Time Capsule: the Morris Ice Company, Jackson, Mississippi

Morris Ice Company, Jackson, Mississippi (BW400CN film, Leica IIIC, 5 cm ƒ/2 Summitar lens)

Background

Last December (2019), quite by chance, I found a treasure in Jackson. On the way to Jackson Ice to buy ethanol-free gasoline, I saw a car at the old Morris Ice Company warehouse at 652 S. Commerce Street. Next to the building, an old electric pump partly smothered with vines called out to be photographed. A young fellow, Mr. Jack Pickering, looked at my Hasselblad camera with interest and said he had recently bought the building along with 4 acres of land from the heirs of the Morris family.

Pump formerly used to supply water for ice-making operation, Morris Ice. Co. (Kodak Panatomic-X film, Hasselblad 501CM, 80mm ƒ/2.8 Planar-CB lens)

A story in the Jackson Business Journal describes Mr. Pickering's ambitious plans:  https://msbusiness.com/2019/01/old-ice-plant-to-turn-back-pages-of-downtown-jackson/.
He plans to convert the shop into a party/band/restaurant/function place. As of 2019, Pearl River Canoe rents one section of the building. I saw gorgeous wood lath canoes drying on racks, and some guys were trimming wood slats. They make these magnificent canoes totally by hand from willow and other indigenous woods.

I asked Mr. Pickering if I could take some pictures inside, and he generously said I was free to take pictures for about a half hour. A movie group was already inside and had set up lights with colored gels. Someone was going to pose with grandma Morris's 1962 Cadillac, which looked pretty good except for flat tyres. My favorite Panatomic-X film was in the film back. Being a slow film, most of my exposures inside were 1 sec at ƒ/5.6, but one exposure was 20 seconds. One of the cinematographers also admired my Hasselblad film camera.

Ice Industry

During the mid-late 1800s, the ice trade was a major industry for the northern states of the USA. In winter, workmen sawed blocks of ice from frozen lakes and rivers. They stored the ice in specially constructed ice houses using sawdust for insulation. Led by the New England states, ice companies shipped ice around the world - as far as South America and even India. 

In the Civil War, the union armies used ice to reduce fever of wounded souldiers. After the war, cattle companies depended on ice to ship beef to stock-houses in Chicago and to ship finished meat products to eastern cities and even across the Atlantic Ocean to Great Britain. 

The problem with block ice cut from frozen lakes was loss from melting, despite the best attempts at storage and insulation. By the 1880s, improved refrigeration equipment became reliable and capable of mass ice manufacture. In the early years of the 20th century, commercial ice plants finally supplanted ice cut from lakes. 

Mississippi History Now features a very interesting article titled "Making Ice in Mississippi" by Elli Morris (the great-granddaughter of the founder of Morris Ice Company). A Civil War veteran originally founded the Morris Ice Company in 1880.* The original company sold ice that had been shipped down the Mississippi River from northern states. The ice factory at S. Commerce Street was in operation from the 1920s to 1988. It was one of the largest ice distributors in Mississippi. According to Morris,

"With the advent of inexpensive manufactured block ice, new businesses could operate year round in Mississippi, while others moved to the state for the first time. Dairy farming, concrete production, chicken processing plants, bakeries, and florists are a few types of industries that prospered using manufactured block ice. Two industries in particular, farm produce and seafood, grew hand-in-hand with the rise of manufactured block ice."

In 1988, Mr. Morris sold his business to a Carthage ice company. I do not know how long the factory on S. Commerce Street remained in production after that.

Former loading dock (Fuji GW690II camera, 90mm ƒ/3.5 Fujinon lens)

Interior Photographs

The inside of the Morris Ice Company is a amazing time capsule of early 20th century machinery. It is a spectacular setting of tubes, big machines, tools, belts, old shelves, and low-angle lighting.

The belt-driven compressors were for an ammonia cycle, where chilled ammonia circulated through pipes in salt water tanks. The molds made 300-lb ice blocks. Trolleys ran on rails along the rafters to carry the ice blocks to waiting rail cars or trucks.

1920s electrical control panel based on slate panels (50mm ƒ/4 Distagon lens)

The company had its own electricity plant and sold excess electricity the City of Jackson. The electric pump outside (see photograph no. 2) was for the former well, which tapped an aquifer 600 ft below. All the levers and fuses on the electric control panel were mounted on slate panels. This had been a totally manual, old-fashioned operation. I thought it was amazing that the electrical panel had survived the decades.

The desk contained time booklets for all employees back to the 1960s. There was no computer technology here.

Diesel engine (Hasselblad 50mm Distagon lens, 20 sec ƒ/5.6)

This large old diesel engine would turn a pulley. Some of the compressors were turned by electric motors, but possibly this was a backup in case the electrical power failed (see the newspaper article quoted below).

This is a collection of oil cans from the old days. I am sure there was a significant oil consumption keeping the many bearings lubricated.

When the movie crew started, we walked outside and Mr. Pickering took me around back to meet a photographer. This gent lives in a garage apartment. He also commented on the Hasselblad. He said he had just given Pickering one of his Nikkormat cameras and was going to teach him how to do film photography. I told them my first serious camera was a Nikkormat that I bought at Lechmere Sales in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The photographer said he knew the place because he graduated from Boston University in the late 1960s. Come to find out, we both used to visit the same camera stores in Harvard Square back in the day. He also used Panatomic-X years ago. Small world.

Most photographs are from medium format Kodak Panatomic-X film from a Hasselblad 501CM camera. As I noted above, most were 1 or ½ sec. exposures, and I used a tripod to stabilize the camera for all photographs. I specifically scanned at low contrast to show all the texture and detail of the machines. Click any photograph to expand it. When the virus restrictions are finally over, I will ask Mr. Pickering if I can return with my 4×5" camera and record some more of the textures and patterns.

Notes

* CLIPPING FROM:
Clarion-Ledger 
Jackson, Mississippi
01 Oct 1988, Sat  •  Page 20

108-year-old Morris Ice sold to Carthage business
The company, one of the city's oldest, will be called Jackson Ice Co 

By Carol B. McPhail Clarion-Ledger Business Writer  

One of Jackson's oldest businesses Morris Ice Co. is being transferred to the owner of Carthage Ice Co. in Carthage. The company, created by a Civil War veteran in 1880, will start to make ice under the name of Jackson Ice Co. in about three weeks.  

Wendell Harrell of Carthage will take over the business, starting today.
Hebron Morris, president of Morris Ice, will retain the property and lease it to the new owner.  

Harrell is expected to keep most of the approximately 20 veteran workers at the Jackson plant, the second ice plant built in the state.  

Morris, the founder's grandson, said the 65-year-old plant simply was not able to keep up with its more automated competitors. The building on S. Commerce Street re placed an earlier one destroyed by fire in 1923. "With the repairs and replacements required to build a modern plant, we just didn't feel like we could make that investment," Morris, 57, said Friday. He added that the company had been seeking a buyer for the past 45 days.
The plant makes 300-pound blocks of ice a foot thick and 4 feet tall that freeze in IV2 days. Yearly sales average $300,000.  

Workers pour water into cans that are submerged in tanks cooled by ammonia coils and a water-salt solution. Today, most companies use electric-powered compressors to freeze ice in chips, a 30-minute process.  

Morris said one of the rare features of the plant is that it uses gas engines to power the compressors. Those engines have been chugging loudly in the area since most Jack-sonians can remember. "It's going to seem pretty unusual for it to be quiet," Morris said.

Major Loss: Beautiful 1903 Steel Arch Bridge over Jackson Road, Vicksburg, Mississippi

Old-timers remember when Confederate Avenue in the Vicksburg National Military Park crossed Jackson Road on a steel arch bridge. It was a beautiful example of early-20th century engineering - light, airy, and strong. I posted low-resolution contact sheet scans before, but as part of my National Park project, I scanned these 2002 negatives individually at 2400 dpi. In the 1980s, pedestrians could still cross the old bridge, but traffic was routed on a modern concrete bridge.

Photographers from the Library of Congress photographed the bridge as part of the Historic American Buildings Survey/Historic American Engineering Record/Historic American Landscapes Survey. According to the Library of Congress:

Notes
-  Significance: The steel arch bridge on Confederate Avenue in Vicksburg National Military Park is significant for its design. It is the only extant steel arch bridge in the State of Mississippi. The structure was included among a number of the state's historic bridges nominated for the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.
-  Unprocessed Field note material exists for this structure: N479
-  Survey number: HAER MS-12
-  Building/structure dates: 1903 Initial Construction

Look at the last photograph; you can see how a footing has been displaced and has tipped over. But the bridge is still standing, held up by three footings. The structure was not weak. Workmen from Riverside Construction of Vicksburg pulled down the span using a bulldozer and dump trucks on June 20, 2002. They cut up the steel and took it away for recycling.

This is how we lose our architectural and engineering heritage: no one cares, and boneheaded authorities take the cheap and easy way out. For shame.

This is a footing on the north side of the road.

These frames are from Kodak Tri-X Professional film exposed with a Tachihara 4×5 inch wood camera with 75mm ƒ/8 Schneider Super-Angulon or 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lenses. I scanned the negatives with an Epson 3200 Photo scanner and touched up dust or chemical blobs with Photoshop CS5.

From the Archives: Around Vicksburg 1998

Dear Readers, I recently looked through a box of negatives and found a roll of Fuji NGII film from 1998. I remember a gorgeous spring day during which I was testing my new Leica 35mm ƒ/2.0 Summicron lens. I still have this lens and use it regularly. This will be a semi-random look at Vicksburg some two decades ago. (Click any picture to enlarge to 1600 pixels wide.)

Railroad depot, view north, 35mm ƒ/2 Summicron lens, polarizing filter

This is a popular scene that tourists see when they visit the Vicksburg waterfront and view the murals. The Mississippi Valley and Yazoo Railroad Depot was built in 1907 and now houses The Old Depot Museum. The Vicksburg Southern Railroad (VSOR), owned by Watco, operates these tracks for occasional freight to the Port of Vicksburg and to International Paper north of the community of Redwood.

Mulberry Street, Vicksburg 

Lower Grove Street with the Biscuit Company and Velchof's Corner restaurants

Levee Street, view northeast

I took these frames from an apartment on the 3rd floor of the depot. Some young guys were renting the apartment and they kindly let me go out on their balcony. That was before the depot was restored in 2011-2012 (recall how it flooded during the spring 2011 high water). A kidney dialysis clinic occupied the ground floor and the 2nd floor may have been unoccupied.

Former rail sidings at the site where the M/V Mississippi IV is now permanently mounted. 1990 4×5" Fuji 50 transparency, taken on a B&J camera

Since I took these 1998 frames, a number of changes have come to downtown. 10 South Restaurant has been built on top of the bank building. In the lower picture, the M/V Mississippi IV has been permanently mounted on a concrete pad where the old railroad tracks one ran, and the Jesse Brent Lower Mississippi River Museum has been built at 910 Washington Street.

Nice Chevrolet! Corner of Grove and Buck Streets

Ansche Chesed Cemetery, Vicksburg

Anshe Chesed Congregation established this cemetery in 1864 for Vicksburg's Jewish community. In May of 1863, fierce fighting occurred here during the siege of Vicksburg.

Azalea blossoms, Leica 90mm ƒ/2.8 Tele-Elmarit lens

This was a splendid Azalea year, and I could not resist a few "pretty" pictures.

These negatives are from Fuji NGII film. My SilverFast Ai scanning software does not have an NHII profile, so the colors are a bit odd. Resized, they almost look digital, which is not what I am trying to achieve. I think B&W is the more effective way to show the differences between film versus digital capture.

High Water Again: 2020 in Redwood and Eagle Lake, Mississippi

Flood Notes

Residents of the southern part of the Mississippi Delta (not the geologic delta in the Gulf of Mexico, the flat alluvial plain in west central and northwest Mississippi) remember the flood of 2019. The water rose and stayed up, month after month. Thousands of deer and other forest animals died. Crops were delayed or not planted at all. Houses were inundated for months. The Corps of Engineers closed the Steele Bayou flood gates for months, and water in the Yazoo basin rose and rose. It was a messy scene.

Comparison of 2019 and 2020 river level measured at the Vicksburg gage (from US Army Corps of Engineers at https://rivergages.mvr.usace.army.mil/

Unfortunately, 2020 saw another flood. It was shorter but still a mess for residents of the lower Delta. The plot above shows the river level measured at the Vicksburg Gage (they spell it "gage"). The 2019 high water lasted almost four months. While 2020's peak was shorter, it was almost as high at 50 ft. Note that the Corps of Engineers defines flood stage as 43.0 ft.

February 27, 2020 satellite view of lower Mississippi River valley from NASA Earth Observatory. The lower Yazoo basin is the blue region near the center of the frame.

The NASA Earth Observatory published the satellite image above on February 27, 2020. "..the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on the NOAA-NASA Suomi NPP satellite acquired an image showing high water along the lower Mississippi, Pearl, and Pascagoula rivers, among others." The Yazoo Basin is the triangular area in the center of the frame, where the Yazoo River flows into the Mississippi.

Eagle Lake

The residents of the little town of Eagle Lake were inundated for weeks in 2019. Many of the homes and trailers became uninhabitable. In December, group of volunteers called Team Rubicion helped demolish houses at no cost to the residents. Most of the members were veterans.

Eagle Lake on a foggy morning is peaceful and scenic. You can hear the ducks and other waterfowl in the distance.

These photographs are from Shell Beach Road. The Rubicon group was efficient in helping tear down damaged structures. But a friend from Eagle Lake told me that months afterwards, the piles of debris were still there and the county had not sent any trucks to take the junk away. I am not sure of the resolution.

Redwood and Floweree Road

Floweree Road on an overcast day (Moto G5 digital file)

Floweree Road is off US 61 north of Redwood. In 2019, I took photographs of flooding on and around the area. My wife and I biked there several times. This year, I returned with my Tachihara 4×5" camera and Tri-X film. This was in April, but there were no other people about and it was not hazardous re. the virus.

These are all Tri-X frames taken with a 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens with yellow or green filters. Click any picture to expand to 1600 pixels wide.

Tar shingle house, US 61 (Tri-X film, 135mm ƒ/4.5 Xenar lens, GGr filter)

This little shack is at the junction of US 61 and W. Deer Creek Road. It is faced with old-fashioned asphalt tiles (similar to roofing tiles). I have photographed it before, but this year, it looks distinctly more fragile or decayed.

The square photographs at Eagle Lake are from Kodak Panatomic-X film exposed in my Rolleiflex 3.5E camera with 75mm ƒ/3.5 Schneider Xenotar lens. I scanned the negatives with a Minolta Scan Multi film scanner. The photographs from Floweree road are from 4×5" Tri-X film, most with a 180mm Caltar lens.

Weekend in Vienna - from the Archives 1979

Many years ago - a previous life - I took the train from Vienna to London en route back to USA. I had spent seven months in southern Europe, and it was time to return to the US. My original plan was to take the train all the way from Athens, but at the last minute, I bought a cheap student air ticket to Vienna and bypassed the long and questionable train ride through Yugoslavia. 

It was March, winter, the best time to tour a city like Wein, when the cultural season is in full swing. I took a few frames with Kodak Tri-X film using my Nikkormat FTn camera. I can't recall who developed the film, but it is a mess of scratches.

Dorky American traveler in the Schönbrunn Palace, Vienna

Schönbrunn Palace Glorietta

Schönbrunn gardens, 28mm ƒ/3.5 Nikkor lens

Schönbrunn gardens, 28mm ƒ/3.5 Nikkor lens

Vienna is full of astonishing cultural and artistic treasures - churches, palaces, statues, concert halls, and museums - remnants from the glorious years of the Hapsburg Empire.* And it looks amazingly good. It is not an urban decay place. The photographs above are from the Schönbrunn Palace, the main summer residence of the Habsburg rulers.

The Karskirche is a Baroque church located on the south side of Karlsplatz. It is a curious architectural mixture of ancient Greek and Roman elements with Byzantine, Renaissance, and Baroque styles. Vienna is full of sights like this.

Photograph of Strauſs from https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b8453822q/f1.item

Vienna is the city of music. Here is Johann Strauſs the Younger (1825-1899). You see him all over town, along with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791). Joseph Haydn, Antonio Vivaldi, Christoph Willibald Gluck, Antonio Salieri, and Franz Schubert also spent time in Vienna.

Staatsoper from the student ticket section

As I noted above, European cities are rewarding in the off season, when cultural events are in full swing. As I recall, I bought a student ticket at the Weiner Staatsoper and had to stand in the upper balcony for a 5-hour performance of Tristan und Isolde. Note how in those days I traveled with a suit and neckties. That is how you dressed in a city. Not only that, back then, gents wore a suit on the airplane, and ladies were similarly properly attired. Today, we have become swine, especially Americans.

In the future, you will see more photographs from the archives. Despite the flaws in these 1979 negatives, the data is still there. Will our digital files be readable (or even last) 40 years? Think about it - you already know the answer.....

* My grandmother told me she remembered visiting Vienna with her sister when it still was Hapsburg. It is amazing how many changes have occurred in one century.

Demolition Pending: 2-Story 1920s (?) House, 900 National Street, Vicksburg, Mississippi

900 National Street from bridge crossing Stouts Bayou (Hasselblad 50mm Distagon lens, Kodak Tri-X film)

A 2-story asbestos-clad house at 900 National Street has been unoccupied for many years. It has a relatively new steel roof, so it has not obviously suffered the water damage and rot that destroys most abandoned Vicksburg houses. But the windows have been open or rotted, and vines have crept up and into some rooms. Someone does periodically cut the lawn, sort-of.

A February 18, 2020, article in the Vicksburg Post stated that this was one of three blighted houses in town slated for imminent demolition.

The house was clad with asbestos shingles, which were popular in the 1920s and later. The shingles hold paint well, do not rot, resist vermin, and resist fire from external sources, meaning embers from fires. During the turn of the century, many homes in Vicksburg heated with coal. Embers often went up chimneys and landed on roofs. Asbestos shingles solved the hazard of roofs and siding catching on fire.

National Street is pretty grungy now. It is an example of the urban decay I see in so many USA towns and cities - our race to the bottom. As of July 2020, the 2-story house was still standing. Possibly the Covid virus disrupted the City's plans regarding blighted properties, or possibly someone bought the house and promised to make repairs.

1920s concrete bridge over Stouts Bayou, National Street

Stouts Bayou view north from National Street (Olympus Trip 35, Kodak TMax 100 film)

Stouts Bayou flows through Vicksburg. It was partly channelized in the 1930s as part of a Works Progress Administration (WPA) project. It has received minimal maintenance since then.

I took the four 2019 photographs with Kodak Panatomic-X film with my Hasselblad 501CM camera, tripod-mounted. Praus Productions in Rochester, NY, developed the film in XTOL. I scanned the negatives with a Minolta Scan Multi medium format film scanner.

Update Jan. 2022: The house is still standing. A nearby resident told me that she had not. seen any activity there for years.

Update Jan. 2023: Someone is doing some minor repairs. Some of the windows have plywood panels over them.

More Scenery in South Jackson: East Rankin Street

Canadian National rail line, view south from E. Rankin St., Jackson, MS (Panatomic-X film, Hasselblad 501CM camera, 250mm ƒ/5.6 Sonnar lens)

Over the last few years, I have been exploring the industrial area in east Jackson. As a follow-up, during the winter of 2019-2020, I wandered around East Rankin Street with my medium format cameras. Jackson never disappoints regarding dumpy places to photograph. This part of town was once industrial, but today, many of the warehouses are unused, and I see little evidence of a revival.

There are a number of car repair shops off Rankin, some in business, some comatose. This place repairs the classic square Volvos.

Town Creek, Jackson, Mississippi (Panatomic-X film, Hasselblad 501CM camera, 50mm ƒ/4 Distagon lens, yellow filter) 

Near State Street, a bridge carries E. Rankin Street over Town Creek. The waterway is revolting, with trash, debris, and stagnant water. A 2013 article in Jackson Free Press described some plans to make the water course a recreational asset for the city:

Many see Jackson's multiple creeks as nothing more than drainage ditches. They are undevelopable space offering only the threat of flooding, bank caving and snakes. Other cities, however, are increasingly recognizing the value that urban creeks can offer as parks, recreational corridors, and in improving water quality and environmental health. 

Town Creek stretches from northwest Jackson (through the heart of the proposed "Medical Corridor"), past the Jackson Zoo, to where it flows under downtown Jackson, day-lighting again just to the south of the Mississippi Museum of Art. Numerous planning sketches have been drawn for the downtown portion of Town Creek, stretching from the art museum to its confluence with the Pearl River. The future of the "Town Lake" and "River Walk" portions of the creek, however, are largely tied to flood-control planning along the Pearl.

 

Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) advisory map for Town Creek, 12 Dec. 2014.

This map from MDEQ shows Town Creek in central Jackson.

Town Creek from E. Rankin Street (Moto G5 digital file)

Auto Platinum, a now-defunct car shop, backs up to Town Creek. These two cars are Cadillac Allanté coupes. These were 2-seaters with bodies made in Italy and final assembly in USA. Platinum must have intended to restore and sell them, but now they sit forlorn and lonely in the grass.

State Street view north, Jackson, Mississippi (Panatomic-X film, Rolleiflex 3.5E Xenotar, yellow filter)

We reach State Street, a major north-south road which eventually connects with US 80 and I-20 a short distance south of the Rankin intersection. State Street is pretty grim in this area. Auto Platinum had an interesting sign with a Corvette perched on top. The fiberglass body was light weight, so a suitable item to perch on a billboard.

State Street view south, Jackson, Mississippi (Panatomic-X film, Rolleiflex 3.5E Xenotar, yellow filter)

This was once car dealership row. The Paul Moak Volvo dealer was formerly across the street, but they moved to a new shop next to I-20 many years ago.

This has been a very brief view of parts of south Jackson. We will continue our survey in the future. For more articles about Jackson, type "Jackson" in the search box.