This structure served for many years as the farm's ice house, though it may have been one of the first buildings erected there and, according to Sutherland-Wilson family tradition, may have been the family's first shelter; it once had a lean-to attached on the west side. Standing at the edge of the farmyard, it was easy for horse-drawn wagons and sledges to reach in winter, when ice for use through the rest of the year was stored inside. Most of that ice was cut from the pond behind the dam in Saline, and some may have come from Mastodon Marsh southeast of the farm. The ice blocks were packed in straw or sawdust to protect them from summer heat, then carried as needed to the kitchen and placed in the upper section of an ice box, with food kept below. The building also offered a source of cool relief, as its shaded east wall, chilled by the diminishing ice supply within, would have been a welcome place for farmhands to rest against after long work in the August heat.