Birdseye's Fantastic Machine

Birdseye had discovered the principle for food preservation, but there were problems to solve before quick frozen foods could be prepared and marketed.  Each food was frozen or defrosted differently depending on the cell structure.  The precise temperature needed to be discovered to retain texture, taste and quality.  Birdseye needed to invent his own machine to quick freeze because mere refrigeration principles were not enough.

Cold storage and household refrigeration had generally depended on drawing heat out of the food by cold air.  This process, however, was not fast enough for quick freezing,  Birdseye's invention froze food by conduction - by pushing thin food particles through metal plates at 25 degrees below zero.  The temperature and freezing time needed to be closely controlled.

Birdseye's process was first applied to seafood to which it worked well.  The ocean catch could be quick frozen as soon as it was lifted aboard the boat.  Later it was found that the frozen food could be pre-cooked and sold ready-to-eat. 

We can thank Clarence for the freezer department on our refrigerators!   Deep freeze compartments were added to home refrigerators once his frozen foods grew in variety and popularity.  By the 1940s small towns had central frozen food lockers where hunters and fishermen could store their catch year round.  By the 1950s one household in three had its own deep freezer, separate from the refrigerator and frozen foods were common place in the American diet.  By the time many of us remember the first Swanson Turkey TV Dinner, frozen foods had been around for almost a hundred years already!

Next time...Traveling in Luxury
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Today in Pioneer History:  "On November 25, 1963, the funeral of President John F. Kennedy was concluded with burial in Arlington National Cemetery with full military honors.  Many of us watched the three days of coverage on TV, the first media coverage on such a large scale, 40 years before 9/11.  Later Jackie Kennedy had the "eternal flame" placed at his grave, which still burns almost 50 years later.