spring box

plural spring boxes · alternative springbox

1. A small compartment or box built over or placed into running water so that containers of perishable foods (milk, etc) inside it are kept cool, a traditional method of refrigeration.

   1 more example

   Springs […] formed where groundwater was pushed up to the surface as a result of differences in slope in the shallow aquifers. […] Ollice's spring surfaced on a hillside beneath the roots of a giant white oak. It flowed into a cypress-encased spring box where fresh milk was stored in the cold water and out through an open-ended pipe eventually making its way to the nearby swamp. For years it served the household needs of several families and the boilers of my great-grandfather's small, steam-powered cotton gin and sawmill.

   2022, Kelby Ouchley, Bayou D’Arbonne Swamp: A Naturalist’s Memoir of Place, page 65

2. alternativeAlternative spelling of spring-box (“box in which springs are coiled or set”).