Kendall Farm is located on Boyden Lake in “Way Downeast” Maine at easternmost point of the US. The farm was purchased in 1854 by my great-great-grandfather, Robert Golding. The circa 1820 farmhouse has been home to my family ever since, and a renovation a few years ago outlined in this Quoddy Tides newspaper article, revealed some surprising history.

At the turn of the century, as more families came to summer on the lake, my grandfather and father hand-sawed ice from the frozen lakes in winter, packed the blocks in hay, and hauled the blocks by horse-drawn sleds to ice houses in the cottages along Boyden Lake. By June, it would still be solid and ready for summer residents to use for refrigeration.