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| Real Photo Postcard, Kerrville from Tivy Mountain, around 1950. |
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Thursday, February 3, 2011
Kerrville, around 1950, a different view.
I see a lot of images taken of Kerrville from south of the river, looking north. This makes sense, because from that hill you can see downtown pretty well. But there's another prominent hill from which one could take a photo, and in this shot, the photographer did: from Tivy Mountain. Note the old Blue Bonnet Hotel, the Ice House, and the newly-built Sid Peterson Memorial Hospital.
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I remember the ice plant and the Blue Bonnet Hotel very well. Both were important to Kerrville's history.
ReplyDeleteI will never forget the Christmas music that emanated from the top of the Blue Bonnet Hotel every December. It was loud, but beautiful.
The ice plant produced 300 pound blocks of ice. Then, the blocks were sent through a scoring machine that carved small grooves in the ice so that an ice pick could be used to chop the 300 pound blocks into 50 pound blocks.
The 50 pound blocks could then be chopped into 25 pound blocks and then 12 1/2 pound blocks.
City crews stopped by the ice plant every morning to fill their drinking water containers with ice.
They would hand the ice plant employee a coupon, torn from a pre-purchased book of coupons. The coupon would be payment for the ice.
I remember Mr. Eastland, Mr. Morgan, Mr. Tamplin and Mr. Jones.
Mr. Eastland owned the ice plant, Mr. Morgan was the manager, Mr. Tamplin was Mr. Morgan's assistant and Mr. Jones "pulled" the ice.
Pulling the ice meant using an electric winch to lift the heavy, steel ice vats out of the brine and then dump the ice from the vat onto the platform, where it could be scored and then dragged into an ice vault.
I suspect it was very, very hard work, but Mr. Jones was up to the task for he was an incredibly powerful man.
I miss the old Blue Bonnet Hotel and the Ice Plant.
If anyone has photos of the hotel or ice plant (during construction, after construction or during demolition) please loan them to Joe so that he might consider posting them on his blog.
I would love to see those old photos.
Thanks.