[Zhurh]

Most fruit cellars here in Ak are under people's cabins. Most small cabins are on cement posts and skirting & insulation around base of cabin. Permafrost affects everything up here. So people dig a room 10 foot down and line it with wood or block walls. They have a trap door from their first floor and keep a light bulb, sometimes several as heat source to keep it from freezing when it gets down to minus 60. You want it t stay as close to right above freezing as possible. We have cement foundation and wifey won't let me take a jack hammer to the basement floor so I use my neighbors to store a few hundred lb taters in. One back room in my basement also stays around 45-50 degrees during winter so it works for me, keep 1000 lb down there. People keep meat and all kinds of produce in fruit cellars.

Back east, many people have houses built against hillsides. I had an uncle, house had been family hundreds of years. One of my ancestors had dug a cave back into the bedrock about 30-40 feet and had a big room, spring water that filled up a cement tank/pool of sorts they had built, always ran. He had the best surface spring water and also had hoses and used the excess to water his garden. It was unreal, but just how they done it in the 1800's. It could have been 100 degrees outside, it was 40 in the cave. Even better than a spring house which one can make if they have a small wet spring anywhere on their property.