Friday, July 25, 2008

W.O.F. 22 better late than never

What have we here???
I am a child of the City. Grew up in the east coast metropolis. However, in the place where I find myself now, I wind up in some pretty countrified settings. One would be the square dance club to which we belong - which is a lot of fun. So tonight may rank as about the most "country" I've been in some time. The square dance club was asked to put on a little demonstration out at the county fairgrounds because there is a tractor show going on. People collect, show off, and gather around old tractors for the weekend. Obviously, as we headed off this evening, I was thinking "W.O.F. Opportunity!" so I stuffed the little Sony in my pocket.

My selection for tonight comes from the tractor show, but it ain't no tractor. There was this fellow there who collects....hand crank ice cream makers. I love how the world is made up of people who get all passionate about such diverse things (hence the quote with the fireworks that I placed over to the right). This guy talked hand-crank ice cream makers with us for a good fifteen minutes and he'd have gone on if we didn't need to get back with the rest of the square for the next tip (squaredance talk for the next dance).

Anyhow, here's a selection of shots of this guy's collection.
This model dates to the late 1800's - early 1900's, as the sign says.
We were told ice cream was made in the 1600's, called "dainties", and eaten with a fork.

This is an ice crusher. It has some vicious spiked prong-like things inside to shred the ice.
More of the collection - lots of colors.

6 comments:

Jessica said...

Is this #22 already!

Was he making ice cream? Did you get a sample? I love old stuff like that.

Didn't know you were a square dancer... now I have a whole new picture of you... :-)

Anonymous said...

They bear little resemblance to the cuisinart ice cream maker that I have. I wouldn't be surprised if the old ones make better Ice cream.

Ben said...

He made a little ice cream but we were in a rush and didn't get any. Reports were that is it was quite tasty.
I'd say square dancing is maybe the most "unlike me" thing I do - but it's fun and can be challenging to the dance-impaired such as myself.

gerry said...

Brings back memories. We use to sit around and share the cranking with the kids in the backyard. I remember it took a long time, but was the best ice cream and the kids could create whatever flavor they wanted.

Minerva said...

A few summers ago, a friend brought over a big plastic ball that she bought at LL Bean. She's a Kindergarten teacher, so she really got it for her class. We were the guinea pigs to try it out. She put ice and rock salt in it. Then there was a metal canister that she filled with cream, sugar, and fruit. It fit into the middle of the ball. We rolled it in the yard, back and forth between kids and parents for about 20 minutes. Lo and behold, we had ice cream! I wonder if this guy has seen this contraption?

Jen said...

One of those wooden ice cream churners would look great on my porch!
quite a collection!