60 WINTER FIELD MEETING. 



more as a reserve than as a source of regular supply, owing 

 to the lack of proper terminal facilities for the loading of 

 vessels. 



In 1859 the Eastern Rail Road Company furnished good 

 wharf accommodations at East Boston and up to 1867 the 

 property was "worked" every year, excepting when the 

 crop failed. 



In 1866 some of the original houses were taken down 

 and modern ones erected : at the same time, steam hoist- 

 ing power was adopted in lieu of the old fashioned method 

 of filling by horse power ; the intention being not only to 

 increase the storage capacity, but to make the crop more 

 certain by housing the Ice by steam, three times as fast 

 as it was possible to do by horse power. These improve- 

 ments were hardly completed when the Eastern Rail Road 

 Company raised the freight charge to such a point that 

 the ice could not be shipped at a profit, with an ordinary 

 market. 



On the night of November 9, 1873, the first anniver- 

 sary of the Boston fire, the houses, containing 35,000 

 tons of superior ice, housed the previous winter, together 

 with the hoisting machinery, were totally destroyed by 

 fire ; without doubt incendiary. 



The freight charge still being as established in 1866, 

 no attempt was made to rebuild with any view to perma- 

 nency. Late in 1876, however, the management of the 

 Eastern Railroad, recognizing the importance of the Ice 

 business, made such a proposition, as to induce the com- 

 pany again to utilize the property. A permanent eleva- 

 tor and temporary houses were at once erected and were 

 ready for the crop of 1877 which proved to be a full one, 

 as did those of 1879 and 1881. The crop of 1878 was 

 less than one-half the average yield while that of 1880 

 was a total failure, a circumstance which seems to have 



