Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly - The Iceman Cometh: How Ice Transformed Our Lives

Episode Date: January 25, 2025

This week, we look at the marketing of ICE.It may sound like a strange topic, but our obsession with ice - as a product - is only 200 years old.The history of ice marketing starts with an amazing story about a bold entrepreneur with a vision, the cutthroat clash between competing ice companies, and the long list of ice brands and products that has transformed our lives.It's a remarkable story. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly. As you may know, we've been producing a lot of bonus episodes while under the influences on hiatus. They're called the Beetleology Interviews, where I talk to people who knew the beetles, worked with them, loved them, and the authors who write about them. Well, the Beetleology Interviews have become a hit, so we are spinning it out to be a standalone podcast series. You've already heard conversations with people like actress Mark Hamill, Malcolm McDowell

and Beatles confidant Astrid Kerscher. But coming up, I talked to Mae Pang who dated John Lennon in the mid 70s. I talked to double fantasy guitarist Earl Slick, Apple Records creative director John Kosh. I'll be talking to Jan Hayworth, who designed the Sgt. Pepper album cover. Very cool. And I'll talk to singer Dionne, who is one of only five people still alive who were on the Sgt. Pepper cover. And two of those people were Beatles. The stories they tell are amazing.

So thank you for making this series such a success. And please do me a favor. Follow the Beatleology interviews on your podcast app. You don't have to be a fan of the Beatles. amazing. So thank you for making this series such a success. And please do me a favor, follow the Beetleology interviews on your podcast app. You don't even have to be a huge Beatles fan. You just have to love storytelling. Subscribe now and don't miss a single beat. At OLG, we celebrate winning every day. That's because we make millions of sports and lottery winners across Ontario all year round. In the last year, we had more than 208 million winning tickets, and we gave away more than

$2.6 billion in prizes. That's a lot of winners and a lot of dreams that came true. At OLG, every winner has one thing in common. They played. Could you win next? Play in store or at olg.ca and bring home the win. Winner, Kenyon. A new year means a new start.

And if you really want to start the new year off right, treat yourself to a better sleep. A new year, a new mattress, a new you. The quality of your sleep affects everything. If you order a Douglas mattress today, you can claim your free comfort sleep bundle. It includes two memory foam pillows, a waterproof mattress protector, and an entire cotton sheet set. And on top of all that, you get 50% off a premium accessory. Still not convinced? Take advantage of the risk-free 365 night in-home trial. Douglas will ship you the mattress for free, try it for a year, and

if you don't love it, Douglas will pick the mattress up, send you a refund, and donate it for free. Canadian Living named it Canada's best mattress, and I couldn't agree more. We love our Douglas mattress. So do over 250,000 satisfied owners, made by Canadians for Canadians. Visit Douglasouglas.ca slash under the influence to take advantage of this offer, exclusive to Canadian listeners only. Douglas Mattress, Canada's best mattress. This is an Apostrophe Podcast production.

podcast production. What love doesn't conquer, Alka-Seltzer will. What a relief! You're under the influence of Terry O'Reilly. During the Great Depression, attendance at hockey games started to decline. So a Pittsburgh arena owner named John Harris decided to try something. He hired Olympic figure skater Sonja Henney to perform between periods during the games. It worked. Whenever Harris booked a figure skater to entertain during intermissions, more and more people came out to see the game. One day during a hockey intermission in 1940, Harris had an idea.

Why not create an ice carnival with figure skaters that could fill his arena during the hockey off-season. So Harris hired professional skaters, comedians, clowns, jugglers, barrel jumpers, and a long line of skating chorus girls. And together with nine other arena owners, he formed the Ice Capades. Harris dubbed the skating chorus girls the Ice Capades. Harris dubbed the skating chorus girls the Ice Capets. He structured the performances like a vaudeville show with an interesting mix of acts. Harris hired a 16-year-old figure skating champion to be the star of the show, promoting

her as the Queen of the Ice. She would begin each show performing a dramatic skating performance to a classical piece of music like Tchaikovsky. Then the fun would start, as the Ice Capets would file out and do rockette-like pinwheels at Center Ice. ["Center Ice"]

At first, reviewers were taken aback by the show. The sultry moves by the ice capets were eyebrow raising, and figure skating couples flirted and touched in ways that weren't acceptable on a ballroom dance floor. Reading the reviews, Harris toned it down and made sure it remained family-friendly. The clowns and the jugglers and the barrel jumpers made the entire show feel like a PG-rated Las Vegas review on ice. By 1952, the Ice Capades was a massive success

that toured throughout Canada and the United States. That year, Harris struck a deal with Disney that allowed the show to use Disney characters and music. The crowds swelled because Disneyland hadn't opened yet, and this was the first time fans could see their favorite characters in real life. The main attraction that year was an ice skating rendition of Cinderella, based on the film, which had been released two years earlier.

Soon, the ice capets were joined by a chorus of male counterparts called the Ice Cadets. There were adaptations of Broadway plays, funny storylines, and elaborate skating numbers that made use of many of the 150 people now working on the show. The Ice Capades became so popular that it dragged portable ice makers along to create ice surfaces in places where there was no ice, like baseball stadiums. The Ice Capades made Harris a rich man, eventually selling his

interest in the show for $5.5 million. Soon the Ice Capades had competition. The Ice Follies featured celebrity ice skaters and later Disney started its own version called Disney on Ice. and later Disney started its own version called Disney on Ice. Ironically, the Ice Capades created its own demise. It made figure skating so popular that people were now drawn to watching figure skating competitions on television, and the Olympic figure skating events became highly rated. As a result, fewer and fewer crowds felt the need to go to the Ice Capades to enjoy figure skating. After six decades of huge box office, the Ice Capades melted away in the 1990s. The ice capades only existed because of one specific thing.

Ice. Artificial ice, to be precise. Today we look at the marketing of ice. You may think it's an odd topic, but the history of ice and the way ice has been marketed has led to the birth of endless products. While man discovered fire some 400,000 plus years ago, our obsession with ice is less than 200 years old. And the history of ice is a story of a bold entrepreneur with a vision, a clash of ice

companies and a long list of brands that has transformed our lives. Not long ago, I read a terrific book titled Ice, From Mixed Drinks to Skating Rinks, A Cool History of a Hot Commodity, by author Amy Brady. It got me thinking about ice, the history of ice merchants, how ice was originally marketed, how it is sold, and how man-made ice led to a multitude of products that we take for granted today, products that could not exist without ice. In North America, our obsession with ice started in the 1800s. Back then, ice was a luxury.

It was difficult and dangerous to harvest from lakes, it was expensive to store, and only the rich could afford ice houses, so ice became known as white gold. It became a symbol of status. Enter a man named Frederick Tudor. Born to a wealthy Boston family in 1783, Frederick enjoyed the benefits of ice because the Tudors had servants and a large ice house. Each winter, those servants risked their lives by cutting 100-pound blocks of ice out of a nearby pond by hand using giant saws, then harnessed horses to pull the huge blocks onto land, then into the backs of wagons.

Dangerous backbreaking work. Frederick Tudor was the black sheep of the family. He quit school early and constantly chased get-rich-quick schemes, annoying his parents to no end. So his father sent Frederick and his brother on a months-long trip to Cuba, hoping the long voyage would give Frederick time to rethink his future.

When the ship reached Havana in the spring, the temperature was blistering, and the brothers didn't know how the spring, the temperature was blistering, and the brothers didn't know how to cope with the oppressive heat. Then spring turned into summer, and the temperatures became unbearable. Back home, they could cool themselves with ice, but there was no ice to be found in Cuba. Even the rum drinks were served warm. Eventually, the brothers sailed back to Boston.

As the ship pulled into the harbor, an interesting idea popped into Frederick's mind. He wondered, could you ship ice to hot climates? Don't go away. We'll be right back. Don't go away, we'll be right back. A new year means a new start. And if you really want to start the new year off right, treat yourself to a better sleep. A new year, a new mattress, a new you. The quality of your sleep affects everything. And if you order a Douglas mattress today, you can claim your free comfort sleep bundle.

It includes two memory foam pillows, a waterproof mattress protector, and an entire cotton sheet set. And on top of all that, you get 50% off a premium accessory. Still not convinced? Take advantage of the risk-free, 365 night in-home trial.

Douglas will ship you the mattress for free, try it for a year, and if you don't love it, Douglas will pick the mattress up, send you a refund, and donate it for free. Canadian Living named it Canada's best mattress, and I couldn't agree more. We love our Douglas mattress. So do over 250,000 satisfied owners.

Made by Canadians for Canadians. Visit Douglas.ca slash under the influence to take advantage of this offer. Exclusive to Canadian listeners only. Douglas mattress, Canada's best mattress. At OLG, we celebrate winning every day. best mattress. billion in prizes. That's a lot of winners and a lot of dreams that came true. At OLG, every winner has one thing in common. They played. Could you win next? Play in store or at olg.ca and bring home the win. Winner, Gagnon. In 1805, Frederick Tudor attracted some investors, bought a ship, and modified the ship's hold to prevent the ice from melting on a long journey.

He set sail for the tropics, loaded with 130 tons of ice cut from a Massachusetts pond, eventually landed on the Caribbean island of Martinique and began selling chunks of ice to the people there. The very next day, furious customers came running back to the ship, accusing Frederick of cheating them. They screamed that the ice they purchased had melted. In that moment, Frederick Tudor realized something. People in the tropics didn't know how to handle ice, use it, or store it. He had another epiphany

too. In order to succeed he couldn't just sell frozen water, he had to sell a lifestyle. And if his hunch was right, he would be rich. So Frederick went back to Boston, loaded up another ship with ice, and sailed to Cuba. Havana had a café culture, so he offered several pounds of ice to local baristas for free on the condition they allow him to demonstrate how to serve their drinks chilled. At first, customers were suspicious of drinks with ice floating in their cups, but once they tried the cool drink, they loved it.

Word spread and demand soared. This time, Frederick charged a steep price for the ice. He showed them how to store ice, then instigated step two of his strategy. Frederick Tudor told the baristas he would give them more ice for free if they would now allow him to demonstrate how to mix it with salt, fresh cream, and fruit to make ice cream. Soon ice cream became an obsession in Cuba. With that success, Frederick set his sights on the southern states, specifically New Orleans.

It was a major city, a busy trading port, and was blisteringly hot in the summer. He sent his brother with a shipload of ice to teach the bartenders there how to serve a cold cocktail. Frederick's entire ice load sold out in days. Soon the bartenders began to experiment with ice, learning how its shape and size could alter the taste of cocktails. They realized ice could be chipped or crushed or shaved. Frederick's ice would change the city forever. Today New Orleans is known around the world as the cradle of drinking culture. And it was only the beginning. ["The Star-Spangled Banner"]

While Frederick Tudor would one day die a wealthy man, he now had lots of rivals who employed fleets of ships and trains to transport their ice. With competition, the price of ice fell, so more people could afford it. They stored their ice in new contraptions called ice boxes. Those ice boxes transformed the public's relationship with food for all time. Prior to ice, people would salt their meat to keep it from spoiling. Fruits and vegetables rotted quickly.

But ice boxes kept food fresh, lowering the rate of food poisoning, and the country was suddenly healthier. ["The Star-Spangled Banner"] Meanwhile, in the mid-1800s, a doctor down in Florida named John Gori was treating patients for yellow fever and theorized that cooling their body temperatures could be a way to treat the ailment.

But Gori knew he would never be able to afford the amount of ice he required, so he created a rudimentary ice machine. It made the first mechanical ice, and it would change the world forever. Gori also knew that cold air falls, so he suspended a metal bed pan filled with ice from a hospital ceiling, drilled holes in the bottom, and opened a window to create a breeze. Within minutes, the room started to cool down. In effect, Gori had created the world's first air conditioner. He patented his idea in 1851, but was attacked in the press as a charlatan. Behind the scenes, it was the natural ice merchants mounting an aggressive campaign

against Gori's mechanical ice. It would take a decade before the man-made ice age would begin. As with any perishable commodity, time is the enemy. But with the ice industry flourishing, the world started to change. Items like seafood could now be packed in ice and shipped to distant cities. Fruits and vegetables could be ice-packed in transported long distances. As a result, scurvy was virtually eliminated. Breweries welcomed ice, as it allowed for year-round brewing for the first time.

Ice also allowed for apples to be shipped far and wide, and because even the poor could afford apples, they used apples to make everything from pies and pastries to breads. Apples became so prevalent in the U, the phrase, as American as apple pie, was born. In theaters, huge ice blocks were placed in front of large fans to cool the audiences. When the shows were popular in packed auditoriums, the fans worked harder and the ice blocks melted faster. This inspired critics to call hit shows blockbusters. As the ice industry boomed, it didn't take long for the business to become cutthroat.

Between 1880 and 1920, ice became one of the biggest industries in North America, employing 90,000 people, providing over 42 million tons of ice each year. As cities became more industrialized, rivers that ran through towns became polluted, so ice companies ventured further afield to cleaner lakes. All this competition created rivalries, specifically between companies that produced ice made by machines versus companies that still harvested ice out of frozen lakes.

Natural ice companies began an aggressive marketing campaign saying their ice was God-made and that artificial ice was blasphemous, made by man. But man-made ice would eventually win out because it wasn't seasonally dependent on winter. Around 1919, General Motors bought Frigidaire and began mass producing refrigerators. They didn't sell well at first. Like Frederick Tudor discovered, the public had to be sold on the idea of a refrigerated lifestyle before they could be sold on the idea of a refrigerated lifestyle before they could be sold refrigerators. Advertising promoted refrigerators as magic machines.

Put a little water into something called an ice cube tray and in a matter of minutes you had an endless supply of cubes even in the summer. Author Amy Brady revealed that ice companies did everything they could to discourage refrigerator sales because it would destroy their business, but it was to no avail. In the 1930s, General Electric began manufacturing even cheaper refrigerators.

Your kitchen can be especially wonderful if you get the new General Electric refrigerator home freezer combination. It's everything you ever dreamed about. Fridges drew more power than any other household appliance because they ran 24 hours a day. So the more Fridges GE sold, the greater its electrical profit. Don't go away. We'll be right back. At OLG, we celebrate winning every day. That's because we make millions of sports and lottery winners across Ontario all year round.

In the last year, we had more than 208 million winning tickets, and we gave away more than $2.6 billion in prizes. That's a lot of winnings. all year round. In the last year, we had more than 208 million winning tickets, and we gave away more than 2.6 billion dollars in prizes. That's a lot of winners, and a lot of dreams that came true. At OLG, every winner has one thing in common. They played. Could you win next? Play in-store or at olg.ca and bring home the win. Winner, Gagnon! the web. By the 1940s, ice companies began delivering blocks of ice to households, and icemen were as common as milkmen.

But icemen were a little more strapping. They would heave 50 pound ice blocks off their trucks and carry them up staircases and down narrow hallways. They were brawny and virile. And unlike milkmen who left their wares on the doorstep, icemen would enter homes when most husbands were at work, and a muscular iceman could set hearts aflutter. Eugene O'Neill's famous play, The Iceman Cometh,

originated from the running gag that salesmen would arrive home to find their wives in bed with the iceman. In the 1956 movie, The Girl Can't Help It, there is a scene where a curvy Jane Mansfield walks by an Iceman. And his 50 pound block of ice melts on the spot. When you stop to think about all the products and brands that were created as a result of man-made ice, it's staggering.

When automobile culture took off, the portable ice chest was invented. Today, we call them coolers. Artificial ice made indoor rinks possible, which led to the business of hockey. By 1931 the NHL had 10 franchises. Arenas became fancy with heating, padded seats, and concession stands that sold food and ice-filled drinks. In 1949, Frank Zamboni invented a machine that could re-coat the ice. He called it a Zamboni. Soon, it was repairing ice at the Winter Olympic Games. Today, there are about 2,800 indoor rinks in Canada.

And it's estimated there are over 550,000 hockey players, male and female, on the ice right now in Canada. Curling is said to have originated in Scotland in the 16th century. The first curling club in Canada opened its doors in Montreal in 1807. Today, Curling Canada boasts over 1,000 indoor curling clubs across the country. Next, the ice cream industry exploded. Have an ice cream festival at your house. Hundreds of flavors to choose from. Hundreds of ways to serve it. Serve ice cream on new way every day. Last year, ice cream companies churned out 1.3 billion gallons of ice cream.

The average Canadian eats about 4.5 liters of ice cream, the equivalent of 85 scoops. Americans eat 20 pounds of ice cream per year. But that's nothing compared to the consumption of ice at places like bars, restaurants, and hospitals. A typical restaurant needs to have 1.5 pounds of ice on hand for each guest. A typical salad bar requires 35 pounds or 15 kilograms of ice per cubic foot. The typical cocktail bar needs

1.3 kilograms or 3 pounds of ice per customer. When you think of how busy some bars are, you can only imagine how much ice they go through. Hospitals use ice for meals and medical purposes. They require 4.5 kg or 10 lbs of ice per patient per day. Not to mention the number of lives saved via transplants with delicate organs being transported packed in ice. Grocery stores require 13.6 kg or 30 lbs of ice per cubic foot display. 1.6 kilograms or 30 pounds of ice per cubic foot display. Prisons need 7 pounds per inmate per day. Hotels need 2.2 kilograms or 5 pounds per room. And there is usually an ice machine on every floor.

That's a whole lot of ice. Tim Horton says that icy drinks account for 40% of its beverage sales now. Its most popular product is the iced cap. Cold drinks account for 75% of Starbucks beverage sales. Last year, Starbucks founder Howard Schultz said, "'Cold' has taken over, and it has surprised the company. The younger the customer, the colder the drink order." Cold drinks can potentially reap bigger profits for coffee chains because they tend to cost more,

and customers often customize their cold drinks drinks which makes them even more expensive. Gas stations and convenience stores also sell a ton of ice by the bag. Have you ever looked closely at an ice cube? Generally speaking, it's clear at the top and cloudy down below. That's because ice freezes from the top down, pushing impurities to the bottom. Today, perfectly clear ice has become all the rage. Companies now specialize in making clear ice. Clear ice cubes don't only make a cocktail look more beautiful, they are also free from impurities and keep drinks colder for

longer periods of time. Mixologists and ice specialists have become very creative. They freeze things like edible flowers, mint leaves, and peppers inside $14 ice cubes. There is a long list of specialty cocktail ice providers that can etch ice cubes with a brand name or the name of the bar or an embossed logo. Cubes now come in all kinds of novelty shapes like skulls and pineapples. There is an international packaged ice association and its motto is, ice is food, which at first glance seems strange,

but then again, think of how much ice you consume over the course of a year. It's all come a long way from Frederick Tudor's original idea that ice could become a hot commodity. Ice is such a basic part of our lives, we rarely give it a second thought. Even though the use of year-round ice is relatively new, it has created endless industries, products and brands and has created entire marketing categories. In North America alone, we use over 360 billion pounds of ice per year. Ice isn't going

away, it's getting fancier and as temperatures increase, the demand for ice is increasing too. But some ice is going away. As author Amy Brady says in her insightful book, maybe in the future we'll have to send blocks of ice not to warm climates, but to ones that used to be cold. Ironically, people seek out ice to stay cool as the planet grows hotter. And, as the planet grows hotter, the natural ice that sparked the appetite for cool continues to disappear. Thanks to Frederick Tudor, we have become obsessed with ice. And that's a cold hard fact when you're under the influence.

I'm Terry O'Reilly. This episode was recorded in the TearStream Airstream mobile recording studio. Producer Debbie O'Reilly Chief Sound Engineer Jeff Devine Research Patrick James Aslan Under the Influence theme by Casey Pick, Jeremiah Pick and James Attengarden Tunes provided by APM Music Let's be social. Follow me at Terry O Influence. This podcast is powered by Acast.

Hey, want to read next week's fun fact? Just go to apostrophepodcasts.ca and follow the prompts. See you next week. Fun fact! Hi, this is Eileen from beautiful Brockville, Ontario. Ever wonder why ice floats? The reason is because ice is less dense than water. At OLG, we celebrate winning every day. That's because we make millions of sports and lottery

winners across Ontario all year round. In the last year, we had more than 208 million winning tickets, and we gave away more than $2.6 billion in prizes. That's a lot of winners, and a lot of dreams that came true. At OLG, every winner has one thing in common. They played. Could you win next? Play in store or at olg.ca and bring home the win. Winner, Kenyo. There you are, alone in your car, waiting at a red light.

Suddenly, there she is, pressed against your window, holding a homemade cardboard sign. Can you really tell what it says about her? Don't let homelessness assumptions get in the way of homelessness solutions. Go to canadacandoit.ca. Help the Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness.