Home Feed
Home
Search
Search
Add Review, Blurb, Quote
Add
Activity
Activity
Profile
Profile
Ice
Ice: From Mixed Drinks to Skating Rinks--a Cool History of a Hot Commodity | Amy Brady
5 posts | 3 read | 5 to read
The unexpected and unexplored ways that ice has transformed a nationfrom the foods Americans eat, to the sports they play, to the way they live todayand what its future might look like on a swiftly warming planet. Ice is everywhere: in gas stations, in restaurants, in hospitals, in our homes. Americans think nothing of dropping a few ice cubes into tall glasses of tea to ward off the heat of a hot summer day. Most refrigerators owned by Americans feature automatic ice machines. Ice on-demand has so revolutionized modern life that its easy to forget that it wasnt always this wayand to overlook what aspects of society might just melt away as the planet warms. In Ice, journalist and historian Amy Brady shares the strange and storied two-hundred-year-old history of ice in America: from the introduction of mixed drinks on the rocks, to the nations first-ever indoor ice rink, to how delicacies like ice creams and iced tea revolutionized our palates, to the ubiquitous ice machine in every motel across the US. But Ice doesnt end in the past. Brady also explores the surprising present-day uses of ice in sports, medicine, and sustainable energyincluding cutting-edge cryotherapy breast-cancer treatments and new refrigerator technologies that may prove to be more energy efficientunderscoring how precious this commodity is, especially in an age of climate change.
Amazon Indiebound Barnes and Noble WorldCat Goodreads LibraryThing
Pick icon
100%
review
KCofKaysville
Pickpick

Very fascinating story of mankind‘s dealings with ice and how it became possible to manufacture it. With asides on ice cream, health uses, art, sports, and global warming, etc. Worthwhile!

blurb
KCofKaysville
post image

Started a book from the Public Library that looked very interesting.

32 likes1 stack add
blurb
keithmalek
post image

From the Onion🤣🤣🤣

review
britt_brooke
post image
Pickpick

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Yes, an entire book about … frozen water. Medical uses, ice cream, popsicles, cocktails, sports surfaces, manufacturing advances, and even its role in the advent of the modern convenience store. Don‘t take ice for granted, y‘all. It‘s a much bigger part of everyday life, and history, than you realize. Fascinating read!

68 likes2 stack adds
review
Walaka
Pickpick

Ice is a fun book that gives a well-researched but accessible account of its topic substance through the lenses of social, political, and economic history. The book is well-organized,always holding the reader's interest.

Special kudos go to Brady for recognizing and mentioning the often overlooked contexts of capitalism, colonialism, and racism that play such an important if unfortunate part in human history.