Hello all,
        Here is a reference to root cellars from a Canadian perspective.
 
        Samuel Strickland in his 1853 work "Twenty-SEven Years in Canada
West or the Experience of an Early Settler" recommended that all log
cabins should have a root cellar built below them.  Built as such, the
provisions would be kept from freezing in the winter, but kept cool in
the summer.  He described the building as such:
        "A log shanty, twenty-four feet long by sixteen, is large enough
to begin with, and should be roofed wither with shingles or troughs.  A
small cellar should be dug near the fire-place, commodious enough to hold
twenty or thirty bushels of potatoes, a barrel or two of prok, &c."
(Strickland 1853:165)
        I also came across a reference while reading some of the early
settler accounts of a settler who dug the cellar, put the supplies in and
closed it up tight for the summer, when the winter came, and he opened it
up to get at the much needed foodstuffs, most of it had spoiled as he had
neglected to allow the cellar to breathe.  I can't remember the reference
off the top of my head, but if it is useful to you, I can look it up.
 
        That's it for now, hope it helped.
 
        Dwayne James
        Graduate Student at Trent University
        [log in to unmask]