Although I couldn't locate any references to skating in Shakespeare, I do happen to have some information about it in nineteenth-century Philadelphia, culled from my research on Rebecca Gratz.
The years from about 1830 to 1860 had some frigid winters with the Schuykill and the Delaware River completely frozen across and ready for skaters. Above is an image of a lithograph of skaters on the Delaware in one of the coldest winters, 1856, and as you can see, lots of people turned out for the fun. It must have been very cold and the ice very hard for so many to skate safely on the river at one time.
There's no record of Rebecca skating and by 1856 she was far too old for the sport. The closest she got to ice that year was the slick in front of her front door, and although the little boys of the neighborhood enjoyed it, she had the ice covered.
I remember skating on the Susquehanna River as a child. We lived in a small town on the west shore and I remember the bonfire on the river bank and also, how smooth the ice was. Wonder why this never happens these days!
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