college ice n [See quot 1896] chiefly NEng old-fash
An ice-cream sundae.
1896 Worcester Daily Spy (MA) 19 May 4/4, Easton’s is besieged these days by thirsty customers, eager for a soda, a shrub, moxie or a college ice. The full name of the latter drink is Smith College ice. . . As translated into the less intellectual air of Worcester, the college ice is made thusly: Take a slender cup or glass and fill it about two-thirds full with vanilla icecream. On the top of this plump perhaps two tablespoons of preserve . . , and then you want to take a long handled spoon, if you have one, and dabble it all up together. 1904 Deland Weekly News (FL) [22 Jan 5]/1, [Advt:] College Ices with Menthe Cherries, Menthe Pineapple, Maraschino cherries, or Maraschino Pineapple, a specialty at Fudgers’s. 1908 St. Albans Daily Messenger (VT) 1 June 2/2, [Advt:] A Chocolate College Ice at Huber’s is “different.” Smooth, tasty ice cream covered with heavy chocolate sauce. 1913 DN 4.39, Sundae, a name now in established usage for college ices. 1925 Berkshire Eve. Eagle (Pittsfield MA) 26 June 15/1, [Advt:] Fresh Fruit College Ices and Sundaes. 1942 Hale Prodigal Women 34 MA (as of 1905–40), They spent every cent of money they could beg, on college ices. 1957 Rose Block Is. 176 sRI (as of early 1900s), Only ten cents for an ice cream soda, fifteen for a college ice, a cabinet or a banana split. 1967 DARE (QR p46) Inf MA50, College ice. c1970 DARE File csMA, College ice, a sundae. 1980 Ibid cnMA (as of c1915), By the time I was in high school we had sundaes, but the first ice cream with “sauce” on it that I ever had in a drug store was a college ice.