Freezing Technology

UT pioneered in freezing technology, beginning studies with a contract from TVA to the Engineering Experiment Station to develop means of freezing strawberries. In the late 1930s, frozen strawberries and blackberries were shipped from the Agricultural Experiment Station in Knoxville across the country. In 1941 the Engineering Experiment Station published UT researcher Harry Carlton’s manual on frozen foods, which gave procedures for preparation from harvest to freezing to marketing. A short course in the College of Agriculture in 1942 for freezing agricultural products is believed to have been the first in the country. Through the research conducted at UT and with the guidance of extension agents, W. Ed Booker established the Winter Garden, Incorporated, a frozen food processing plant in Knoxville.