Wednesday, March 12, 2014

Icebox


Norge.
Hotpoint.
Fridgidaire.
Can you remember other brands?
I was watching a movie from the '50's the other night and one of the characters referred to "The Icebox", then walked over and opened the door to a contraption that looked like the one pictured above.
That tweaked another memory from when we were kids-
It seemed every summer we'd hear about some poor kid playing "Hide and Seek" who had found the PERFECT hiding spot-
In the old Icebox one of the neighbors had taken out back and abandoned there. They'd pull the door closed and the latch would latch, and then the victim would find there was no way to push the door open from the inside. When the child didn't show up for dinner, authorities would go looking, only to find the child had suffocated in the cramped, overheated space.
Tragic.


I can remember at least two kids dying from suffocation this way.
As I delivered "The Indianapolis News" on my route, I can remember reading the pleas from officials to disable the latches on these old machines if you had one outside on your property.

And of course, the reason our new "Iceboxes" have doors that seal magnetically is a direct result of these tragedies.
Thank God.

Can you think of any other scenarios like this that have improved our appliances/tools?

9 comments:

Greybeard said...

Pilots frequently refer to ideas for engineering improvements having been "written in blood".
(Same, to a degree, with automobiles.)
The improvement in "Iceboxes" was written with the last breath of dozens (hundreds?) of small children.

Anonymous said...

I can remember my aunts and mamma having one of these. I also remember the horrible stories of kids dying in them. Shucks I can remember my granny having the real ice box that the ice man would drop off a block of ice every morning. The cook stove that was heated by wood and taking baths in a small round wash tub where the water was heated by some kind of a gadget mamma would put in the tub to heat the water or heat it on the wood burning stove. Bringing back some good memories. Also some bad when we had to go outside to the out building to go to the bathroom in cold weather and hoping no snakes where in the outhouse. I could go on and on about my memories in the hills of Tennessee. Thanks for bringing back the memories. Carol

Anonymous said...

Looks like the article on REFRIG was not very popular. Seems to me this column is dying.

Greybeard said...

I think you're right, "Anonymous".
It's dying because one person is doing all the writing/work, and too many "anonymous" folks are out there lurking, not writing "columns".

Anonymous said...

How long do we have to look at the "Refrig" picture? Surely someone has an article that can be written..

Greybeard said...

Anon-
Put your fingers to your keyboard.

Anonymous said...

04-02-14
<>One of the first things I do each morning from the internet is to read “Vandy's Kids”. Since things are going very slowly I will try writing in Vandy's Kids.
<>After I did my student teaching at Center Grove in the high school subjects of Civics and Geometry in spring of 1957 I thanked Mr. Loren “Woody” Wilson, supervising principal, for allowing me to student teach at C.G. He then asked me if I wanted to teach there in the fall. I told him that I would think about it. After conferring with other former teachers and friends I later told Mr. Wilson that I would be happy to teach at Center Grove.
<>In the fall when school began I was one of new three six grade teachers. The sixth grade teachers were Mr. Willard Hillenburg, Mrs. Betty Hicks, and myself. My class of 20 boys was in the tunnel by the football dressing room, later in the football dressing room, then in the middle building. I think Mrs. Hicks' class was a room in the high school, and Mr. Hllenburg's class was in the middle building. The second year we were all in the middle building.
<>My first teaching job I was so excited and ready to get started until Alva Surface, custodian, showed me my classroom earlier in the week, no desk, large table, chair, and 20 student desks in the tunnel. I accepted the challenge, and the classroom did not make the student I was thinking.
<>The second year I had a classroom in the middle building with about 50 kids. What a jump of kids to teach I thought.
<>The third and fourth years I was in a brand new classroom in the elementary school with the class sizes of about 32 and 36.
<>What I learned:
**I was not married so I had plenty of time to learn and prepare for the subjects I would teach.
**Individual differences.
**Have fun while teaching.
**Always be prepared for the unexpected
**Allow for classroom changes
**I learned subject material for myself as well as the kids did. This I can truly say I went back to basic education that I had not been exposed since my elementary education. Besides I studied to teach junior and senior high school at Franklin College. Thanks to them later what I was exposed those four years helped me in my future teaching.
<>I had few discipline problems these four years. The worse thing was catching students chewing gum.
<>We had fun in our education endeavors.
<>I really liked teaching in the self contained classroom instead of what they do today, moving the kids from room to room. In a self contained classroom you get to learn the kids so well in every way. They would say things in class that they would not say in the upper classes. Each class to me became family. The parents backed me.
<>After my first year, the elementary principal died, Mr. Clashman, and he was replaced by my former math teacher at Franklin High School and mentor, Mr. Otto J. Sloop, Sn. I really enjoyed him being my principal, and of course, Mr. Wilson, was the greatest person in his position in my teaching career.
<>In closing these four classes were very dear to me. They were like family. I still hear from several former students. From my 38.5 years of teaching these 4 years of teaching these four classes were definitely special kids and classes in my life as an educator. From what I learned from them I used with the students that would sit in front of me. The sad thing is that I now read the obits and find many listed.
<>The administration of C.G. said it was time for me to teach in the middle school with my subjects being math and social studies. You see I taught those six graders on a temporary permit.
<>I went to the middle school now housed in the middle building teaching math and social studies, then my last year at Center Grove I was moved in the new part of the high school where the middle school students were moved.
<>My heart will always be part of my seven years teaching at Center Grove, and all the students, faculty, and administrators that were part of my early career. Thanks Center Grove,
WCL

Anonymous said...

The above brought back alot of my memories from those days, wcl. Thanks.....

Anonymous said...

Dear WCL,
Enjoyed reading your post about teaching at CG. I was so fortunate to be one of your students in 6th grade. Loved our classroom in that old middle building AND you as my teacher. If it were not for you I would have never learned what nouns, verbs, adjectives were and loved your classroom every day. I remember wishing that you would be our teacher in 7th grade too! So good to hear from you because I have been thinking about you. Hope all is well with you. From your curly haired student, Kathy Rainey Willman