History with Kev

12/22/2023

Historian Jill Lepore has an interesting article on the New Yorker website on the failure to convict Confederate President Jefferson Davis after the Civil War....

12/22/2023

On December 25, 1868, Andrew Johnson issued his final amnesty proclamation pardoning former Confederates for treason against the United States. Although the vast majority of...

12/22/2023

Thomas Nast did not invent the American Christmas, but the German immigrant did develop the iconic image of its central celebratory figure, Santa Claus. Nast’s...

12/08/2023

Need something to do? Can't sleep?
Then watch my latest presentation video in the Rise and Fall of the Natural Ice Trade.

This video is on the Rise and Fall of the Natural Ice Trade and is presented by Kevin Bair – historywithkev.com and Wakulla County Historical Society. Learn how the natural ice trade started, how the Civil War changed the face of the natural ice trade, and how it helped spur the birth of the mecha...

12/08/2023

Click the photo to watch Kev’s presentation on the Rise and Fall of the Natural Ice Trade.

This video is on the Rise and Fall of the Natural Ice Trade and is presented by Kevin Bair – historywithkev.com and Wakulla County Historical Society. Learn how the natural ice trade started, how the Civil War changed the face of the natural ice trade, and how it helped spur the birth of the mecha...

11/10/2023

This video describes Kev's upcoming talk on the rise and fall of the natural ice trade on Nov. 14, 2023, at the Wakulla County Library. The presentation will discuss Frederick Tudor and his natural ice shipping empire, Dr. John Gorrie, the Civil War blockade, blockade runners with smuggled French ice-making machines, the end of the natural ice trade, and the rise of the ice machine.

This video describes Kev's upcoming talk on the rise and fall of the natural ice trade on Nov. 14, 2023, at the Wakulla County Library. The presentation will...

11/04/2023

WCHS November 2023 Program-The Civil War and the End of the Natural Ice Trade

The Wakulla County Historical Society welcomes back Kevin Bair, who will present a program on, “The Civil War Blockade, Smuggled Ice Machines, and the End of the Natural Ice Trade” at our monthly program at 4:30 p.m., on Tuesday, November 14, 2023, at the Wakulla County Public Library, 4330 Crawfordville Hwy, Crawfordville, FL. The public is invited and there is no charge for this event.

Have you ever wondered what life in the South was like before the ice-making machine? How and where did the Southern States get ice for their drinks, storing food, ice cream, and for medical use? Ice in the South was supplied by the natural ice trade. Frederick Tudor of Boston started the natural ice trade in 1805. Tudor built an ice empire. He was coined the “Ice King”. Tudor shipped ice to Calcutta, the Caribbean, and Southern United States ports.

In 1850, Dr. John Gorrie of Apalachicola patented an early ice-making machine. The future of mechanical ice-making machines threatened the natural ice trade and the “Ice King” by having the capability to produce ice year-round and it was less expensive to produce than shipping ice to the South. In retaliation, the natural ice trade created fake news against Gorrie and others who lobbied for mechanical ice-making machines thus stifling the developing new technology.

It took the Civil War and the Union blockade of Confederate ports that prompted enterprising men in New Orleans desperate for ice in the beer-making businesses to smuggle two ice-making machines from France through the blockade. These machines were reverse-engineered and duplicated and slowly distributed in the South, cutting the South’s dependence on Yankee ice.

For more information, please call the Museum at 850-966-1110.

10/09/2023

Greetings history fans,
we are making a few Civil War stops on our way to the Willard library in Evansville Indiana, to conduct additional research for my dissertation on medical at the battle of Shiloh, April 6,7, 1962. We made a stop at the courthouse in Murfreesboro, Tenn, then Fort Defiance in Clarksville, TN, and then the Oak Hill Cemetery where 598 union and 24 Confederates. Most died at the Marine Hospital or on route from the wounds they received at Shiloh.

09/07/2023

Kevin Bair will give a presentation on “Medicine during the Civil War” at the monthly Wakulla County Historical Society program on Tuesday, September 12, 4:30 p.m., at the Wakulla County Public Library. The public is invited.
Kevin Bair, a Navy veteran, has been an adjunct professor of history at Tallahassee Community College, and is currently working on a doctoral dissertation on Civil War Medicine at the Battle of Pittsburg Landing, aka Shiloh, which was fought April 6-7, 1862. He holds a master’s degree in liberal studies from Johns Hopkins University, focusing on medicine and war. He plans to return to TCC to teach after finishing his doctoral degree in history from Liberty University.
He participated in the Tallahassee History Fair with a booth on Plagues and Diseases. He has written papers and made presentations on Gorrie and the nineteenth century ice trade and, along with Dale Cox, was interviewed by ASU TV (PBS) for the program Local Routes on John Gorrie at the John Gorrie Museum in Apalachicola. His paper, First Battle of Manassas: Unwarranted Deaths of Savable Men, was published in the journal Surgeon’s Call, through the National Museum of Civil War Medicine.
For more information, please call 850-926-1110.

06/29/2023

WFSU’s Mike Plummer explores the complicated story of Apalachicola’s Dr. John Gorrie.

06/29/2023

Greeting,
Sorry that I have not posted much, as I am busy writing my dissertation, but I did take time in April to be interviewed. On April 12, 2023, I had the opportunity to participate in an interview for the local PBS station program called Local Routes. The interview was about Dr. John Gorrie and his 1850 ice-making machine. Mike Plummer, a video producer at Florida State University TV, interviewed me, historian Dale Cox and Joshua Hodson, the manager of the Gorrie Museum. I was chosen for my expertise on Dr. John Gorrie, known for inventing the early artificial ice-making machine patented in 1851 in Apalachicola, Florida.
You can watch the video using the link below.
Kevin
The video link to the 13-minute segment of the Local Routes video on John Gorrie:
https://wfsu.org/local-routes/2023-06-28/john-gorrie-inventor-of-ice-machine/

I have written papers on John Gorrie and Frederic Tutor, the King of the Natural Ice Trade. They can be found at https://historywithkev.com/ and in the links below.
The Civil War, The Ice Trade, And the Rise of the Ice Machine: https://historywithkev.com/2020/08/25/the-civil-war-the-ice-trade-and-the-rise-of-the-ice-machine/
The Natural Ice Trade, preview video a presentation I gave on ice trade: https://historywithkev.com/2021/05/11/938/
Dr. John Gorrie: The birth of Refrigeration and Frederic Tudor: Natural Ice Trade: https://historywithkev.com/2020/06/05/ice-trade/
Dr. John Gorrie, “Father of Refrigeration and Air Conditioning”?: https://historywithkev.com/2021/03/26/831/

John Gorrie and I were mentioned on the UK website-synthesis capital:
https://synthesis.capital/insights/what-the-rise-of-artificial-ice-can-teach-us-about-the-future-adoption-of-alternative-proteins

Here is a link to the John Gorrie Museum: https://www.floridastateparks.org/parks-and-trails/john-gorrie-museum-state-park.

Dale Cox: https://www.facebook.com/BooksbyDaleCox/

Here is a link to the Apalachicola Historical Society: https://aahs.wildapricot.org/