Montgomery County History Center | David McFarland
Most of us weathered new year 2017-18 with a chill or two and lots of frozen water pipes. I even heard of a water tower freezing solid in Eastern Iowa. Remember though, we live in the Midwest, and never take Iowa for granted, she is unpredictable and she is always full of surprises.
There are none of us left who can remember the Blizzard of 1888. It is often referred to as the “Schoolhouse Blizzard,” because so many school children and teachers fell victim to its fury. The winter of 1888 seemed to be pretty much normal with some periods of extremely cold weather, but also with some warm and mild days.
Wednesday, Jan. 11 turned cold and began to snow heavily all across the Dakota Territories, Wisconsin, Nebraska, and most of Iowa. However, Thursday morning the snow quit, the sun came out, and the temperature began to climb. Miss Alice Wheeler of Sciola related she was teaching school in the Dakotas and on that morning of Jan. 12, it had gotten up to 24 degrees and the sun was shining. However, by noon it was snowing so hard that you could not see six feet beyond the front door of the school. She and her students weathered the storm by huddling around the stove all night. It was reported that the temperature by 4 o’clock in afternoon was -38 degrees. Many were not as lucky as Alice and her students.
A teacher in Aberdeen, D.T. (Dakota Territory) was trapped along with her students. Their situation grew desperate, and she attempted to go to a house nearby for help. The house was only 30 yards away, but the teacher failed to make it. Her body was eventually found nearly a mile away, frozen to death. Another story related how a school teacher made his students stay and try and weather the storm in their little schoolhouse. They burned books and desks and even ripped up floor boards to burn. In a final act of desperation, he had his student shuddle together and he removed his outer clothing to cover them. They all perished.
In Nebraska and Iowa, the second round of snow did not come until after 4 p.m. and the temperature had been even milder. Many school children were dismissed and started home totally unprepared, only to be caught in nature’s fury. In one case, two sisters were caught by the blizzard. They became lost, but luckily they happened across a haystack. The older girl hollowed out a space, pushed her sister in, and then crawled in behind her. They were found alive the next afternoon. The older girl’s feet suffered from frostbite because she could not get them all the way in the hay. In another case, three school children, one young boy and two girls, were caught in the storm. The boy managed to walk toward home until his feet were frozen to above his ankles. He had to crawl the last half mile to home. He survived, but lost both feet. One of the girls spent 22 hours lost in the storm and remained unconscious for five hours after rescue. The third girl was not found.
The stories go on and on. Montgomery County resident John Denlinger’s son survived, but one grandson was frozen to death and another was alive but nearly frozen to death. Hanniman May of Red Oak lost his 14-year-old son in the Dakotas, taking nearly two weeks to get the body back to Red Oak due to weather. Rowland Chambers buried his young sons in the snow to keep them warm while he stood watch and yelled for help. Help did not come until the following day. Rowland died, it was believed, less than hour before rescue; his boys did survived.
Many in Iowa called it the “Black Blizzard,” because it impossible to see during it and the snowfall was so heavy it blocked the sunlight. One Iowa man related that he went to the barn to do chores about 4 in the afternoon. By 4:30, the wind had changed direction, and when he looked outside he could see a wall of ice and snow half a mile away coming. The telegraph poles and fence posts just seemed to be disappearing in the on rush. Then came the sound, a roar like that of an on-coming train. He raced for the house a few feet away, but he said it became difficult to move because of the cold. He made it to the house, but his eyes and nose were so full of ice he could not see and could barely breathe. His brother had been about 50 yards from the barn and made it to the barn by holding onto and following the fence. He was only a few minutes behind his brother, but could not reach the house. He survived the night in the barn and was not able to get to the house until 8 the next morning.
The Black Blizzard hit Iowa like a ravenous monster; leaving untold dead and many more crippled for life. Jan. 13 dawned bright, sunny and bitterly cold, the lowest recorded temperature for Iowa was -42 degrees. Sadly, in March another winter storm hit the Northeast part of the United States with even more disastrous results.
Just nostalgia or take it as food for thought the next time you turn up the thermostat and hit the remote start on the car and start complaining about the cold. Oh! And here is one that my wife, Roxanne, found and said, add it just to give the story some warmth: there was a country school teacher, who saved her 13 students by not letting them leave school and keeping them warm with a song and an old wood stove. She had the forethought to have the boys bring in lots of coal before the storm. She must have been viewed as quite the heroine as she was soon overwhelmed by countless marriage proposals.
David McFarland is the director of the Montgomery County History Center. You can contact him via email at mchsociet@qwestoffice.net.