Ice Cream in American History
Ice cream has played a subtle role in America’s history. In many ways, it characterizes some of the best qualities of America: innovative, refreshing, joyful, inspiring, and lovable.
It may not be surprising, then, that our founding fathers each shared a close relationship with the ice cream pastime. George Washington, himself, was a great ice cream lover. He possessed two of his own ice cream makers at home. Thomas Jefferson, author of the declaration of independence, had his own love affair with French style ice cream, which is richly imbued with vanilla and served enveloped in a pastry. He, too, had 2 ice cream machines. President James Madison and his wife, Dolly, became famous for serving ice cream at their inaugural ball, the milk of which was supplied by their very own cows! Dolly further served ice cream regularly to important guests at the White House and it was greatly through her influence that ice cream became a widespread American delicacy.
Later Presidents continued the ice cream tradition. Franklin Roosevelt was known for being a chocolate ice cream lover, again serving it to his distinguished political visitors. Ronald Reagan was so fond of ice cream that he dubbed July “National Ice Cream Month” and the 3rd Sunday in July as “National Ice Cream Day” in 1984.
It may be no wonder, then, that Americans consume more ice cream than any other country in the world – an average of 23 quarts per person, per year! This may be traced back as far as the 1800’s when there began the “Hokey Pokey” trend. Ice cream merchants used to call out the Italian phrase “Ecco un poco”, meaning “Try a bit” or “Have a sample” as they would offer passers by a spoonful to taste their delicious goods. What was then called “Hokey Pokey” ice cream soon evolved into “penny licks” which were a small portion of ice cream in a dish for only a penny.
In the end of the 1800’s, the first version of the ice cream cone was created by a man named Italo Marchiony, who sold ice cream on Wall Street. After being fed up with broken or stolen ice cream dishes, he designed an edible cookie-bowl to serve his customers in. It even had a handle and resembled a mug! This later developed into our well known and well loved ice cream cones.
As more and more nationalities integrated into America’s melting pot, ice cream became more and more of a symbol of friendship and unity. In fact, ice cream began being introduced to America’s newcomers as soon as they arrived in Ellis Island, as a welcoming introduction to American culture. Many of them were unfamiliar with ice cream and tried to spread it on bread as if it were butter! Luckily, it didn’t take long for them to learn the proper manner for eating ice cream.
It wasn’t long before America’s first waffle cones were served fortuitously at the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis. One of the ice cream vendors ran out of cups to serve his ice cream, so he enlisted the help of his neighboring waffle vendor and asked him to roll his waffles into cones for him to use. As they say, necessity is the mother of invention; and in this case, a delicious one!
Last, but not least, a description of American ice cream would be incomplete without mentioning our very dear Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream. Like so many American stars, it was born in a small town, among the rolling hills of Vermont. It all began in an old gas station which they converted into an ice cream shop. Like so much of America, it’s beginnings were so humble, but the results have helped change the world into a better place.
Here’s to ice cream and a bright future for America!
