Amsler's Ice House Castleton N.Y. 12033

 One of the problems one can come up against when researching various history topics is you run out of time. All the people that remember ice houses as a going concern are long gone. People that even remember where such shells were located  have declined greatly as well.  Such is the case with Amsler's Ice House located off Ransom Avenue in my hometown of Castleton N.Y. So with what I know from brief interviews and personal observation this is what I know. Amler's Ice house was located off Ransom Avenue next to the land bought for the Castleton Union School , now the Castleton Elementary  School. It was a smaller ice house and served the uptown section of Castleton above the Hudson River area. It was built inside of a hill which gave it a sunken appearance.  The Amsler family had a small store across the street from the ice house. It had 2 doors one facing Ransom Avenue the other a side entrance. As a kid we hung around the old barn looking structure , as remembered by various people inside were collapsed old pallet type structures. The earth inside had a dusky chalk type feel , probably from old saw dust used as a basic form of insulation for the ice. It was torn down in the late 60's or early 70's because it was considered by the Town Fathers to not only be a danger from collapse but rather ugly. As old barn type structures built from that era it was not easily wrecked. Once down it provided more room for the phone company bld  expansion which was located directly in back of that piece of property. It is now a landscaped piece if property where one would not guess an ice house once stood. The Ransom Avenue  school driveway runs next to where it was. Families like the Amsler's and the Hudson's made a good living from this piece of old technology. General Electric's first refrigerator was built circa 1911. Ice slowly lost it's hold on kitchens across America and as well memories of Ice Men making deliveries from these old structures.My thanks to Beverly Ingalls of Clifton Park and Checker Block of Schodack Landing N.Y. for their memories.