1 00:00:01,160 --> 00:00:04,120 Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you missed in History Class from how 2 00:00:04,160 --> 00:00:14,800 Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcomed the podcast. I'm 3 00:00:14,880 --> 00:00:19,200 Speaker 1: Tracy V. Wilson and I'm Holly Frying. Most of the 4 00:00:19,239 --> 00:00:23,239 Speaker 1: profiles of Frederick Tudor that are floating around the web 5 00:00:23,920 --> 00:00:27,440 Speaker 1: some of his story like this. In the early nineteenth century, 6 00:00:27,480 --> 00:00:30,720 Speaker 1: he noticed that one thing Massachusetts had a lot of 7 00:00:30,800 --> 00:00:33,760 Speaker 1: in the wintertime was ice, and so he hatched a 8 00:00:33,840 --> 00:00:37,320 Speaker 1: clever plan that in cold weather he would harvest that 9 00:00:37,400 --> 00:00:39,680 Speaker 1: ice for really cheap, and then he would sell it 10 00:00:39,760 --> 00:00:42,479 Speaker 1: all around the world when it was hot, single handedly 11 00:00:42,560 --> 00:00:47,080 Speaker 1: turning ice into a commodity and becoming fastly wealthy in 12 00:00:47,080 --> 00:00:51,680 Speaker 1: the process. Uh. As so often happens with our show, 13 00:00:52,000 --> 00:00:54,880 Speaker 1: it is way more complicated than that, beginning with the 14 00:00:54,920 --> 00:00:57,160 Speaker 1: fact that it was not even his idea in the 15 00:00:57,240 --> 00:01:01,120 Speaker 1: first place. Like I, I saw articles and a lot 16 00:01:01,200 --> 00:01:06,240 Speaker 1: of I mean, generalist publications, mainstream stuff, but all repeating 17 00:01:06,319 --> 00:01:10,959 Speaker 1: the idea that this was his idea. But it wasn't. Uh. 18 00:01:11,040 --> 00:01:13,319 Speaker 1: He also didn't do it alone. He had a lot 19 00:01:13,400 --> 00:01:17,560 Speaker 1: of help from things like tax incentives and economic systems 20 00:01:17,560 --> 00:01:21,720 Speaker 1: that ultimately skewed things in his financial favor. So we 21 00:01:21,760 --> 00:01:25,080 Speaker 1: are going to look at that more complicated story than 22 00:01:25,680 --> 00:01:28,119 Speaker 1: is often in the one page right up today. Yeah, 23 00:01:28,200 --> 00:01:30,160 Speaker 1: he really doesn't. I mean I haven't had not read 24 00:01:30,160 --> 00:01:32,119 Speaker 1: a lot about him, but he really does. Usually get 25 00:01:32,160 --> 00:01:35,920 Speaker 1: lauded as like this really insightful idea man who took 26 00:01:35,959 --> 00:01:38,000 Speaker 1: this one concept and ran with it, and wasn't he 27 00:01:38,040 --> 00:01:42,959 Speaker 1: an entrepreneur And it's like, oh, yeah, apart from that, 28 00:01:43,120 --> 00:01:46,920 Speaker 1: we're going to talk about some other issues. Yeah, uh so. 29 00:01:47,080 --> 00:01:51,960 Speaker 1: Frederick Tudor was from a prominent Boston family. His father, William, 30 00:01:52,000 --> 00:01:54,880 Speaker 1: had gone to Harvard, had studied law under John Adams, 31 00:01:55,240 --> 00:01:58,040 Speaker 1: and had been in George Washington's Continental Army during the 32 00:01:58,080 --> 00:02:02,720 Speaker 1: Revolutionary War, including Irving as its judge advocate, and after 33 00:02:02,760 --> 00:02:06,600 Speaker 1: marrying Frederick's mother, Delia Jarvis, in seventeen seventy eight, he 34 00:02:06,720 --> 00:02:09,000 Speaker 1: left the army to set up a law office, and 35 00:02:09,040 --> 00:02:11,680 Speaker 1: he would also go on to serve in the Massachusetts 36 00:02:11,760 --> 00:02:16,680 Speaker 1: legislature and as Secretary of the Commonwealth. William and Delia 37 00:02:16,800 --> 00:02:21,160 Speaker 1: had six surviving children between seventeen seventy nine and seventeen 38 00:02:21,240 --> 00:02:25,600 Speaker 1: ninety one, and Frederick was born on September four, sevree. 39 00:02:26,200 --> 00:02:30,160 Speaker 1: Their family was comfortable, but it wasn't really until seventeen 40 00:02:30,240 --> 00:02:34,880 Speaker 1: ninety six, when William's father died that they became truly wealthy. 41 00:02:35,080 --> 00:02:37,880 Speaker 1: William inherited in a state that was worth about forty 42 00:02:37,880 --> 00:02:42,720 Speaker 1: thou dollars, which was a lot of money at the time. Uh. 43 00:02:43,040 --> 00:02:45,200 Speaker 1: I didn't try to translate them and to did it 44 00:02:45,280 --> 00:02:49,320 Speaker 1: today's dollars, because that is always it's tricky, and it's 45 00:02:49,360 --> 00:02:51,440 Speaker 1: there's never really a one to one way to do it. 46 00:02:52,000 --> 00:02:55,720 Speaker 1: There's really not. It's really like throwing just the dartboard 47 00:02:55,880 --> 00:02:58,720 Speaker 1: at some dollar signs and landing on something. It's it 48 00:02:58,880 --> 00:03:03,000 Speaker 1: was a lot of money, though, um. And at that 49 00:03:03,040 --> 00:03:06,760 Speaker 1: point he retired from law and became a gentleman of leisure, 50 00:03:07,320 --> 00:03:10,000 Speaker 1: that's the dream, I mean, gentleman of leisure while also 51 00:03:10,040 --> 00:03:11,960 Speaker 1: being in the state legislature and stuff. But he didn't 52 00:03:12,000 --> 00:03:16,359 Speaker 1: work as a full time job anymore. And the Tutors 53 00:03:16,360 --> 00:03:20,280 Speaker 1: were also an active part of Boston society, and Delia 54 00:03:20,520 --> 00:03:23,200 Speaker 1: was so charming and charismatic that she was something of 55 00:03:23,200 --> 00:03:27,080 Speaker 1: a local celebrity. Although the word would not be coined 56 00:03:27,120 --> 00:03:30,040 Speaker 1: until eighteen sixty. The Tutor family was part of the 57 00:03:30,040 --> 00:03:33,680 Speaker 1: Boston upper class known as the Boston Brahmins. Just co 58 00:03:33,800 --> 00:03:36,120 Speaker 1: opting the word from the highest rank of the cast 59 00:03:36,200 --> 00:03:39,840 Speaker 1: system in India. Yet to be clear that word existed 60 00:03:39,880 --> 00:03:42,720 Speaker 1: in India far longer than eighteen sixty, but it was 61 00:03:42,760 --> 00:03:46,920 Speaker 1: in eighteen sixty that people started applying it to uh 62 00:03:47,240 --> 00:03:52,000 Speaker 1: influential rich people in Boston. For the most part, Frederick's 63 00:03:52,000 --> 00:03:55,000 Speaker 1: siblings started off following the paths that would have been 64 00:03:55,040 --> 00:03:58,440 Speaker 1: expected of the children of such a family. His brothers 65 00:03:58,520 --> 00:04:02,240 Speaker 1: William Jr. John, and Henry all went to Harvard, and 66 00:04:02,360 --> 00:04:06,320 Speaker 1: his sisters Emma and Delia married a wealthy landowner and 67 00:04:06,400 --> 00:04:11,640 Speaker 1: a prominent navy officer, respectively, although Delia didn't marry until 68 00:04:11,640 --> 00:04:13,840 Speaker 1: the age of twenty six, and that marriage was rocky 69 00:04:13,960 --> 00:04:17,599 Speaker 1: and ultimately ended in a messy divorce which could have 70 00:04:17,680 --> 00:04:23,040 Speaker 1: been its own podcast, a lot of drama and possibly espionage. 71 00:04:23,440 --> 00:04:28,440 Speaker 1: Nice uh. Frederick, though, was having none of his family's expectations. 72 00:04:29,000 --> 00:04:32,200 Speaker 1: At thirteen, while his parents were on a European tour 73 00:04:32,320 --> 00:04:35,440 Speaker 1: that they could finally afford to take, he left school 74 00:04:35,560 --> 00:04:39,440 Speaker 1: and he apprenticed himself at a store. His brother William, 75 00:04:39,440 --> 00:04:42,479 Speaker 1: who graduated from Harvard that same year, thought this was 76 00:04:42,520 --> 00:04:46,200 Speaker 1: an absolute disgrace. Frederick, on the other hand, thought Harvard 77 00:04:46,279 --> 00:04:49,400 Speaker 1: was for layabouts, something he would confirm for himself a 78 00:04:49,400 --> 00:04:52,440 Speaker 1: few years later when he visited another brother there and 79 00:04:52,480 --> 00:04:56,320 Speaker 1: found his roommate Washington Allston's art stuff all over the room. 80 00:04:57,279 --> 00:05:00,520 Speaker 1: Is a side note. Washington Alston was an influential Romantic 81 00:05:00,600 --> 00:05:04,640 Speaker 1: landscape painter. He studied at the Royal Academy of Art 82 00:05:04,760 --> 00:05:09,159 Speaker 1: and Allston, Massachusetts, which is a neighborhood uh is named 83 00:05:09,160 --> 00:05:12,640 Speaker 1: after him. I would not really call him a lay about. 84 00:05:12,839 --> 00:05:20,800 Speaker 1: Frederick Tutor's perspective lazy. Yeah. So, Frederick's whole argument in 85 00:05:20,920 --> 00:05:24,360 Speaker 1: leaving school was that this apprenticeship was going to afford 86 00:05:24,400 --> 00:05:27,560 Speaker 1: him a much better education, but he didn't stick with 87 00:05:27,600 --> 00:05:30,080 Speaker 1: it for very long, and with his parents still out 88 00:05:30,120 --> 00:05:32,880 Speaker 1: of the country, he went to the family's country estate 89 00:05:32,920 --> 00:05:36,800 Speaker 1: of Rockwood, which is northeast of Boston. In spite of 90 00:05:36,839 --> 00:05:40,440 Speaker 1: this whole argument about Harvard being for idlers, he spent 91 00:05:40,520 --> 00:05:44,080 Speaker 1: the next few years somewhat lazily. He did do some 92 00:05:44,120 --> 00:05:47,440 Speaker 1: work on the farm at Rockwood, but not particularly strenuously, 93 00:05:47,920 --> 00:05:51,400 Speaker 1: and more of it was about experimenting with agricultural techniques 94 00:05:51,520 --> 00:05:54,760 Speaker 1: than about putting a serious effort into making it productive. 95 00:05:55,640 --> 00:05:59,040 Speaker 1: He also hunted and read and dabbled in various investments. 96 00:06:00,040 --> 00:06:03,760 Speaker 1: In eighteen o one, when he was seventeen, Frederick accompanied 97 00:06:03,800 --> 00:06:07,040 Speaker 1: his brother John on a trip to Cuba. John had 98 00:06:07,080 --> 00:06:11,159 Speaker 1: been advised to go recover someplace warm following a serious 99 00:06:11,240 --> 00:06:15,480 Speaker 1: knee injury, and since Frederick's business deals had included trading 100 00:06:15,520 --> 00:06:19,800 Speaker 1: molasses and cigars out of Havana, the tutors already had 101 00:06:19,839 --> 00:06:23,880 Speaker 1: some contacts there. But John's condition didn't improve, and soon 102 00:06:23,960 --> 00:06:27,080 Speaker 1: they were back in the United States. They crossed paths 103 00:06:27,120 --> 00:06:30,720 Speaker 1: with their mother and brother William near Philadelphia, which is 104 00:06:30,760 --> 00:06:34,720 Speaker 1: where John died on January eighteen o two, and by 105 00:06:34,760 --> 00:06:37,360 Speaker 1: that point Frederick and William had already gone back home. 106 00:06:38,480 --> 00:06:41,720 Speaker 1: Back in Boston, Frederick started working in the offices of 107 00:06:41,800 --> 00:06:46,640 Speaker 1: Major William B. Sullivan. He wasn't exactly working for the major. 108 00:06:46,760 --> 00:06:49,359 Speaker 1: It was more like Sullivan's office was his home base, 109 00:06:49,839 --> 00:06:53,400 Speaker 1: where he took no salary and invested in whatever seemed 110 00:06:53,440 --> 00:06:56,520 Speaker 1: like it might turn a profit, still not with any 111 00:06:56,520 --> 00:07:00,760 Speaker 1: particular dedication, and once he turned twenty one, Frederick's father 112 00:07:00,880 --> 00:07:03,040 Speaker 1: set him up with a business of his own, where 113 00:07:03,120 --> 00:07:06,640 Speaker 1: at first he kept doing the same basic thing, investing 114 00:07:06,720 --> 00:07:11,280 Speaker 1: and trading in various odds and ends. Frederick finally found 115 00:07:11,320 --> 00:07:14,760 Speaker 1: something to take seriously. In the summer of eighteen oh five, 116 00:07:15,320 --> 00:07:19,240 Speaker 1: g noting after his sister Emma's wedding to Robert Hallowell Gardner, 117 00:07:19,600 --> 00:07:22,840 Speaker 1: the family was at a party at Rockwood, enjoying drinks 118 00:07:22,880 --> 00:07:25,160 Speaker 1: that were chilled with ice that had been cut from 119 00:07:25,200 --> 00:07:27,840 Speaker 1: their pond the previous winter and then stored in the 120 00:07:27,880 --> 00:07:32,840 Speaker 1: ice house for the summer. Frederick's brother William casually remarked 121 00:07:32,880 --> 00:07:36,040 Speaker 1: that people in the West Indies would probably love such 122 00:07:36,080 --> 00:07:39,960 Speaker 1: a luxury. This was not a serious statement at all. 123 00:07:40,240 --> 00:07:44,000 Speaker 1: The very idea was absurd. Cutting ice in the winter 124 00:07:44,120 --> 00:07:46,360 Speaker 1: and storing it in an ice house for the summer 125 00:07:46,440 --> 00:07:50,200 Speaker 1: was common for New England. Families of means and societies 126 00:07:50,200 --> 00:07:52,800 Speaker 1: with access to ice have been storing it for later 127 00:07:52,880 --> 00:07:56,440 Speaker 1: use since antiquity. But loading ice onto a ship and 128 00:07:56,520 --> 00:07:59,680 Speaker 1: sending it thousands of miles away and to the tropics 129 00:08:00,080 --> 00:08:03,080 Speaker 1: was a ludicrous idea. Not only did it seem like 130 00:08:03,080 --> 00:08:06,600 Speaker 1: the ice would just melt on the way, but pirates, privateers, 131 00:08:06,680 --> 00:08:09,720 Speaker 1: and the navies of multiple nations that were variously at 132 00:08:09,720 --> 00:08:12,160 Speaker 1: war with each other all had chips in the waters 133 00:08:12,160 --> 00:08:15,920 Speaker 1: in the Caribbean. The islands themselves were also seeing their 134 00:08:15,920 --> 00:08:20,440 Speaker 1: share of unrest. Slave uprisings were an ongoing occurrence, and 135 00:08:20,720 --> 00:08:23,360 Speaker 1: recent years had seen the Second Maroon War in Jamaica 136 00:08:23,720 --> 00:08:29,000 Speaker 1: as well as the Haitian Revolution, but Frederick Tutor latched 137 00:08:29,080 --> 00:08:34,160 Speaker 1: onto his brother's offhand, not serious comment as his next 138 00:08:34,240 --> 00:08:38,320 Speaker 1: big venture, along with claiming that it was his own idea. 139 00:08:39,160 --> 00:08:43,640 Speaker 1: Later on, his insistence that he and not William, had 140 00:08:43,679 --> 00:08:46,640 Speaker 1: thought up the whole thing would lead to a severe 141 00:08:46,800 --> 00:08:50,400 Speaker 1: falling out with Robert Gardner, who basically told the truth 142 00:08:50,480 --> 00:08:54,560 Speaker 1: when somebody asked him about it. Frederick never forgave him, 143 00:08:54,720 --> 00:08:58,200 Speaker 1: even though Robert and William Jr. Both insisted that it 144 00:08:58,280 --> 00:09:01,240 Speaker 1: just didn't matter who had thought of it first, since 145 00:09:01,280 --> 00:09:05,560 Speaker 1: Frederick was the person who actually made it happen. And 146 00:09:05,600 --> 00:09:08,040 Speaker 1: we're going to get into the details of how Frederick 147 00:09:08,120 --> 00:09:10,640 Speaker 1: started to build an ice business, but first we're gonna 148 00:09:10,640 --> 00:09:16,000 Speaker 1: pause for a moment and have a little sponsor break. 149 00:09:20,120 --> 00:09:24,520 Speaker 1: On August one, eighteen oh five, Frederick Tudor began documenting 150 00:09:24,600 --> 00:09:28,559 Speaker 1: his ideas for exporting ice in a newly purchased journal 151 00:09:28,640 --> 00:09:31,959 Speaker 1: that he would later dubbed the Ice House Diary, even 152 00:09:31,960 --> 00:09:35,160 Speaker 1: though he refused to acknowledge that the idea had first 153 00:09:35,240 --> 00:09:38,800 Speaker 1: been his brother Williams. He pulled William into the scheme 154 00:09:38,880 --> 00:09:42,959 Speaker 1: along with their cousin James Savage. Frederick and James or 155 00:09:43,000 --> 00:09:46,160 Speaker 1: each twenty one at the time, and William was twenty six. 156 00:09:47,000 --> 00:09:50,040 Speaker 1: Frederick sent William and James to the Caribbean to set 157 00:09:50,120 --> 00:09:54,160 Speaker 1: up business relationships, oversee the building of ice houses, and 158 00:09:54,320 --> 00:09:57,760 Speaker 1: generally just handled the Caribbean end of the business. This 159 00:09:57,840 --> 00:10:00,800 Speaker 1: included talking to the government on each island and trying 160 00:10:00,800 --> 00:10:04,400 Speaker 1: to get an exclusive license to distribute. It was deeply 161 00:10:04,440 --> 00:10:06,760 Speaker 1: important to Frederick that he not only have the right 162 00:10:06,800 --> 00:10:08,960 Speaker 1: to sell the ice, but that he also have a 163 00:10:09,000 --> 00:10:13,760 Speaker 1: monopoly on it. They began in the French territory of Martinique. 164 00:10:14,040 --> 00:10:17,480 Speaker 1: Once William and James arrived there, they did secure an 165 00:10:17,520 --> 00:10:21,559 Speaker 1: exclusive license to sell ice as planned. They also noted 166 00:10:21,600 --> 00:10:25,040 Speaker 1: a couple of good locations for ice houses and compiled 167 00:10:25,080 --> 00:10:27,680 Speaker 1: a list of prominent people who should get a free 168 00:10:27,720 --> 00:10:31,360 Speaker 1: sample once the ice actually got there. But not long 169 00:10:31,440 --> 00:10:35,120 Speaker 1: at all after they arrived, James got yellow fever. He 170 00:10:35,240 --> 00:10:39,000 Speaker 1: spent weeks recovering, during which time William went on ahead 171 00:10:39,040 --> 00:10:42,240 Speaker 1: to other islands to try to make similar arrangements there. 172 00:10:43,120 --> 00:10:47,959 Speaker 1: Frederick followed behind them departing for Martinique on February eighteen 173 00:10:47,960 --> 00:10:51,480 Speaker 1: o six. He couldn't find anyone willing to ship the ice, 174 00:10:51,600 --> 00:10:55,120 Speaker 1: so he'd bought a brig called the Favorite for four thousand, 175 00:10:55,240 --> 00:10:58,080 Speaker 1: seven hundred fifty dollars, and he modified it with a 176 00:10:58,080 --> 00:11:01,360 Speaker 1: wooden ceiling to separate the ice in the hold from 177 00:11:01,360 --> 00:11:05,960 Speaker 1: the hot upper deck. When Frederick arrived on March five, 178 00:11:06,080 --> 00:11:09,720 Speaker 1: his cargo of ice, which had been insulated with wood shavings, 179 00:11:09,800 --> 00:11:14,480 Speaker 1: was surprisingly intact, but he was not pleased at all 180 00:11:14,520 --> 00:11:17,800 Speaker 1: with the arrangements that William and James had made. Since 181 00:11:17,840 --> 00:11:20,440 Speaker 1: they had marked some sites for an ice house, but 182 00:11:20,520 --> 00:11:23,240 Speaker 1: they had not actually built one, there was nowhere to 183 00:11:23,320 --> 00:11:26,400 Speaker 1: unload the product, so Frederick had to get permission to 184 00:11:26,440 --> 00:11:29,960 Speaker 1: sell it directly off of the ship, and even though 185 00:11:30,000 --> 00:11:32,760 Speaker 1: he did sell some ice, the people who bought it, 186 00:11:32,960 --> 00:11:36,600 Speaker 1: some of whom had never seen anything frozen, didn't really 187 00:11:36,640 --> 00:11:38,920 Speaker 1: know what to do with it. In a letter to 188 00:11:39,040 --> 00:11:42,360 Speaker 1: Robert Gardner, Frederick wrote, quote, their methods of keeping it 189 00:11:42,400 --> 00:11:45,600 Speaker 1: are laughable. To be sure, one carries it through the 190 00:11:45,640 --> 00:11:49,040 Speaker 1: street to his house in the sun noonday, puts it 191 00:11:49,080 --> 00:11:51,680 Speaker 1: in a plate before his door, and then complains that 192 00:11:51,760 --> 00:11:54,839 Speaker 1: il font another puts it in a tub of water. 193 00:11:55,320 --> 00:11:59,320 Speaker 1: A third, by way of climax, puts his insult. He 194 00:11:59,360 --> 00:12:03,480 Speaker 1: did eventually print up some handbills to give people instructions 195 00:12:03,520 --> 00:12:06,600 Speaker 1: about what to do, but his instructions on the handbills 196 00:12:06,600 --> 00:12:10,240 Speaker 1: wouldn't have been all that helpful. They were basically like 197 00:12:10,360 --> 00:12:15,120 Speaker 1: rapid in a blanket. Well, and I like how he's 198 00:12:15,160 --> 00:12:18,720 Speaker 1: there's like a conceit to the whole thing, right, idiot, 199 00:12:18,760 --> 00:12:20,520 Speaker 1: don't you know what to do with ice? No, we've 200 00:12:20,559 --> 00:12:26,200 Speaker 1: never seen it before. Frederick lost between three thousand and 201 00:12:26,240 --> 00:12:28,880 Speaker 1: four thousand dollars on this first attempt, and he placed 202 00:12:28,920 --> 00:12:32,000 Speaker 1: all of the blame on William and James. Did not 203 00:12:32,080 --> 00:12:35,119 Speaker 1: matter to him that James had been critically ill for weeks, 204 00:12:35,160 --> 00:12:38,200 Speaker 1: he hadn't been able to even leave his lodgings for 205 00:12:38,240 --> 00:12:42,120 Speaker 1: a long time, or that William had secured an exclusive 206 00:12:42,200 --> 00:12:48,160 Speaker 1: import license in multiple other Caribbean nations. Even as Frederick 207 00:12:48,320 --> 00:12:51,840 Speaker 1: was sailing home, William was on the way to Europe 208 00:12:51,880 --> 00:12:54,520 Speaker 1: to try to get a general license from the nations 209 00:12:54,520 --> 00:12:57,320 Speaker 1: of Britain and France to sell in their Caribbean colonies 210 00:12:57,840 --> 00:13:00,280 Speaker 1: so he would not have to negotiate with every single 211 00:13:00,320 --> 00:13:05,320 Speaker 1: island individually. None of that compared to the fact that 212 00:13:05,320 --> 00:13:09,520 Speaker 1: they didn't build an ice house, so Frederick had nowhere 213 00:13:09,520 --> 00:13:11,720 Speaker 1: to put the ice. He he put all the blame 214 00:13:11,720 --> 00:13:15,600 Speaker 1: on his brother and cousin. Frederick tried again in eighteen 215 00:13:15,640 --> 00:13:19,200 Speaker 1: o seven, this time having ice houses ready before the 216 00:13:19,240 --> 00:13:23,000 Speaker 1: ice arrived and tinkering with his methods of insulating and 217 00:13:23,040 --> 00:13:26,560 Speaker 1: securing the cargo. He was more successful this time than 218 00:13:26,600 --> 00:13:28,800 Speaker 1: in eighteen o six, but he couldn't try again in 219 00:13:28,880 --> 00:13:33,000 Speaker 1: eighteen o eight because of the Napoleonic Wars. The Embargo 220 00:13:33,080 --> 00:13:36,480 Speaker 1: Act of eighteen o seven, drafted in response to the wars, 221 00:13:36,640 --> 00:13:40,800 Speaker 1: closed all US ports to export shipping. Yeah, the United 222 00:13:40,840 --> 00:13:44,959 Speaker 1: States is basically trying to stay out of the wars 223 00:13:45,040 --> 00:13:48,960 Speaker 1: themselves while also retaliating against the fact that their ships 224 00:13:48,960 --> 00:13:53,920 Speaker 1: are being harassed in transit. So with exports completely closed off, 225 00:13:53,960 --> 00:13:56,240 Speaker 1: Frederick had to spend a couple of years biding his 226 00:13:56,320 --> 00:13:59,479 Speaker 1: time at Rockwood, trying to make ends meet, and experimenting 227 00:13:59,480 --> 00:14:02,960 Speaker 1: with different ice house designs and different methods of insulating 228 00:14:03,000 --> 00:14:06,960 Speaker 1: them in the cargo, taking really meticulous measurements of how 229 00:14:07,080 --> 00:14:11,200 Speaker 1: these different designs and insulators affected how quickly the ice melted. 230 00:14:11,840 --> 00:14:15,480 Speaker 1: Times were hard for most of the tutors around this time. 231 00:14:15,520 --> 00:14:19,000 Speaker 1: Because Frederick's father also lost most of his money on 232 00:14:19,040 --> 00:14:22,880 Speaker 1: a failed land speculation, he wasn't able to repair his 233 00:14:22,960 --> 00:14:27,400 Speaker 1: finances before his death in eighteen nineteen. The Embargo Act 234 00:14:27,440 --> 00:14:30,480 Speaker 1: of eighteen o seven was repealed in eighteen o nine, 235 00:14:31,040 --> 00:14:33,960 Speaker 1: and by eighteen ten Frederick was ready to try again, 236 00:14:34,720 --> 00:14:37,360 Speaker 1: though he had to borrow money to finance the trip. 237 00:14:37,960 --> 00:14:41,040 Speaker 1: The eighteen ten voyage was his most profitable to that point, 238 00:14:41,400 --> 00:14:44,240 Speaker 1: and he secured a six year agreement giving him exclusive 239 00:14:44,240 --> 00:14:48,560 Speaker 1: control of the Cuban ice market. But when he tried 240 00:14:48,600 --> 00:14:52,000 Speaker 1: to build on this success in eighteen eleven, things once 241 00:14:52,040 --> 00:14:56,080 Speaker 1: again became shaky. Frederick's first shipment of ice to Jamaica, 242 00:14:56,200 --> 00:15:00,520 Speaker 1: sank Off Port Royal, and an agent managing his operation, Havannah, 243 00:15:00,600 --> 00:15:03,840 Speaker 1: swindled him, turning over only a thousand dollars of what 244 00:15:04,000 --> 00:15:07,400 Speaker 1: was supposed to be a nine thousand dollar profit. With 245 00:15:07,520 --> 00:15:11,000 Speaker 1: these things combined, he lost almost all of his eighteen 246 00:15:11,000 --> 00:15:15,360 Speaker 1: eleven profits and consequently was arrested and sent to Debtors 247 00:15:15,440 --> 00:15:19,080 Speaker 1: prison on March nine of eighteen twelve. Once he got 248 00:15:19,120 --> 00:15:22,200 Speaker 1: out of prison, the United States and Britain went to 249 00:15:22,320 --> 00:15:25,880 Speaker 1: war in the War of eighteen twelve, once again disrupting 250 00:15:26,080 --> 00:15:29,440 Speaker 1: exports from the United States and putting yet another stop 251 00:15:29,480 --> 00:15:33,280 Speaker 1: to Frederick's ice business. At this point, the threat of 252 00:15:33,320 --> 00:15:37,000 Speaker 1: going back to prison loomed. Frederick's first shipment of ice 253 00:15:37,120 --> 00:15:40,560 Speaker 1: after the war left Boston on November one, eighteen fifteen, 254 00:15:40,920 --> 00:15:43,920 Speaker 1: and Frederick himself was on the boat, having been quote 255 00:15:44,200 --> 00:15:49,400 Speaker 1: pursued by sheriffs to the very wharf. Slowly but surely, 256 00:15:49,600 --> 00:15:52,720 Speaker 1: his ice business started to grow over the next few years, 257 00:15:52,800 --> 00:15:56,640 Speaker 1: and Boston had a number of advantages as the location 258 00:15:56,760 --> 00:16:01,840 Speaker 1: of his headquarters. These advantages became more important as business 259 00:16:01,920 --> 00:16:06,200 Speaker 1: got bigger. Numerous ponds in the area provided the product 260 00:16:06,320 --> 00:16:10,720 Speaker 1: for pretty cheap, including Fresh Pond, Spy Pond, Jamaica Pond, 261 00:16:10,880 --> 00:16:13,200 Speaker 1: and even wild In Pond, where he would go on 262 00:16:13,320 --> 00:16:16,120 Speaker 1: to bother Henry David Thorreau by harvesting ice there in. 263 00:16:18,560 --> 00:16:21,640 Speaker 1: The nature of the shipping trade through Boston also meant 264 00:16:21,680 --> 00:16:24,600 Speaker 1: that once he had proved it could be done, he 265 00:16:24,640 --> 00:16:28,280 Speaker 1: could move his product at a lower cost. Ships sailing 266 00:16:28,320 --> 00:16:31,000 Speaker 1: to the Tropics from Boston to retrieve goods such as 267 00:16:31,080 --> 00:16:34,960 Speaker 1: sugar were often empty, with holds full of rocks. His ballast. 268 00:16:35,680 --> 00:16:39,320 Speaker 1: Frederick filled these otherwise empty ships with ice replacing rocks 269 00:16:39,320 --> 00:16:42,640 Speaker 1: with sellable cargo, and the ship's owners glad it was 270 00:16:42,680 --> 00:16:46,480 Speaker 1: no longer a wasted trip gave him a discount. The 271 00:16:46,480 --> 00:16:48,840 Speaker 1: fact that he was mostly using things like wood shavings 272 00:16:48,880 --> 00:16:53,800 Speaker 1: and sawdust, which were waste by products of the lumber industry, 273 00:16:53,880 --> 00:16:57,440 Speaker 1: also meant like even the things that he was using 274 00:16:57,520 --> 00:17:00,960 Speaker 1: to keep keep things frozen in transit that was free 275 00:17:01,080 --> 00:17:05,280 Speaker 1: or cheap. Also in eighteen six team he built an 276 00:17:05,280 --> 00:17:08,439 Speaker 1: ice house in Charleston, South Carolina. When he started selling 277 00:17:08,480 --> 00:17:11,800 Speaker 1: his ice from there, an ice house in Savannah, Georgia, 278 00:17:11,880 --> 00:17:14,879 Speaker 1: soon followed, and as the business grew. In addition to 279 00:17:15,119 --> 00:17:19,280 Speaker 1: securing licenses and building ice houses, Frederick was selling people 280 00:17:19,359 --> 00:17:22,879 Speaker 1: the idea that they needed ice. One of his eighteen 281 00:17:23,000 --> 00:17:27,240 Speaker 1: nineteen diary entries describes how he would start with the bars. 282 00:17:27,960 --> 00:17:31,480 Speaker 1: Here's a quote. It became necessary to establish with one 283 00:17:31,480 --> 00:17:34,720 Speaker 1: of the most conspicuous bar keepers a jar and give 284 00:17:34,840 --> 00:17:38,080 Speaker 1: him his ice for a year. The object is to 285 00:17:38,160 --> 00:17:42,119 Speaker 1: make the whole population use cold drinks instead of warm 286 00:17:42,240 --> 00:17:45,159 Speaker 1: or tepid, and it will be affected in the course 287 00:17:45,200 --> 00:17:49,199 Speaker 1: of three years. A single conspicuous bar keeper having one 288 00:17:49,240 --> 00:17:53,000 Speaker 1: of the jars and selling steadily his liquors, all cold 289 00:17:53,119 --> 00:17:57,240 Speaker 1: without an increase in price, render it absolutely necessary that 290 00:17:57,320 --> 00:18:00,399 Speaker 1: the others come to it or lose their customers. They 291 00:18:00,400 --> 00:18:03,320 Speaker 1: are compelled to do what they could in no other 292 00:18:03,400 --> 00:18:08,280 Speaker 1: way be induced to undertake. Ice really had been considered 293 00:18:08,320 --> 00:18:12,080 Speaker 1: a luxury until this point, but Frederick's whole model relied 294 00:18:12,119 --> 00:18:15,080 Speaker 1: on it being thought of as a basic necessity, and 295 00:18:15,160 --> 00:18:19,960 Speaker 1: on tepid or warm beverages being considered undrinkable. He remarked 296 00:18:20,000 --> 00:18:23,320 Speaker 1: that he knew his business in Charleston was successful once 297 00:18:23,359 --> 00:18:27,760 Speaker 1: he saw enslaved people with cold drinks. We should note 298 00:18:27,800 --> 00:18:32,359 Speaker 1: here that although slavery was effectively abolished in Massachusetts the 299 00:18:32,400 --> 00:18:36,560 Speaker 1: year that Frederick was born, his business, which he created 300 00:18:36,640 --> 00:18:40,240 Speaker 1: from scratch, was built on selling ice to slave states 301 00:18:40,320 --> 00:18:44,200 Speaker 1: and to Caribbean and eventually South American colonies and nations 302 00:18:44,200 --> 00:18:49,600 Speaker 1: whose economies relied heavily on enslaved labor. For example, the 303 00:18:49,680 --> 00:18:53,959 Speaker 1: Emancipation Proclamation was issued the year before he died, and 304 00:18:54,000 --> 00:18:57,600 Speaker 1: Britain and France both abolished slavery in their colonies during 305 00:18:57,640 --> 00:19:00,879 Speaker 1: his lifetime, but this was long after hearted trading with 306 00:19:00,960 --> 00:19:05,359 Speaker 1: some of those colonies. Slavery wasn't abolished in Cuba or 307 00:19:05,440 --> 00:19:09,840 Speaker 1: Brazil until long after his death, and Tracy did the 308 00:19:09,840 --> 00:19:12,280 Speaker 1: research on this one, and she didn't find evidence that 309 00:19:12,880 --> 00:19:16,080 Speaker 1: he had directly enslaved anyone, although there is a troubling 310 00:19:16,119 --> 00:19:19,960 Speaker 1: account of an agent from India bringing him a quote 311 00:19:20,000 --> 00:19:24,199 Speaker 1: servant as a gift. But it's incredibly likely that at 312 00:19:24,240 --> 00:19:26,960 Speaker 1: least some of the people unloading ice at Southern and 313 00:19:27,040 --> 00:19:30,399 Speaker 1: Caribbean ports and working for the year round agents and 314 00:19:30,480 --> 00:19:34,879 Speaker 1: ice housekeepers living there were enslaved, and a lot of 315 00:19:34,920 --> 00:19:38,320 Speaker 1: Frederick's customers would have been buying his ice with profits 316 00:19:38,359 --> 00:19:41,639 Speaker 1: that came from slave labor. It's a good example of 317 00:19:41,680 --> 00:19:45,040 Speaker 1: how industries in the United States were complicit in slavery, 318 00:19:45,080 --> 00:19:47,960 Speaker 1: even when founded and run from states where slavery had 319 00:19:48,000 --> 00:19:51,320 Speaker 1: long been abolished. Some of the things he was investing 320 00:19:51,359 --> 00:19:56,919 Speaker 1: in before he started this ice business similarly were being 321 00:19:56,960 --> 00:20:04,080 Speaker 1: produced using enslaved labor. Like his his molasses trades, molasses 322 00:20:04,160 --> 00:20:06,720 Speaker 1: was made from sugar that was farmed on plantations that 323 00:20:06,840 --> 00:20:14,360 Speaker 1: used enslave labor. I found it frustrating that zero of 324 00:20:14,480 --> 00:20:18,760 Speaker 1: the accounts that I looked at about both Frederick Tudor 325 00:20:18,840 --> 00:20:22,320 Speaker 1: and the ice trade in general really got into the 326 00:20:22,359 --> 00:20:26,639 Speaker 1: fact that he created an industry selling stuff to enslavers 327 00:20:26,680 --> 00:20:32,399 Speaker 1: like that is where the money was coming from. So 328 00:20:33,840 --> 00:20:37,199 Speaker 1: to get back to his basic story, although he was 329 00:20:37,440 --> 00:20:40,240 Speaker 1: selling lots of ice in the eighteen teens, he was 330 00:20:40,320 --> 00:20:42,960 Speaker 1: not breaking even because he still had so many debts 331 00:20:42,960 --> 00:20:45,120 Speaker 1: to pay, And we will talk about how he finally 332 00:20:45,240 --> 00:20:52,680 Speaker 1: started to break even briefly after another quick sponsor break 333 00:20:56,760 --> 00:21:00,600 Speaker 1: even though Frederick's brother, William was really a lot more 334 00:21:00,640 --> 00:21:03,720 Speaker 1: interested in being a writer, he published several books in 335 00:21:03,800 --> 00:21:06,359 Speaker 1: his lifetime. He was one of the co founders of 336 00:21:06,480 --> 00:21:09,640 Speaker 1: the Boston Athenaeum, which is a membership library that still 337 00:21:09,640 --> 00:21:14,080 Speaker 1: exists to Boston. William borrowed money to join Frederick's ice 338 00:21:14,080 --> 00:21:17,320 Speaker 1: house business in eighteen twenty. He was the person who 339 00:21:17,359 --> 00:21:20,400 Speaker 1: managed the introduction of Frederick's ice into New Orleans, which 340 00:21:20,440 --> 00:21:24,080 Speaker 1: would become his biggest market in the Deep South. In 341 00:21:24,160 --> 00:21:27,600 Speaker 1: eighteen twenty one, Frederick finally managed to get ahead of 342 00:21:27,640 --> 00:21:30,159 Speaker 1: his debts and it seemed as though the ice business 343 00:21:30,200 --> 00:21:33,639 Speaker 1: would just grow from there. But that year Frederick had 344 00:21:33,640 --> 00:21:37,159 Speaker 1: a nervous collapse. He had been working himself to exhaustion 345 00:21:37,359 --> 00:21:39,880 Speaker 1: trying to make the ice business lucrative enough to pay 346 00:21:39,920 --> 00:21:43,840 Speaker 1: off his debts. Everything was compounded by his generally weak 347 00:21:43,880 --> 00:21:46,600 Speaker 1: health and the fact that he'd had both yellow fever 348 00:21:46,760 --> 00:21:49,720 Speaker 1: and malaria, along with other ailments while he was in 349 00:21:49,720 --> 00:21:54,560 Speaker 1: the tropics. He did recover, though, and by ninety six 350 00:21:54,640 --> 00:21:57,320 Speaker 1: the ice business had gotten so big that he brought 351 00:21:57,320 --> 00:22:01,560 Speaker 1: on Nathaniel J. Wyath to supervise direct the harvesting side 352 00:22:01,560 --> 00:22:06,480 Speaker 1: of it. Wyath introduced several improvements, including a horse drawn 353 00:22:06,600 --> 00:22:11,360 Speaker 1: ice cutter that he had invented the prior year. Previously, 354 00:22:11,520 --> 00:22:13,879 Speaker 1: ice had been cut by hand, which meant that the 355 00:22:13,880 --> 00:22:16,919 Speaker 1: blocks were uneven, they were harder to insulate, and they 356 00:22:16,920 --> 00:22:21,400 Speaker 1: were prone to shifting and transit. But Whyatt's cutter scored 357 00:22:21,520 --> 00:22:24,520 Speaker 1: the ice in a perfect checkerboard, which allowed crews to 358 00:22:24,600 --> 00:22:28,399 Speaker 1: cut the blocks into very regular, tightly stackable blocks that 359 00:22:28,520 --> 00:22:31,760 Speaker 1: left very little space for air or for shifting, and 360 00:22:31,840 --> 00:22:34,240 Speaker 1: also let them fill the holds a lot more full. 361 00:22:35,200 --> 00:22:39,240 Speaker 1: In January of eighty nine, Wyath also suggested a method 362 00:22:39,320 --> 00:22:42,880 Speaker 1: of making the blocks thicker, basically cutting a sheet of ice, 363 00:22:43,200 --> 00:22:46,000 Speaker 1: sliding it under solid ice to make a double layer, 364 00:22:46,400 --> 00:22:48,879 Speaker 1: and then cutting around the stack to allow it to 365 00:22:48,960 --> 00:22:52,800 Speaker 1: float while refreezing. This let them make blocks of ice 366 00:22:52,880 --> 00:22:55,960 Speaker 1: up to twenty inches thick, when previously they had considered 367 00:22:56,000 --> 00:22:59,600 Speaker 1: themselves lucky for a naturally frozen layer of nine to 368 00:22:59,680 --> 00:23:04,120 Speaker 1: twelve inches. So he was starting to do financially really well. 369 00:23:04,240 --> 00:23:07,560 Speaker 1: And then two events massively changed Frederick's life. In eighteen 370 00:23:07,600 --> 00:23:11,479 Speaker 1: thirty three, when he was forty nine, he started making 371 00:23:11,680 --> 00:23:16,480 Speaker 1: massive investments into coffee futures, and he also met Euphemia Fenno, 372 00:23:16,600 --> 00:23:20,720 Speaker 1: who was aged nineteen. Tutor was immediately smitten with her 373 00:23:20,960 --> 00:23:24,000 Speaker 1: and they were quickly engaged, but he kept it in 374 00:23:24,040 --> 00:23:28,440 Speaker 1: the wedding secret from his family, who he was increasingly 375 00:23:28,680 --> 00:23:34,560 Speaker 1: estranged from. There was a lot of drama and pettiness 376 00:23:34,600 --> 00:23:39,720 Speaker 1: in the Tutor family. Uh. If if you read accounts 377 00:23:39,760 --> 00:23:43,719 Speaker 1: that that get into his family dynamics, um, it's really 378 00:23:43,960 --> 00:23:48,080 Speaker 1: his his brother in law, Robert halliwell Gardner, that comes 379 00:23:48,119 --> 00:23:51,400 Speaker 1: off the best of all of them. Um. So by 380 00:23:51,440 --> 00:23:54,280 Speaker 1: this point he was not really getting along and he 381 00:23:54,320 --> 00:23:56,520 Speaker 1: did not tell them that he was getting married. But 382 00:23:56,560 --> 00:24:00,320 Speaker 1: they got married on January eighteen thirty four, and they 383 00:24:00,359 --> 00:24:04,360 Speaker 1: would go on to have six children. The coffee speculation, 384 00:24:04,560 --> 00:24:07,320 Speaker 1: on the other hand, would not be nearly so productive. 385 00:24:08,119 --> 00:24:11,479 Speaker 1: Coffee prices collapsed and he lost about two hundred and 386 00:24:11,480 --> 00:24:15,439 Speaker 1: fifty thousand dollars of his investors money. He convinced his 387 00:24:15,480 --> 00:24:19,080 Speaker 1: creditors to allow him to continue his ice business unhindered, 388 00:24:19,480 --> 00:24:22,440 Speaker 1: committing to pay at least the interest back every year 389 00:24:22,640 --> 00:24:25,040 Speaker 1: and estimating that it would take about six years to 390 00:24:25,080 --> 00:24:29,760 Speaker 1: pay off. The sale of ice to India is what 391 00:24:29,920 --> 00:24:33,400 Speaker 1: ultimately allowed him to pay off this debt. He had 392 00:24:33,480 --> 00:24:36,560 Speaker 1: already planned to expand into India with a couple of 393 00:24:36,600 --> 00:24:40,840 Speaker 1: business partners even before he realized how bad his financial 394 00:24:40,840 --> 00:24:45,280 Speaker 1: situation was because of this whole coffee situation. In spite 395 00:24:45,320 --> 00:24:48,440 Speaker 1: of the fact that it was a four month, fourteen 396 00:24:48,520 --> 00:24:53,200 Speaker 1: thousand mile that's two kilometer journey to India that involved 397 00:24:53,240 --> 00:24:56,480 Speaker 1: crossing the equator twice, it turned out to be his 398 00:24:56,560 --> 00:25:00,480 Speaker 1: most lucrative destination by far. I feel like if he 399 00:25:00,560 --> 00:25:03,800 Speaker 1: had just invested in coffee after I had been born, 400 00:25:03,840 --> 00:25:08,359 Speaker 1: he would have been fine. Yes, sure, I mean I 401 00:25:08,440 --> 00:25:11,240 Speaker 1: have a many many cups a day habits, so I 402 00:25:11,240 --> 00:25:14,320 Speaker 1: could have kept him afloat. Thanks to the British East 403 00:25:14,359 --> 00:25:17,200 Speaker 1: India Company, India was home to a lot of British 404 00:25:17,200 --> 00:25:20,919 Speaker 1: people and Anglo Indians, and among this population, it was 405 00:25:21,000 --> 00:25:24,840 Speaker 1: incredibly fashionable to complain about how hot it was, and 406 00:25:24,880 --> 00:25:28,960 Speaker 1: to describe the Indian subcontinent as the most punishingly miserable 407 00:25:29,000 --> 00:25:32,840 Speaker 1: hot place on Earth. And although the British had adopted 408 00:25:32,880 --> 00:25:35,200 Speaker 1: a number of local methods for dealing with the heat, 409 00:25:35,440 --> 00:25:39,080 Speaker 1: including using saltpeter infused water to chill bottles of wine, 410 00:25:39,880 --> 00:25:42,600 Speaker 1: many of these ways of coping were very time and 411 00:25:42,720 --> 00:25:48,040 Speaker 1: labor intensive. A lot of more affluent households actually had 412 00:25:48,080 --> 00:25:51,960 Speaker 1: a person whose job it was to use this saltpeter 413 00:25:52,040 --> 00:25:55,640 Speaker 1: infused water to cool things, and like that person's job 414 00:25:55,680 --> 00:25:59,600 Speaker 1: was as important as the cook uh it took a 415 00:25:59,600 --> 00:26:05,320 Speaker 1: lot of um. But in addition to dedicating people to 416 00:26:05,800 --> 00:26:09,399 Speaker 1: chilling stuff, India also did have its own sources of ice. 417 00:26:09,920 --> 00:26:12,720 Speaker 1: One was ice brought in from around the Himalayas to 418 00:26:12,760 --> 00:26:16,800 Speaker 1: further south in the subcontinent, and the other was a 419 00:26:16,880 --> 00:26:20,720 Speaker 1: novel way of manufacturing it. People would cut pits into 420 00:26:20,720 --> 00:26:24,000 Speaker 1: the ground and then fill the pits with straw, and 421 00:26:24,040 --> 00:26:27,560 Speaker 1: then place shallow earthenware dishes onto them, filled with a 422 00:26:27,600 --> 00:26:31,520 Speaker 1: couple of inches of water. As the water seeped through 423 00:26:31,600 --> 00:26:35,359 Speaker 1: the earthenware vessels, that acted as an evaporative cooler, which 424 00:26:35,440 --> 00:26:38,440 Speaker 1: let the water freeze, even if the air temperature wasn't 425 00:26:38,600 --> 00:26:42,000 Speaker 1: quite to the freezing point yet. That's some cool science 426 00:26:42,000 --> 00:26:47,440 Speaker 1: at work, right. But this method didn't yield much ice, 427 00:26:47,640 --> 00:26:50,320 Speaker 1: and some of it was more like slush. So the 428 00:26:50,320 --> 00:26:53,879 Speaker 1: British population was incredibly eager for a steady supply of 429 00:26:53,920 --> 00:26:56,840 Speaker 1: tons of ice at a time. The British population of 430 00:26:56,920 --> 00:27:00,440 Speaker 1: Kolkata raised money for ice houses under the under standing 431 00:27:00,840 --> 00:27:03,040 Speaker 1: that some of the ice stored there would be reserved 432 00:27:03,040 --> 00:27:06,439 Speaker 1: for medical use in years when the ice harvest was 433 00:27:06,480 --> 00:27:09,760 Speaker 1: poor or ships were lost in transit. The ice in 434 00:27:09,760 --> 00:27:12,520 Speaker 1: India was strictly rationed and you had to have a 435 00:27:12,600 --> 00:27:16,320 Speaker 1: doctor's note to get more. This isn't actually the first 436 00:27:16,359 --> 00:27:18,879 Speaker 1: doctor's note that there's an important role in the story. 437 00:27:19,160 --> 00:27:21,879 Speaker 1: When William was trying to negotiate a license with the 438 00:27:21,880 --> 00:27:25,480 Speaker 1: British government to sell in the British colonies, they thought 439 00:27:25,560 --> 00:27:28,560 Speaker 1: that this idea was so far fetched that it must 440 00:27:28,640 --> 00:27:31,560 Speaker 1: just be a front for smuggling. So he had to 441 00:27:31,600 --> 00:27:34,600 Speaker 1: get a note from a doctor explaining how ice could 442 00:27:34,640 --> 00:27:42,720 Speaker 1: be beneficial uh in in Caribbean colonies. So tutors first 443 00:27:42,840 --> 00:27:46,840 Speaker 1: ice delivery to India arrived in Kolkata on September six 444 00:27:47,359 --> 00:27:51,200 Speaker 1: thirty three, and intense British demand for it made it 445 00:27:51,240 --> 00:27:54,760 Speaker 1: an immediate success. It was not just the demand for 446 00:27:54,840 --> 00:27:58,639 Speaker 1: ice that made the Anglo British market so lucrative the 447 00:27:58,680 --> 00:28:02,280 Speaker 1: British East India count but He's terms were very favorable 448 00:28:02,320 --> 00:28:05,960 Speaker 1: for Frederick Tudor. He got a lot of exemptions and 449 00:28:05,960 --> 00:28:09,919 Speaker 1: and incentives that made India more profitable than any other market, 450 00:28:10,520 --> 00:28:13,920 Speaker 1: and so soon he was expanding into other Indian cities 451 00:28:13,960 --> 00:28:18,560 Speaker 1: as well. In eighteen thirty four, Frederick also began shipping 452 00:28:18,600 --> 00:28:23,080 Speaker 1: ice Tarrio, and this was coincidentally where his brother William 453 00:28:23,160 --> 00:28:26,600 Speaker 1: had died. William had left the business after being appointed 454 00:28:26,640 --> 00:28:30,199 Speaker 1: to US consul in Peru in eighteen twenty four, and 455 00:28:30,280 --> 00:28:34,040 Speaker 1: he was appointed charge a fair for Brazil in eighteen seven. 456 00:28:34,720 --> 00:28:38,000 Speaker 1: He died there of an infection on March nine, eighteen 457 00:28:38,120 --> 00:28:43,400 Speaker 1: thirty Although Frederick dabbled in plenty of other side investments 458 00:28:43,400 --> 00:28:45,880 Speaker 1: and side businesses over the course of his life, nothing 459 00:28:46,000 --> 00:28:49,760 Speaker 1: was ever nearly as successful as the ice trade, and 460 00:28:49,800 --> 00:28:53,000 Speaker 1: he was doing so much business through exports that he 461 00:28:53,080 --> 00:28:56,840 Speaker 1: was nearly unaffected by the Panic of eighteen thirty seven 462 00:28:57,160 --> 00:29:00,320 Speaker 1: or by the start of the Civil War, completely opping 463 00:29:00,320 --> 00:29:03,760 Speaker 1: his shipping to southern ports, and that, as a side note, 464 00:29:04,880 --> 00:29:08,280 Speaker 1: led to some of the development of artificial refrigeration technologies 465 00:29:08,320 --> 00:29:10,560 Speaker 1: as the South had come to rely on these ice 466 00:29:10,600 --> 00:29:13,560 Speaker 1: exports that they could no longer get because they were 467 00:29:13,600 --> 00:29:16,280 Speaker 1: at war with the North and they needed their ice. 468 00:29:16,360 --> 00:29:19,720 Speaker 1: Tea we love it in the South. Uh Tutor paid 469 00:29:19,760 --> 00:29:22,640 Speaker 1: off the last of his coffee debts in eighteen forty nine. 470 00:29:22,840 --> 00:29:25,360 Speaker 1: He was sixty five at the time. It had actually 471 00:29:25,400 --> 00:29:28,120 Speaker 1: taken him fourteen years to do it, during which time 472 00:29:28,160 --> 00:29:31,920 Speaker 1: he paid about fourteen thousand dollars worth of interest. He 473 00:29:32,080 --> 00:29:35,440 Speaker 1: continued to be heavily involved in the ice trade until 474 00:29:35,600 --> 00:29:38,479 Speaker 1: very late in his life, and eventually a lot of 475 00:29:38,520 --> 00:29:42,280 Speaker 1: the New England ice harvesting moved north into Maine. The 476 00:29:42,360 --> 00:29:45,840 Speaker 1: harvesting season was longer, and the ice could be harvested 477 00:29:45,880 --> 00:29:49,280 Speaker 1: directly from the Qunebec River and then loaded directly onto 478 00:29:49,320 --> 00:29:51,719 Speaker 1: a ship, rather than having to transport it from all 479 00:29:51,760 --> 00:29:55,600 Speaker 1: these ponds over land to the harbor in Boston. Also, 480 00:29:55,880 --> 00:29:58,800 Speaker 1: the ice in Massachusetts towards the end of his life 481 00:29:58,920 --> 00:30:02,239 Speaker 1: was becoming a lot dirtier, as the land around the 482 00:30:02,320 --> 00:30:05,560 Speaker 1: ponds was more developed and as the horses used to 483 00:30:05,640 --> 00:30:10,840 Speaker 1: draw the ice plows left their waist behind. By eighteen 484 00:30:10,880 --> 00:30:14,040 Speaker 1: fifty six, ice companies in New England were sending one 485 00:30:14,080 --> 00:30:18,200 Speaker 1: hundred fifty thousand tons of ice to forty three nations, 486 00:30:18,240 --> 00:30:21,240 Speaker 1: and similar businesses had sprung up in other cold weather 487 00:30:21,320 --> 00:30:25,440 Speaker 1: parts of the country as well. Although Frederick had continually 488 00:30:25,480 --> 00:30:29,200 Speaker 1: sought monopolies and did occasionally managed to secure them, they 489 00:30:29,200 --> 00:30:33,800 Speaker 1: didn't generally last for long. Competition with other ice exporters 490 00:30:33,880 --> 00:30:37,640 Speaker 1: increased over the course of his life, especially when Italian traders, 491 00:30:37,880 --> 00:30:41,040 Speaker 1: who were much closer to India than Boston was, began 492 00:30:41,120 --> 00:30:45,120 Speaker 1: transporting alpine ice, and as New York began to overtake 493 00:30:45,160 --> 00:30:48,400 Speaker 1: Boston in terms of overall shipping, much of the ice 494 00:30:48,440 --> 00:30:53,000 Speaker 1: trade had moved there. Frederick Tudor died on February six, 495 00:30:53,120 --> 00:30:55,640 Speaker 1: eighteen sixty four, at the age of eighty, and he 496 00:30:55,800 --> 00:31:00,360 Speaker 1: was by then vastly wealthy, both from the actual fits 497 00:31:00,400 --> 00:31:04,160 Speaker 1: of the ice trade, but also really importantly from the 498 00:31:04,320 --> 00:31:07,400 Speaker 1: land value of all this property that he had bought 499 00:31:07,520 --> 00:31:11,960 Speaker 1: decades before to build ice houses on. His widow ran 500 00:31:12,040 --> 00:31:15,040 Speaker 1: the business after his death, changing her name to Fenmo 501 00:31:15,240 --> 00:31:19,440 Speaker 1: Tutor in eighteen sixty seven. Possibly don't actually know her 502 00:31:19,480 --> 00:31:23,520 Speaker 1: motivations for sure, but the speculation is so that correspondence 503 00:31:23,600 --> 00:31:25,840 Speaker 1: in the ice trade would assume that she was a man. 504 00:31:26,960 --> 00:31:32,440 Speaker 1: She also, in the continuing pile of things that make 505 00:31:32,680 --> 00:31:35,920 Speaker 1: make of wonder whether Frederick was that much fun to 506 00:31:35,960 --> 00:31:39,960 Speaker 1: be around. She went through and annotated all of his 507 00:31:40,160 --> 00:31:44,040 Speaker 1: journals from the early years of their marriage, often saying 508 00:31:44,120 --> 00:31:46,840 Speaker 1: things happen in a very different way than we're written 509 00:31:46,880 --> 00:31:49,880 Speaker 1: down in the journals, and alleging that he had been 510 00:31:49,920 --> 00:31:53,720 Speaker 1: sharing quote the marriage privileges with the woman he had 511 00:31:53,840 --> 00:31:57,520 Speaker 1: lived on and off with since eighteen twenty four. I 512 00:31:57,560 --> 00:32:01,240 Speaker 1: don't know who that woman was or slash may have been. 513 00:32:01,320 --> 00:32:04,880 Speaker 1: Since this is an allegation, right, we have nothing but 514 00:32:05,760 --> 00:32:10,320 Speaker 1: Venmo Tutor's word at that point um and during the 515 00:32:10,320 --> 00:32:13,000 Speaker 1: window of time when Tutor was the ice King, though 516 00:32:13,480 --> 00:32:16,400 Speaker 1: the ice trade was changing the world, The first home 517 00:32:16,440 --> 00:32:19,760 Speaker 1: refrigerators were powered by huge blocks of ice, hence the 518 00:32:19,840 --> 00:32:23,120 Speaker 1: name icebox. They didn't just help people save money by 519 00:32:23,200 --> 00:32:26,640 Speaker 1: keeping their food longer without spoiling, though, they also improved 520 00:32:26,680 --> 00:32:31,040 Speaker 1: public health. Without the ability to keep food cold, pathogens 521 00:32:31,160 --> 00:32:34,360 Speaker 1: multiplied in warmer weather, leading to acute diarrhea known as 522 00:32:34,400 --> 00:32:38,840 Speaker 1: summer complaint, which could be fatal. Aside from that, just 523 00:32:39,160 --> 00:32:43,000 Speaker 1: as examples, hospitals use ice to cool patients who had 524 00:32:43,080 --> 00:32:46,960 Speaker 1: high fevers. Fishing vessels were able to stay at sea 525 00:32:47,000 --> 00:32:50,160 Speaker 1: longer because they could keep their catches on ice, and 526 00:32:50,280 --> 00:32:53,640 Speaker 1: perishable foods could be shipped much farther away, so this 527 00:32:54,320 --> 00:32:57,040 Speaker 1: changed the types of food that people were able to eat. 528 00:32:57,520 --> 00:33:01,440 Speaker 1: Tropical fruits could also be shipped much farther packed an 529 00:33:01,480 --> 00:33:03,960 Speaker 1: ice that had first been shipped to the tropics to 530 00:33:04,000 --> 00:33:07,600 Speaker 1: pick it up. The British Royal Navy even used ice 531 00:33:07,680 --> 00:33:11,320 Speaker 1: to cool their gun turrets. And of course, the advent 532 00:33:11,400 --> 00:33:15,720 Speaker 1: of artificial refrigeration and ice making once again changed everything. 533 00:33:16,160 --> 00:33:20,240 Speaker 1: Mechanical refrigerators were in development by the eighteen seventies, and 534 00:33:20,360 --> 00:33:25,000 Speaker 1: home refrigerators were becoming ubiquitous by the nineteen twenties. Once 535 00:33:25,080 --> 00:33:28,840 Speaker 1: manufactured ice became a possibility, most folks stopped wanting to 536 00:33:29,000 --> 00:33:32,560 Speaker 1: use frozen pond water that could potentially have horse poop 537 00:33:32,600 --> 00:33:35,400 Speaker 1: in it. Of Course, the ice trade, much as was 538 00:33:35,480 --> 00:33:38,160 Speaker 1: the case with butter versus margarine, the ice trade, tried 539 00:33:38,200 --> 00:33:41,480 Speaker 1: to make a a lot of arguments about how artificial 540 00:33:41,560 --> 00:33:44,600 Speaker 1: ice was bad and chemical. You should want this naturally 541 00:33:44,680 --> 00:33:48,800 Speaker 1: fresh pond water that horses have been pooping in and 542 00:33:48,960 --> 00:33:53,840 Speaker 1: on secades. I mean, we still right, there are variations 543 00:33:54,000 --> 00:33:56,880 Speaker 1: of that that are not so much legal arguments as 544 00:33:57,000 --> 00:34:00,200 Speaker 1: marketing schemes, right, Like you want this water fresh from 545 00:34:00,200 --> 00:34:05,160 Speaker 1: a stream, not one that's been processed. Uh. I don't 546 00:34:05,160 --> 00:34:09,400 Speaker 1: think anybody's making the case for horse poop water. So 547 00:34:10,480 --> 00:34:13,480 Speaker 1: one of his descendants donated all of his papers and 548 00:34:13,520 --> 00:34:17,600 Speaker 1: all the family papers to Baker Library at Harvard Business School, 549 00:34:17,960 --> 00:34:20,680 Speaker 1: and I kind of want to go down there and 550 00:34:21,000 --> 00:34:23,799 Speaker 1: pour through them and try to figure out, like, did 551 00:34:23,880 --> 00:34:30,600 Speaker 1: he think about what he was doing regarding establishing a 552 00:34:30,600 --> 00:34:34,279 Speaker 1: business that for so long was almost exclusively trading to 553 00:34:34,840 --> 00:34:37,080 Speaker 1: people that were making all their money off of slavery, 554 00:34:37,239 --> 00:34:44,680 Speaker 1: Like he has to have known about slavery being wrong, 555 00:34:44,840 --> 00:34:48,400 Speaker 1: especially since he was literally harvesting ice from where Henry 556 00:34:48,520 --> 00:34:52,960 Speaker 1: David Throw was hanging out the row was a staunch abolitionist, um. 557 00:34:53,960 --> 00:34:58,040 Speaker 1: But I couldn't find anybody that had looked into that 558 00:34:58,120 --> 00:35:01,280 Speaker 1: at all. Most of this are says are really candid 559 00:35:01,400 --> 00:35:04,080 Speaker 1: about the fact that he was selling to you know, 560 00:35:04,200 --> 00:35:07,240 Speaker 1: you know, British colonial India, which has its own set 561 00:35:08,080 --> 00:35:13,440 Speaker 1: of issues and human rights concerns and all of that, 562 00:35:14,680 --> 00:35:20,400 Speaker 1: but I didn't find any anyone really looking into the 563 00:35:20,480 --> 00:35:24,920 Speaker 1: part where he created a trade that was so reliant 564 00:35:24,920 --> 00:35:29,280 Speaker 1: on slavery for so long. I would be willing to wager. 565 00:35:29,880 --> 00:35:31,680 Speaker 1: And this is a bet that can probably never be 566 00:35:31,719 --> 00:35:35,880 Speaker 1: proven out unless we somehow managed to reanimate long decease people. 567 00:35:37,360 --> 00:35:40,000 Speaker 1: I would bet he didn't even really think about it. 568 00:35:41,400 --> 00:35:47,319 Speaker 1: That is my sad suspicion. I suspect he was like, 569 00:35:48,080 --> 00:35:50,480 Speaker 1: I just want to sell my ice. I don't care 570 00:35:50,560 --> 00:35:56,600 Speaker 1: to I'm not going back to prison, ma'am. I do 571 00:35:56,760 --> 00:36:00,520 Speaker 1: know that there is a letter that's in some way 572 00:36:00,680 --> 00:36:05,799 Speaker 1: related to slavery and to the Movement for Abolition Abolition 573 00:36:06,600 --> 00:36:09,680 Speaker 1: that's listed in the finding guide of the Tutor family 574 00:36:09,920 --> 00:36:12,759 Speaker 1: papers at Harvard, But I like, I don't know what 575 00:36:12,800 --> 00:36:18,319 Speaker 1: that letter is is about. I feel like it's We 576 00:36:18,400 --> 00:36:22,759 Speaker 1: have gotten comments before on social media about how like 577 00:36:22,920 --> 00:36:27,080 Speaker 1: the money related to slavery was all the Southern money, 578 00:36:27,080 --> 00:36:29,800 Speaker 1: and that's so false, And to me, this is a 579 00:36:29,920 --> 00:36:34,840 Speaker 1: really good example of how a Northern industry could really 580 00:36:35,480 --> 00:36:40,680 Speaker 1: be heavily connected to slavery, even if it wasn't using 581 00:36:40,880 --> 00:36:45,960 Speaker 1: enslaved labor or directly enslaving anyone. Um A lot of 582 00:36:45,960 --> 00:36:49,239 Speaker 1: the as I was like, I really, I don't know. 583 00:36:49,280 --> 00:36:51,440 Speaker 1: I should not have been astonished, but I was. And 584 00:36:51,480 --> 00:36:53,440 Speaker 1: as I was looking around trying to figure out if 585 00:36:53,440 --> 00:36:56,160 Speaker 1: there was anything that anybody had really put together about this, 586 00:36:56,560 --> 00:36:59,160 Speaker 1: and I kept finding articles where the only reference to 587 00:36:59,200 --> 00:37:03,280 Speaker 1: slavery at all was the caption of a photo of 588 00:37:03,360 --> 00:37:07,879 Speaker 1: some ice being unloaded by enslaved people in a Caribbean port. 589 00:37:08,200 --> 00:37:11,760 Speaker 1: And I was like, well, this is my unsatisfactory experience 590 00:37:11,920 --> 00:37:15,920 Speaker 1: of the week. Uh. In in an episode I chose 591 00:37:15,960 --> 00:37:17,759 Speaker 1: because I thought it was going to be more fun 592 00:37:17,800 --> 00:37:23,279 Speaker 1: than talking about eugenics. Nothing's ever fun in history, That's 593 00:37:23,280 --> 00:37:29,600 Speaker 1: what we learned from. So anyway, I have some listener mail. Fantastic, 594 00:37:30,520 --> 00:37:34,240 Speaker 1: it serves Susan. I just want to say, Susan, your 595 00:37:34,400 --> 00:37:39,040 Speaker 1: your intro to your email is charming and true. Uh. 596 00:37:39,080 --> 00:37:41,440 Speaker 1: And then Susan goes on to say, back in February, 597 00:37:41,520 --> 00:37:44,840 Speaker 1: I was learning more about the Underground Railroad. I discovered 598 00:37:44,880 --> 00:37:47,560 Speaker 1: this really great map online from the National Park Services, 599 00:37:47,600 --> 00:37:50,440 Speaker 1: part of their Network to Freedom program that marked notable 600 00:37:50,440 --> 00:37:53,560 Speaker 1: locations of the railroad's history. You may have already been 601 00:37:53,560 --> 00:37:57,920 Speaker 1: aware of it. About your researching prowess. She links to it, 602 00:37:58,280 --> 00:38:01,200 Speaker 1: and then says, as anyone who loves a good map, 603 00:38:01,239 --> 00:38:03,760 Speaker 1: I was intrigued to discover not just one, but three 604 00:38:03,800 --> 00:38:07,200 Speaker 1: pins on the map in my city of Lincoln, Nebraska, Nebraska, 605 00:38:07,360 --> 00:38:10,200 Speaker 1: being on the fringes of many escaped slave roots. I 606 00:38:10,239 --> 00:38:12,759 Speaker 1: grew up knowing the likes of John Brown's Cave in 607 00:38:12,840 --> 00:38:15,719 Speaker 1: Nebraska City, but never heard of a connection in the 608 00:38:15,800 --> 00:38:20,439 Speaker 1: state capital. Specifically, there are three documented graves of people 609 00:38:20,480 --> 00:38:23,560 Speaker 1: who escaped slavery via the underground railroad, buried in a 610 00:38:23,640 --> 00:38:26,520 Speaker 1: cemetery less than a mile from where I lived, so 611 00:38:26,600 --> 00:38:30,520 Speaker 1: on a freakishly warm Saturday in February, my husband and 612 00:38:30,560 --> 00:38:34,040 Speaker 1: I paid them a visit and some pictures. The connection 613 00:38:34,120 --> 00:38:37,759 Speaker 1: to Frederick Douglas comes in the form of Ruth Cox Adams, who, 614 00:38:37,840 --> 00:38:41,840 Speaker 1: through a seemingly circuitous route, eventually settled and died in Lincoln, 615 00:38:42,440 --> 00:38:45,800 Speaker 1: born in Maryland as well. Apparently they recognized one another 616 00:38:45,880 --> 00:38:48,600 Speaker 1: vaguely when she met up with him after escaping to 617 00:38:48,680 --> 00:38:51,880 Speaker 1: freedom in New York in eighteen forty two. He referred 618 00:38:51,880 --> 00:38:55,440 Speaker 1: to her as his adopted long lost sister, though it's 619 00:38:55,520 --> 00:38:58,240 Speaker 1: unclear to me if they truly believed they were related, 620 00:38:58,320 --> 00:39:00,600 Speaker 1: or if the phrase was used to connect them because 621 00:39:00,640 --> 00:39:04,279 Speaker 1: of a perceived recognition from their pasts. For years, Ruth 622 00:39:04,360 --> 00:39:06,200 Speaker 1: lived with Douglas and took care of his wife and 623 00:39:06,280 --> 00:39:08,919 Speaker 1: children while he was out of the country. After leave, 624 00:39:09,040 --> 00:39:12,240 Speaker 1: living in Massachusetts with the with the Douglas family, Adams 625 00:39:12,239 --> 00:39:14,759 Speaker 1: married and moved to Rhode Island, then later Nebraska with 626 00:39:14,800 --> 00:39:17,440 Speaker 1: her daughter and son in law, living in various eastern 627 00:39:17,560 --> 00:39:21,160 Speaker 1: Nebraska towns and eventually settling in Lincoln, where she died 628 00:39:21,480 --> 00:39:26,000 Speaker 1: on April two nine. And then she goes on. She 629 00:39:26,040 --> 00:39:27,520 Speaker 1: goes on to say that it's one thing to read 630 00:39:27,560 --> 00:39:30,120 Speaker 1: about famous figures, and then it's another to see how 631 00:39:30,200 --> 00:39:34,480 Speaker 1: far reaching their personal connections can be. Um So I 632 00:39:34,560 --> 00:39:37,000 Speaker 1: found that really interesting. That was not a name I 633 00:39:37,080 --> 00:39:41,440 Speaker 1: had stumbled upon when doing that research. So if you 634 00:39:41,440 --> 00:39:43,319 Speaker 1: would like to write to us about this or any 635 00:39:43,320 --> 00:39:46,279 Speaker 1: other podcast, where at history Podcasts at how stuffworks dot com. 636 00:39:46,360 --> 00:39:49,040 Speaker 1: We're also on Facebook at Facebook dot com, slash missed 637 00:39:49,040 --> 00:39:51,600 Speaker 1: in History and on Twitter at miss in History. 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Also 647 00:40:18,960 --> 00:40:21,759 Speaker 1: a searchable archive of every episode we have ever done. 648 00:40:21,880 --> 00:40:23,359 Speaker 1: So you can do all that and a whole lot 649 00:40:23,360 --> 00:40:25,600 Speaker 1: more that how stuff works dot com or missed than 650 00:40:25,719 --> 00:40:32,799 Speaker 1: history dot com. For more on this and thousands of 651 00:40:32,800 --> 00:40:43,440 Speaker 1: other topics, is it how stuff works dot com