac. It was great fun watching old Mac lick his chops to get all the icing.

We enjoyed seeing John and Mac for two summers, but then one day they never showed up at out house. I asked Mom, “Do you think John is sick, or do you think it is Mac?”

            “No honey,” Mom said, “John has gone off to heaven to be with the Lord. He won’t be able to come back to our house anymore. I’m so sorry.”

            “What about Mac? Will he get a new master?” I asked Mom.

            “No Sonny, Mac has been retired. He is very old and deserves his rest. He has worked very hard for many years. Your dad is getting us a refrigerator tomorrow from your grandma. We won’t need the ice any longer.”

            I was too young to realize that going to heaven meant that John had died. I’m not sure how long it was before my older friend Gene told me John died. I remember I told my brother and my sisters and we all cried.

            Dad and my Uncle Orville borrowed a truck from one of their friends and hauled the refrigerator from grandma’s house to our house. Grandpa had bought a brand new one for Grandma and she gave us her old one. It was a big white box with a great big round motor on top. It was very heavy, but Shelby, our neighbor, came over and helped my dad and my uncle Orville to get it in the house. Dad plugged it in and it started making a loud humming noise. Mom was standing there smiling because she was so glad to have the refrigerator.

            Mom was right; we never needed any ice after that. Mom could even make ice cubes in the new box. It was really great!

Paul R. Meredith

1982