Ever wonder why The Greatest Generation has such an easy-going air and rolls with the punches so well? Their ranks are thinning but they still stand as an example. They show us how to arrange our priorities.
Step into a time machine and go back to November 11, 1940. The Great Depression had been horrid. We were coming out of that in fits and starts, but adversity was still plentiful. Jobs remained scarce. Same with disposable income.
The modern conveniences we take for granted in rural areas were not a given. We're talking electricity, telephones and running water.
So it was a heckuva time for an historic blizzard to blow in. But just such a scenario unfolded on November 11, 1940.
Just think of all the people whose lives would change in the next couple years because of WWII. We were watching that conflict from afar then. There was a huge movement to remain as spectators. That attitude would change abruptly with the bombing of Pearl Harbor.
It was about one year prior to Pearl Harbor that Minnesota got swept over by the most tragic blizzard ever.
Was it actually the worst blizzard? Absolute statements are hard to make, but in light of how Minnesotans lived in 1940, minus many of the resources of today, it stands as the worst. Even the best wool hunting clothes could leave us feeling wet and cold.
Today we take for granted our synthetics and water-resistant items.
In so many ways we didn't have the assets of today to fend off the dangers of Minnesota's harshest weather. Many people were killed.
The year 1940 grows more remote in time. We are blessed having Betty Waage in our midst who can recite specifics.
Sherman and Betty Waage are members of my church in Morris: First Lutheran. They have come to our home two or three times because they offer to make personal visits to people 90-plus years of age on occasion of their birthday. What a wonderful gesture to people whose mobility is usually greatly reduced.
My father is 95. He still gets around thanks to yours truly, but it's a challenge.
My father once shared his own stories about the Armistice Day Blizzard and I should have written it down. His mind today is OK but many specific memories of those long-ago times have faded.
Betty was 13 years old at the time of the fateful storm. She was the oldest of six children.
"This storm was different," Betty recalled in the book "All Hell Broke Loose" by William H. Hull. She recalled bitter cold and a "swirling wind" that impeded one's breathing.
The family lived seven blocks from main street in Morris - "the outskirts of town," as she described it. The family needed to get groceries and coal for the cookstove. The stove was a source of heat for the kitchen and entry.
Betty and her father trekked out in the storm, getting some protection from buildings. On the way back that protection became insufficient. She recalled "the full force of the wind" unleashing itself, making it uncertain where the road even was.
Her father said "let's turn back." Betty spotted some lilac bushes where she recalled playing, so her orientation was restored and she insisted they could proceed on.
"Somehow we had to make it," Betty said.
With half a block left, there was no assurance this trek would be completed, when along came a neighbor in a vehicle. The neighbor had the father and daughter get in, affording relief from the absolutely piercing cold.
Betty and her dad made it to their front door, bringing great relief for mom who was with the small children with limited supplies. There was no phone in the home. There was an unreliable radio.
They checked on the chicken shed as soon as the weather allowed. Snow was ubiquitous, packed everywhere, and certainly the chickens must have expired, they felt.
There was "a loud squawk," Betty recalled. They removed snow with their hands, ultimately to find the chickens had miraculously survived.
"We were thankful also that we were all alive and survived that storm," Betty told author Hull. "For me, it was an experience that I will never forget."
The chapter in which Betty gave her story was called "Seven Very Tough Blocks to Walk." One shivers when looking at the chapter name that follows hers: "Sheep Stuck to the Ground at Backus."
Hull's bock was copyrighted in 1985.
Weather forecasting was a primitive proposition in 1940 compared to today. Hull pointed out that road-clearing vehicles were likewise far less developed and plentiful. There was no interstate highway system.
It's important to emphasize that the nature of clothing was an impediment. Today we have "heat efficient and water protective outerwear," Hull pointed out. Also, "modern airlift capabilities."
Houses didn't afford a good enough defense and in many cases there was no central heating. Insulation could be quite deficient if it existed at all. Rural areas had special challenges even during good weather.
Antifreeze was expensive. So, many people opted for alcohol in auto radiators. But if applied too soon on the calendar, "it could overheat and boil away and be lost," Hull wrote.
Betty and her father benefited from the caring neighbor in the vehicle. But such gestures weren't necessarily the norm, contradicting the notion we might have about "the good old days," Hull observed. Many who could have shared did not.
I have written before about "the old oaken bucket principle" in which we think surely the people of past eras lived a richer life. But if we spent some time in 1940, we'd surely decide to hop in that time machine and plop back to the present.
"All Hell Broke Loose," to recite again the title of Hull's book, and about a year later we'd be pulled into WWII with its unspeakable tragedies, even though good prevailed over evil.
Hull noted he could only share a portion of the blizzard stories he collected, due to the space limitations presented by the book. I hope all the stories he gathered are still preserved somewhere. Because today we have the Internet.
- Brian Williams - morris mn Minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com
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