Ice cream is our favorite dessert.

“You scream, I scream, for ice cream” was a summer cry of the neighborhood kids as we listened for the bell and looked down the street for the ice cream man.

We love the frozen confection. So much so that the average American consumes 23.2 quarts a year.

Let’s visit the origins of this popular summer past-time.

Ice cream was invented about 4,000 years ago in China. On the streets of Peking, iced treats sold from pushcarts. Marco Polo grabbed an icy and introduced the dessert to fourteenth-century Italy. From there, the chilly delight traveled to France for King Henry II’s wedding in 1533. Because ice was hard to store and expensive to keep, ice cream was at this time a costly delectable reserved for royalty. Then, in 1560, it was discovered that if you added a bit of salt to the bath of snow and ice, the ice cream became solidly frozen and more transportable. Ice cream for the masses was on the way.

By 1870, the Italian ice cream vendor or “hokey pokey” man was plying his trade on the streets of London. Hokey pokey was a child’s hearing of the vendor’s cry in Italian, “Ecco in poco” — “Here’s a little.” From there, the hokey pokey man and the street sales of ice cream traveled to the New World, which was hungrily awaiting a taste.

To this point, ice cream was sold in saucers and dishes. Until 1904, at the St. Louis World’s Fair, when an ice cream vendor ran out of dishes. His neighbor vendor reached over a rolled waffle. The purveyor of bowls of ice cream looked hard at that rolled waffle, hesitated a second, scooped a scoop and placed the frozen concoction atop the edible cone. The ice cream cone was born to the joy of the thirteen million fair goers.

Within a decade, one third of all ice cream was consumed in cones. And, it gets even better. In 1920, in Youngstown, Ohio, the “Good Humor Sucker” was invented, the first chocolate-covered vanilla ice cream bar on a stick. With that the hokey pokey man became the Good Humor man and ice cream took off to new realms of presentation and consumption.

A double WOW and a half to ice cream, our favorite sport on a warm summer evening. Think happy thoughts, smack your lips and head to your local good humor stand. It is a tradition with a rich history that we must continue.

Roll your eyes and enjoy that ice cream,

Grandpa Jim

PS: “Mary and the Mud Pie Wedding Reception” is under Mary Stories. Give it a read if you haven’t and another if you have, and don’t miss the song.

PPS: The next Uncle Joe Story is only 7 days away!!!!!!!