
Ice Cream Charlie

Photo: Sali Mahomet with his original ice cream
cart, ca. 1903.
- Ferrymead Heritage Park.
Sali Mahomet, who had previously been a
hawker around the South Island with his father, moved from
Dunedin to Christchurch and set up his own business in 1903,
applying
to the City
Council
for a license to sell
ice
cream
in Christchurch's Cathedral Square. Initially he made ice
cream from his home in a hand-cranked churn, rising before
dawn, carting it into town, and selling it in summer
from his red, white and gold ice cream cart outside the Bank
of New Zealand on the south-eastern corner of the Square.
Sali became 'Charlie' and eventually became known to generations
as ‘Ice
Cream Charlie’.
By 1907
he was manufacturing in his own electric-powered "dairy" (a
stand-alone building behind his house) at 69 Caledonian Rd.,
St. Albans.

Photo: Sali Mahomet making ice cream in his 'dairy' behind
his house at
69
Caledonian Road, St Albans, ca. 1910
- Christchurch
City Libraries File Reference CCL
PhotoCD 18, IMG0041.
Milk and cream was supplied by the Tai Tapu Dairy Company, and flavour syrups
by wholesale druggist H F Stevens.
A horse and cart would deliver one hundred weight (42kg) blocks of ice from the
Canterbury Frozen Meat Company each morning. Ice and salt was used to freeze
the ice cream, made in four Westinghouse churns, and also for packing around
the
ice
cream
to
transport
it
into
the
Square
and
keep it frozen during the day.
Sali's ice cream was sold in cup-shaped cones and glass sundae dishes with silver
spoons, and in small and large take-home packs, or customers could take home
ice cream
in their own containers.
A journalist reported:
“Ice-cream Charlie’s stall… is a rendezvous
for children and for boys, youths and young men, mainly on
bicycles, who, while hurrying through the town on errands,
can only spend a few minutes for refreshment. Parents passing
the stall find it difficult to resist the persuasions of their
children and often join them in having an ice-cream.”
The Press of 1 May 1915 reported that four ice cream
sellers, including Sali, were prosecuted by the Health
Department for selling ice
cream that did not comply with the regulations, ie., milk fat
levels below the legal standard of 10%. He was fined 5
shillings and costs.

Advertisement, Press, 16 December 1915
In January 1916, Sali contributed 10 gallons of ice cream to the Red Cross Fund
for sick and wounded soldiers.
‘Ice
Cream Charlie’ became a Christchurch institution and he continued to sell
ice cream in the Square until 1942.
In later years, Sali made attempts to sell the business, in 1932, and again in
1940:

Advertisement, New Zealand Herald, 7 December 1940
However these were unsuccessful, and Ice Cream Charlie carried on, until in 1942,
at
age
76,
a
stroke
left
Sali
unable
to
continue.
Sali died a year later after a second stroke, on October 7th, 1943.
Read
much more about Sali Mahomet at Lost
Christchurch.
Sali Mahomet had gone, but his iconic "Ice Cream Charlie" legacy lives
on -
subsequent
ice
cream
vendors,
based
mostly
around
Victoria
Square,
have
taken up the famous name, and to this day you can still
buy an ice
cream in Christchurch from an Ice Cream Charlie.
Victor James Wilkinson
(1902-1985) was the
second Ice Cream
Charlie.
Sali's decayed dairy was still standing in 1999.
Two of Sali's original
ice cream carts survive and are displayed at Ferrymead Heritage Park:

Photo: Sali Mahomet's original ice cream cart - note hand-cranked
churn.
-
Chris Newey; Ferrymead Heritage Park.

Photo: Sali Mahomet's second, larger ice cream cart.
-
Chris Newey; Ferrymead Heritage Park.
Over the years there have been just seven owners of
the Ice Cream Charlie business and all have honoured Sali's
heritage, maintaining the same vanilla ice recipe and
the loyalty of the public.
On
the 6th of December 2020, Christchurch mayor Lianne
Dalziel
officially opened Ice
Cream Charlie's brand new ice cream cart "Peggy". Peggy replaced "Edith", the
pink cart that had faithfully served up the company's famous vanilla
ice in Victoria Square
for the
last 70
years.
Other references and related sites:
Christchurch City Libraries
http://christchurchcitylibraries.com/Heritage/Photos/Disc18/IMG0041.asp
Ferrymead Heritage Park
www.ferrymead.org.nz
Ice Cream Charlie
www.icecreamcharlie.co.nz
Lost Christchurch:
http://lostchristchurch.org.nz/icecream-charlie-icecream-vendor-cathedral-square-c-1930
Papers Past (National Library of New Zealand digitised newspapers database):
http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/
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Ice Cream Brands from the Past. |