WEBVTT - The Long Winter 0:00:01.240 --> 0:00:04.200 Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class from how 0:00:04.280 --> 0:00:14.360 Stuff Works dot com. Hello and welcome to the podcast. 0:00:14.440 --> 0:00:17.799 I'm Tracy B. Wilson. I'm Holly Frying. This episode is 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:22.599 coming out on Christmas Day. We looked around for something 0:00:22.760 --> 0:00:25.840 Christmas Eve to talk about. Past hosts have some great 0:00:25.880 --> 0:00:29.160 ones in the archive. There's Who Was Good King WinCE's Loss, 0:00:29.520 --> 0:00:33.200 There's the Christmas Truths. There's one on whether Oliver Cromwell 0:00:33.320 --> 0:00:37.000 really canceled Christmas, and there's even one on Saturnalia. And 0:00:37.080 --> 0:00:40.680 thanks to a request from listener Leanne and our earlier 0:00:40.720 --> 0:00:43.479 episode this week on Laura Angles and Wilder, this year's 0:00:43.520 --> 0:00:47.040 Christmas episode is about the terrible winter of eighteen eighty 0:00:47.120 --> 0:00:51.239 and eight one, which was immortalized in Laura Angles Wilder's 0:00:51.280 --> 0:00:55.000 The Long Winter. Laura, both real and fictional, was going 0:00:55.040 --> 0:00:57.560 on fourteen and the winter that she wrote about was 0:00:57.600 --> 0:01:00.880 a real event, and in the book, our first inkling 0:01:01.040 --> 0:01:03.400 of how bad this winter was going to be is 0:01:03.440 --> 0:01:06.720 while they're cutting hay in hot weather and Laura and 0:01:06.840 --> 0:01:09.920 Pap find a muskrat house that has very thick walls, 0:01:10.080 --> 0:01:13.000 and Paw says that this is a sign that a 0:01:13.160 --> 0:01:16.400 very hard winter is to come. They keep on harvesting 0:01:16.400 --> 0:01:18.560 the hay through September, and then they wake up on 0:01:18.600 --> 0:01:22.720 October one to a really heavy frost. They rush to 0:01:22.800 --> 0:01:24.959 get as much of the harvest in as they can, 0:01:25.200 --> 0:01:27.400 and Pa goes to hunt, but he can't find any 0:01:27.440 --> 0:01:32.080 geese or other birds anywhere. The first blizzard, that's the 0:01:32.080 --> 0:01:35.840 first blizzard hits in October and it lasts for three 0:01:35.920 --> 0:01:38.040 days and nights, which is bad enough to stop all 0:01:38.040 --> 0:01:41.360 the trains. And on the fourth day they find several 0:01:41.400 --> 0:01:45.679 cows outside so heartbreaking with their heads frozen to the 0:01:45.760 --> 0:01:48.080 ground thanks to the ice that was formed by their 0:01:48.120 --> 0:01:52.200 own breadth, with the moisture in their exhalation froze on them. 0:01:52.280 --> 0:01:57.200 Pap saves them. So it's hard. It's so very sad. Uh. 0:01:57.360 --> 0:01:59.880 Not long after that, in a depiction that is quite 0:02:00.040 --> 0:02:04.000 problematic by today's standards, a Native American man tells a 0:02:04.040 --> 0:02:06.360 bunch of folks at the store that a big winter 0:02:06.480 --> 0:02:11.400 is coming with seven months of blizzards. His his physical 0:02:11.440 --> 0:02:14.679 description and his use of language today people would say 0:02:14.680 --> 0:02:19.640 are pretty heavily stereotyped. The Ingalls family moves into town 0:02:19.720 --> 0:02:21.480 for the winter, where they hope they're going to have 0:02:21.560 --> 0:02:24.000 a little bit of an easier time a bit, and 0:02:24.040 --> 0:02:27.760 the blizzards do indeed continue for months and months, with 0:02:27.919 --> 0:02:32.200 various alarming adventures and misadventures to go along. Uh. There's 0:02:32.240 --> 0:02:34.919 frequent talk about whether the worst is over and when 0:02:34.960 --> 0:02:38.240 the trains might be running again. The cover copy of 0:02:38.280 --> 0:02:40.400 the book that Tracy used for a lot of this 0:02:40.520 --> 0:02:44.560 research is shockingly merry his children having a snowball fight 0:02:44.600 --> 0:02:47.680 on it. They're sledding. It looks like the jolliest, most 0:02:47.960 --> 0:02:51.080 enjoyable and delightful time ever, But we know that it 0:02:51.160 --> 0:02:54.840 was a little bit rougher than that. Um. In reality, 0:02:54.880 --> 0:02:58.480 it's really quite oppressive. Coal and food were becoming increasingly 0:02:58.560 --> 0:03:01.480 scarce as long as the train can't get through, and 0:03:01.560 --> 0:03:03.480 for a while, even when the weather is good in 0:03:03.480 --> 0:03:06.520 the story Uh and good enough for school, school is 0:03:06.600 --> 0:03:09.320 canceled because they don't have enough coal to heat the building. 0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:13.720 Some of the series most memorable tidbits happen during this 0:03:13.880 --> 0:03:16.600 hard winter, like having to break the ice and the 0:03:16.639 --> 0:03:19.680 water basin to wash their faces in the morning, carrying 0:03:19.760 --> 0:03:23.560 flat irons upstairs to warm the beds, mob bringing frozen 0:03:23.639 --> 0:03:26.840 washing in from the line, and Almonso, who was not 0:03:26.960 --> 0:03:30.040 yet known as manly trying to hide his seed wheats 0:03:30.040 --> 0:03:32.200 so that his brothers won't sell it to other people 0:03:32.240 --> 0:03:35.280 who run out of food. And as things get worse, 0:03:35.440 --> 0:03:38.720 the Engles family has to twist their hay into sticks 0:03:38.760 --> 0:03:42.000 to burn. When they have nothing else for fuel, Almonzo 0:03:42.040 --> 0:03:45.000 Wilder and Cap Garland make a heroic trip to buy 0:03:45.000 --> 0:03:48.480 wheat for families that will otherwise starve. There's also the 0:03:48.480 --> 0:03:52.160 thing that everyone mentioned to me when I said we 0:03:52.160 --> 0:03:55.040 were doing a little house related episode, and that is 0:03:55.080 --> 0:03:57.600 that they had to grind grain in the coffee mill 0:03:57.760 --> 0:04:00.680 all day to make enough flour for dinner. This would 0:04:00.720 --> 0:04:02.680 have made a flower that was not at all like 0:04:02.840 --> 0:04:05.280 bread flower. It was more really more like a coarse 0:04:05.440 --> 0:04:09.440 graham flower. And of course, as always happens during the 0:04:09.440 --> 0:04:14.040 Northern Hemisphere, Christmas happens during winter. A few days before Christmas, 0:04:14.040 --> 0:04:17.479 the mail actually comes through and everyone is overjoyed. The 0:04:17.520 --> 0:04:19.919 family gets a letter from a reverend saying they should 0:04:19.920 --> 0:04:23.400 expect a Christmas barrel from his church, and knowing that 0:04:23.440 --> 0:04:27.160 the odds are long on that barrel actually arriving by Christmas, 0:04:27.200 --> 0:04:31.320 they decided to save the church papers and youth companions 0:04:31.360 --> 0:04:33.440 that have all come in the mail to open on 0:04:33.520 --> 0:04:37.039 Christmas Day. The girls also start trying to figure out 0:04:37.040 --> 0:04:40.359 how to get some actual presents. Once they tally up 0:04:40.400 --> 0:04:42.520 all their money and go shopping, it turns out there's 0:04:42.560 --> 0:04:45.800 really nothing to be bought. They do find some suspenders 0:04:45.800 --> 0:04:48.480 for Pa, and Laura decides to give things she's already 0:04:48.520 --> 0:04:51.839 knitted and embroidered for herself to her mom and sisters. 0:04:52.400 --> 0:04:55.320 Grace also gets a toy, and Ma gets two cans 0:04:55.320 --> 0:04:58.080 of oysters, which were basically the last of the provisions 0:04:58.120 --> 0:05:00.320 at one of the stores she used to them to 0:05:00.360 --> 0:05:04.479 make oyster soup for lunch. Everyone including Laura, gets a 0:05:04.480 --> 0:05:06.960 piece of candy that Pa had brought ahead of time, 0:05:07.600 --> 0:05:10.800 but that's all that Laura gets. Christmas night, they run 0:05:10.839 --> 0:05:14.000 out of kerosene for the lamp, which means the rest 0:05:14.040 --> 0:05:16.520 of the winners is gonna be dark and sad. The 0:05:16.560 --> 0:05:19.920 blizzards go on and on and on, and it's made 0:05:20.000 --> 0:05:22.520 before a freight train brings anything new to the town. 0:05:23.720 --> 0:05:25.919 But on the upside, they get to have Christmas again, 0:05:26.080 --> 0:05:29.800 complete with turkey and cranberries, and Laura finally gets a present, 0:05:30.320 --> 0:05:33.920 which is beautiful yarns and embroidery silks uh and she 0:05:34.200 --> 0:05:36.080 can use them up to replace the things that she 0:05:36.120 --> 0:05:39.040 gave away to mom and her sister. I'm actually kind 0:05:39.040 --> 0:05:41.479 of conflicted about this, this present for Laura, because she 0:05:41.560 --> 0:05:44.000 wasn't the fondest of sewing. So in a way this 0:05:44.200 --> 0:05:48.480 present is work well, but she couldn't have bought those things. 0:05:48.520 --> 0:05:51.080 She is grateful for it and in one of the 0:05:51.120 --> 0:05:56.160 many examples of what we might consider good values. So 0:05:56.240 --> 0:05:58.719 it's a very sweet story in the end, and in 0:05:58.760 --> 0:06:01.680 spite of the danger and oppress in the middle. But 0:06:01.720 --> 0:06:05.440 how much of that blizzard after blizzard after blizzard, in 0:06:05.440 --> 0:06:07.560 this kind of sense of good gracious, when will the 0:06:07.560 --> 0:06:10.960 train come? How much of that is real? There's a 0:06:11.000 --> 0:06:16.920 short answer, spoiler. This really was a real weather event. 0:06:17.600 --> 0:06:20.080 People during the time called it the hard Winter, and 0:06:20.200 --> 0:06:24.080 even the starvation winter. Hard Winter was actually Laura's original 0:06:24.120 --> 0:06:27.120 title for the book, A nine four History of South 0:06:27.200 --> 0:06:30.440 Dakota reads, the Great Blizzard in the middle of October 0:06:30.520 --> 0:06:33.719 eighty was the initial performance of a of a winter 0:06:34.000 --> 0:06:37.240 unprecedented and never succeeded in severity in the history of 0:06:37.279 --> 0:06:41.400 Dakota or the Northwest. Heavy snows and severe storms came 0:06:41.440 --> 0:06:46.200 at frequent intervals, rendering train service unreliable and uncertain, hindering 0:06:46.240 --> 0:06:48.920 the removal of crops and the shipment into the country 0:06:49.080 --> 0:06:52.960 of supplies of fuel and groceries, and in some places 0:06:52.960 --> 0:06:57.560 even the telegraph wires were under snow, so complete isolation 0:06:59.040 --> 0:07:00.880 this meant, which is the town on where they were living, 0:07:01.000 --> 0:07:04.560 did not start keeping weather records until eighteen eighty nine, 0:07:04.920 --> 0:07:07.400 but yanked in South Dakota, which is about a hundred 0:07:07.400 --> 0:07:10.840 and ten miles to the south did. Yankton reported lows 0:07:10.960 --> 0:07:14.320 as cold as thirty two below zero fahrenheit that winter, 0:07:15.320 --> 0:07:17.760 and even though there were days when the temperatures rose 0:07:17.800 --> 0:07:21.119 above freezing, they didn't last long enough for a real fall, 0:07:21.640 --> 0:07:25.560 and so what had melted within refreeze into ice. The 0:07:25.760 --> 0:07:29.400 rotary snow plow had also not yet been invented. This 0:07:29.560 --> 0:07:33.480 was a steam engine mounted plow used specifically for clearing 0:07:33.560 --> 0:07:36.640 railroad tracks. It was kind of like a vertically mounted 0:07:36.800 --> 0:07:40.040 fan carrying scoops that basically threw the snow out of 0:07:40.040 --> 0:07:42.880 the way as it moved. The first design came out 0:07:42.920 --> 0:07:46.640 in eighteen sixty nine, but it wasn't really viable. Working 0:07:46.840 --> 0:07:49.240 version of it didn't exist until eighteen eighty three or 0:07:49.240 --> 0:07:54.200 eighteen eighty four. Would have been really, really useful had 0:07:54.320 --> 0:07:57.720 that been a couple of years faster and without this 0:07:57.800 --> 0:08:00.720 piece of equipment to keep things going. Blowing snow quickly 0:08:00.760 --> 0:08:03.040 filled up the cuts through hills and mountains where the 0:08:03.080 --> 0:08:07.160 train tracks ran, packing into ice and making them completely impassable. 0:08:07.600 --> 0:08:11.080 Plus people's efforts to clear the tracks when the weather 0:08:11.120 --> 0:08:14.040 allowed for it just made things worse because they made 0:08:14.080 --> 0:08:16.960 these very high snow banks on either side, and that 0:08:17.000 --> 0:08:19.920 allowed for more drifting and packing as the wind blew. 0:08:20.720 --> 0:08:23.080 The train's inability to get through was really what made 0:08:23.080 --> 0:08:25.840 this winter so hard, and it brought the population of 0:08:25.840 --> 0:08:29.960 the area so perilously close to starvation. Because the blizzards 0:08:30.000 --> 0:08:33.280 had started so early, the harvest was already small, and 0:08:33.320 --> 0:08:35.360 no trains meant that there was no way to supplement 0:08:35.400 --> 0:08:38.960 that small amount of food people had been able to 0:08:39.040 --> 0:08:42.360 bring in from their crops, so the Angles and It's 0:08:42.600 --> 0:08:45.800 had even harvested pumpkins that were not ripe yet, just 0:08:45.840 --> 0:08:47.760 so that they could get them in before the freeze. 0:08:48.559 --> 0:08:51.400 There are archival pictures of trains stuck in the snow, 0:08:51.600 --> 0:08:54.160 with the snow on either side of them taller than 0:08:54.200 --> 0:08:56.920 the train cars. One of these was taken in March 0:08:57.000 --> 0:08:59.960 of one near sleep Beyond, Minnesota, which is the name 0:09:00.000 --> 0:09:02.320 Aim that fans of the series and the TV show 0:09:02.400 --> 0:09:06.320 will probably recognize, And this meant was also a really 0:09:06.360 --> 0:09:08.439 new settlement at this time, so a lot of people 0:09:08.480 --> 0:09:10.800 had not cleared as much land or enriched it for 0:09:10.880 --> 0:09:13.840 better crops yet, and a lot of the people also 0:09:13.880 --> 0:09:17.719 did not have firsthand experience of the weather there. This 0:09:18.240 --> 0:09:22.160 terrible weather condition also meant that animals were scarce beforehand, 0:09:22.240 --> 0:09:26.360 having having already taken shelter thanks to their instincts, and 0:09:26.400 --> 0:09:29.439 they became pretty much impossible to find as the winter 0:09:29.559 --> 0:09:32.440 wore on, and the book there's this one moment of 0:09:32.440 --> 0:09:35.480 hope when word spreads of an antelope herd near the town, 0:09:35.600 --> 0:09:39.200 and that hunt is unfortunately unsuccessful, and it's one of 0:09:39.240 --> 0:09:43.120 the very few large animal sightings the whole time in 0:09:43.200 --> 0:09:46.720 Laura's account. And as people ran out of fuel for burning, 0:09:47.120 --> 0:09:50.400 they broke down their outbuildings that they didn't crucially need, 0:09:50.880 --> 0:09:54.000 so fences and bridges too, along with the Ingles method 0:09:54.000 --> 0:09:57.320 of twisting haynd sticks, all went towards just keeping a 0:09:57.360 --> 0:09:59.920 fire going, yes, saying were having something to cook on. 0:10:00.760 --> 0:10:03.920 But communities and families banded together so that they could 0:10:04.040 --> 0:10:07.960 ensure that the what they did have was fairly distributed 0:10:08.400 --> 0:10:11.520 and to pull their resources as much as they were able. 0:10:12.720 --> 0:10:17.160 On February two, a blizzard started that lasted for nine days, 0:10:17.200 --> 0:10:20.080 and it dropped so much snow that some buildings were 0:10:20.080 --> 0:10:23.200 in snow up to their roofs. People had to tunnel 0:10:23.200 --> 0:10:26.319 through the snow in some locations, and people who were 0:10:26.360 --> 0:10:29.280 still on their homesteads had to tunnel to their barns 0:10:29.320 --> 0:10:34.480 and their other outbuildings. The one thaw started in April, 0:10:36.400 --> 0:10:39.000 started in October, and the thaw started in April the 0:10:39.120 --> 0:10:42.240 long time. Towards the end of the book, Laura references 0:10:42.280 --> 0:10:45.360 the Chinook winds, and these are winds that that go 0:10:45.600 --> 0:10:48.640 down the eastern slopes of the Rockies. They warm up 0:10:48.679 --> 0:10:51.360 along the way and then they move across the plains 0:10:51.600 --> 0:10:54.640 and they're responsible for bringing warmer weather and thawing to 0:10:54.760 --> 0:10:58.800 the area. This eventual faw actually led to severe flooding, 0:10:59.360 --> 0:11:01.760 and some of the was simply the sheer volume of 0:11:01.840 --> 0:11:04.520 water from the snow melt, and some was from ice 0:11:04.640 --> 0:11:07.480 jams in bends and narrow places in the rivers, and 0:11:07.559 --> 0:11:10.840 several towns actually flooded and the course of the Missouri 0:11:10.920 --> 0:11:13.880 River shifted as a consequence. Some of the records that 0:11:13.880 --> 0:11:16.720 were set during these floods still stand. They have never 0:11:16.760 --> 0:11:20.720 seen a flood comparable. The roads and crops were also 0:11:20.840 --> 0:11:23.040 damaged as a result of the flooding, which made the 0:11:23.080 --> 0:11:26.280 recovery a lot slower, And even though it was called 0:11:26.280 --> 0:11:29.520 the Starving Winter, there actually weren't many reported deaths from 0:11:29.520 --> 0:11:35.160 starvation or freezing. Oddly lucky. So we've mostly been talking 0:11:35.200 --> 0:11:38.080 about what this winter was like for the predominantly white 0:11:38.080 --> 0:11:41.240 settlers out on the frontier, and that's because most of 0:11:41.280 --> 0:11:45.079 the written records that survived today are from that perspective. 0:11:45.559 --> 0:11:49.160 But this was naturally also an enormously difficult winter for 0:11:49.280 --> 0:11:52.040 the Native Americans in the area too, and in some 0:11:52.080 --> 0:11:54.559 ways it was even harder since by this point in 0:11:54.600 --> 0:11:58.920 American history, many Native Americans had been removed to reservations, 0:11:58.960 --> 0:12:01.960 completely altering the way of life and in many cases 0:12:02.080 --> 0:12:04.560 robbing them of the means that they had previously used 0:12:04.600 --> 0:12:08.319 to sustain themselves through hard winters like this. The Great 0:12:08.320 --> 0:12:11.520 Sioux Reservation at this point in history spanned roughly the 0:12:11.559 --> 0:12:14.760 western half of what is now South Dakota, and that 0:12:14.800 --> 0:12:17.880 wasn't really a fraction of the amount of land that 0:12:17.880 --> 0:12:21.840 that that group had lived on before. One piece that 0:12:21.880 --> 0:12:25.760 we do have is a ledger book drawn by Lakota 0:12:25.880 --> 0:12:29.120 artist and spiritual leader black Hawk, and that was created 0:12:29.160 --> 0:12:32.360 after he worked out a deal with William Edward Canton, 0:12:32.400 --> 0:12:35.760 who was an Indian trader and what was then Dakota Territory. 0:12:36.200 --> 0:12:39.400 And here's how Canton's daughter, whose name was Edith M. Teal, 0:12:39.559 --> 0:12:44.319 described this arrangement. Black Hawk, chief medicine man of the Sioux, 0:12:44.640 --> 0:12:47.400 was in great straits that winter, having several squaws and 0:12:47.480 --> 0:12:52.480 numerous children dependent upon him. He had absolutely nothing, no food, 0:12:52.679 --> 0:12:56.160 and he would not beg father knew his condition. He 0:12:56.280 --> 0:12:59.439 also knew that black Hawk had a wonderful dream, so 0:12:59.480 --> 0:13:01.960 he sent him and asked him to make pictures of 0:13:02.080 --> 0:13:05.800 his dreams, offering to furnish paper and pencils and to 0:13:05.840 --> 0:13:08.320 give him fifty cents in trade at the store for 0:13:08.400 --> 0:13:11.760 each sheet that he brought in. So, after drawing a 0:13:11.800 --> 0:13:15.000 couple of the images from his dream, black Hawk moved 0:13:15.000 --> 0:13:17.800 on to drawings of other things relevant to his daily 0:13:17.840 --> 0:13:21.080 life and the Lakota customs, as well as pictures of 0:13:21.120 --> 0:13:24.760 Crow warriors, who were traditional enemies of the Lakoda and 0:13:24.800 --> 0:13:27.760 in the end, he made seventy six drawings and earned 0:13:27.880 --> 0:13:30.760 thirty eight dollars in trade at the store, although as 0:13:30.800 --> 0:13:34.480 we discussed earlier, it's not completely clear how well stocked 0:13:34.559 --> 0:13:37.040 the store would have even been, but it probably helped 0:13:37.120 --> 0:13:40.079 him out to uh, you know, get some provisions for 0:13:40.120 --> 0:13:43.320 his family. Yeah, and this, uh, this lender book actually 0:13:43.440 --> 0:13:46.160 survives today. They're scans of it on the on the 0:13:46.200 --> 0:13:48.960 internet that we can link to from our show notes. 0:13:49.480 --> 0:13:53.400 One industrious person is actually fact checked whether Laura angles 0:13:53.440 --> 0:13:57.320 Wilder's description of the weather actually uh adds up to 0:13:57.520 --> 0:13:59.439 what the weather was really like, or whether it's a 0:13:59.640 --> 0:14:02.440 sort of embellishment. And before we talk about that, let's 0:14:02.440 --> 0:14:06.280 take a moment talk about our sponsor. So speaking of Laura, 0:14:06.559 --> 0:14:09.240 let's go back to fact checking her story, right, So, 0:14:09.520 --> 0:14:13.880 National Weather Service meteorologist and pH d student Barbara Mays 0:14:13.960 --> 0:14:16.960 Bapstad fact checked the book. What she did was she 0:14:17.040 --> 0:14:21.720 crossed referenced meteorological records from nearby cities including Omaha, Nebraska, 0:14:21.760 --> 0:14:24.720 and Des Moines, Iowat. These are not really that nearby, 0:14:24.840 --> 0:14:27.600 but they are the nearest by cities that were keeping records, 0:14:28.040 --> 0:14:30.720 as well as a few military forts in South Dakota, 0:14:31.240 --> 0:14:34.560 and based on historical accounts that she found, this winter 0:14:34.720 --> 0:14:39.000 got between eleven and fourteen feet of snow on top 0:14:39.080 --> 0:14:42.880 of ice. According to her work, the three day blizzard 0:14:42.920 --> 0:14:44.760 that marks the start of the Long Winter in the 0:14:44.800 --> 0:14:49.720 book really happened from October fifty and in the book 0:14:49.800 --> 0:14:52.200 the children are trapped by a blizzard while at school 0:14:52.240 --> 0:14:55.840 on December six. That also seems to have really happened 0:14:56.160 --> 0:14:59.240 on December two through the fourth, So pretty close there, 0:14:59.600 --> 0:15:01.320 if not. I mean, a couple of days off is 0:15:01.360 --> 0:15:04.120 not that much, no, especially when you're reconstructing it from 0:15:04.160 --> 0:15:07.880 memory many many years later. There was also really a 0:15:07.880 --> 0:15:10.520 blizzard on Christmas Day that year. The trip to get 0:15:10.520 --> 0:15:13.520 wheat that al Monzo and Cap took probably happened on 0:15:13.560 --> 0:15:17.040 February six, based on the clear night in the full moon. 0:15:17.680 --> 0:15:20.560 Bausta did all this fact checking after rereading the book 0:15:20.640 --> 0:15:24.640 during a similarly severe modern winter, which also had a 0:15:24.680 --> 0:15:28.400 thaw that led to flooding, and coincidentally, they had to 0:15:28.520 --> 0:15:31.480 roll out some of the few remaining rotary plows still 0:15:31.520 --> 0:15:35.760 in working order during that particular event, and she theorizes 0:15:35.920 --> 0:15:38.600 that this winter was caused by the jet stream pulling 0:15:38.680 --> 0:15:41.880 Arctic air deep into the Midwest plus an al nemeo year. 0:15:42.640 --> 0:15:45.360 That jet stream pattern is called a negative oscillation of 0:15:45.360 --> 0:15:49.920 the North Atlantic oscillation. Without the negative North Atlantic oscillation, 0:15:50.000 --> 0:15:52.360 it would have been a warmer winter than normal, and 0:15:52.480 --> 0:15:55.800 wetter for that matter, rather than wetter and full of 0:15:55.840 --> 0:15:58.920 the lizards. She has presentations on all of us at 0:15:58.920 --> 0:16:01.040 her website, which you can watch. We will link to 0:16:01.080 --> 0:16:03.720 them from our show notes Love a little history and 0:16:03.760 --> 0:16:09.080 meteorology coming together. There's also an interesting trivia bit. According 0:16:09.080 --> 0:16:11.680 to Bousted, this winter event was actually one of the 0:16:11.720 --> 0:16:15.200 things that led to the prevalence of quote blizzard as 0:16:15.200 --> 0:16:18.800 the word that means a blinding snowstorm before it meant 0:16:18.840 --> 0:16:21.600 a knockout blow, and it was first used in relation 0:16:21.640 --> 0:16:24.520 to weather in eighteen sixty two. So I made fun 0:16:24.560 --> 0:16:27.120 of the cover of my copy of The Long Winter 0:16:27.520 --> 0:16:29.880 because it does not at all suggest my family and 0:16:29.880 --> 0:16:32.720 are nearly starved and my future husband almost died trying 0:16:32.720 --> 0:16:35.040 to get wheat for the town, and said, it looks 0:16:35.080 --> 0:16:38.840 like they're very happy. Let's go play outside winter. And 0:16:39.360 --> 0:16:42.720 while that is kind of incongruous with the material that's inside, 0:16:43.240 --> 0:16:45.560 it turns out that even though it was a very 0:16:45.640 --> 0:16:47.600 lean winter. A lot of the people are on the 0:16:47.600 --> 0:16:51.000 frontier kind of thought of it fondly. They were mostly young, 0:16:51.120 --> 0:16:54.600 healthy people, which helped them make it through. And according 0:16:54.640 --> 0:16:59.400 to the history book that we discussed earlier, they said, quote, 0:16:59.760 --> 0:17:02.920 it is the almost universal testimony of the pioneers that 0:17:02.960 --> 0:17:05.919 they have never gotten more real enjoyment out of a 0:17:05.920 --> 0:17:09.359 winter than they did from the winter of the Big Blockade. 0:17:10.040 --> 0:17:12.640 Shortly after the big snow of February, a thought came 0:17:12.680 --> 0:17:15.399 of sufficient power to soften the surface of the drifts, 0:17:15.440 --> 0:17:19.439 and an immediate freeze followed, forming an impenetrable crust, and 0:17:19.480 --> 0:17:24.240 thereafter slaying was superb. This condition continued until the twenty 0:17:24.280 --> 0:17:27.760 six of April. I would imagine, if you are having 0:17:27.800 --> 0:17:33.560 a horrific, seemingly never ending winter, never ending winter, a 0:17:33.600 --> 0:17:36.440 deaf version of slaying sounds great. Yeah. Well, and then 0:17:36.880 --> 0:17:40.640 a thing that is kind of hard to remember sometimes 0:17:40.680 --> 0:17:44.399 is that being on the frontier um four settlers was 0:17:44.440 --> 0:17:47.919 basically twenty four hour day work essentially, I mean not 0:17:47.960 --> 0:17:50.399 really twenty four hour day, but was a constant labor 0:17:50.480 --> 0:17:52.720 and chore. And if it come to this point that 0:17:52.720 --> 0:17:55.200 you were basically snowed in and you couldn't get any 0:17:55.200 --> 0:17:58.040 provisions and you couldn't do anything. We had a break 0:17:58.280 --> 0:18:00.800 from all the work that was a little it more 0:18:00.960 --> 0:18:04.520 substantial than the normal reduction and workload that would happen 0:18:04.600 --> 0:18:07.600 during winter from not being planting and harvesting crops. Well. 0:18:07.640 --> 0:18:09.840 And it was also a big community building thing because 0:18:09.840 --> 0:18:12.240 they did all throw in their resources together and kind 0:18:12.240 --> 0:18:15.720 of shape equally. And I imagine it formed some really 0:18:16.080 --> 0:18:20.920 interesting and meaningful, you know, long term relationships amongst people. Uh. 0:18:20.920 --> 0:18:23.439 This history book is also kind of glib about the 0:18:23.760 --> 0:18:27.160 like positive side of all of this flooding um, which 0:18:27.200 --> 0:18:30.080 is that most of the frontier towns that were affected 0:18:30.119 --> 0:18:33.760 were so new that there was very little to be lost. 0:18:34.119 --> 0:18:36.800 When all of it was lost, it hits some more 0:18:36.920 --> 0:18:39.800 established cities very hard. But in its tone is sort 0:18:39.800 --> 0:18:41.800 of like it was a good thing they hadn't had 0:18:41.800 --> 0:18:43.639 time to do a whole lot of work here because 0:18:43.800 --> 0:18:45.960 you know, it all got washed away. It's like the 0:18:46.000 --> 0:18:49.440 bright sidiest way to look at it. It was extremely 0:18:49.480 --> 0:18:53.439 bright siding. So yes, do you also have some listener 0:18:53.480 --> 0:18:56.159 mail for us to enjoy? Have some listener mail And 0:18:56.200 --> 0:18:58.600 it's a quick one. Uh. It is from Emma and 0:18:58.720 --> 0:19:02.000 Emma says, Hi, guys, I really love your podcast. My 0:19:02.080 --> 0:19:04.040 name is Emma and I'm fifteen, and I got very 0:19:04.080 --> 0:19:07.600 excited listening to your podcast on Audrey Lord because she's amazing, 0:19:08.000 --> 0:19:10.640 and because through that podcast I learned that she went 0:19:10.680 --> 0:19:13.800 to my high school. Hunter is very different now. We 0:19:13.880 --> 0:19:16.000 are no longer an all girls school, for example, but 0:19:16.080 --> 0:19:19.240 knowing that someone is inspirational as her went here makes 0:19:19.240 --> 0:19:20.920 me feel like all of the stress we are put 0:19:21.000 --> 0:19:23.920 under is worth it. The poetry club Audrey Lord loved 0:19:24.000 --> 0:19:25.720 is no longer a club here at Hunter, but my 0:19:25.760 --> 0:19:27.960 friend and I have decided that we need to remedy 0:19:28.080 --> 0:19:31.440 the situation and restarted as soon as we can. Love 0:19:31.480 --> 0:19:35.760 the podcast. Thanks for the two great episodes, Emma. Thank you, Emma. 0:19:35.880 --> 0:19:37.960 I love an email still much. That made us both 0:19:37.960 --> 0:19:41.359 smile a whole lot. It seems like a nice happy 0:19:41.400 --> 0:19:45.840 note to end on for this Christmas Day podcast. If 0:19:45.840 --> 0:19:50.040 you celebrate Christmas, Mary, Christmas, did you not happy? Whatever 0:19:50.240 --> 0:19:54.760 you celebrate, Yeah, happy holiday or specific Holiday'd be hopefully 0:19:54.800 --> 0:19:58.280 not horrible with her. You're in a cold climate, yes, 0:19:58.320 --> 0:20:02.040 if you're somewhere warm. In summary, happy happy summer Christmas. 0:20:03.000 --> 0:20:05.560 I always think of that ten mentions on called Fightline 0:20:05.560 --> 0:20:08.520 and the Sunnow, which you may or may not like 0:20:08.640 --> 0:20:14.639 depending on how you feel about holiday. Um Yes, happy 0:20:14.640 --> 0:20:18.480 holidays to everyone. Feed. If you would like to write 0:20:18.480 --> 0:20:20.840 to us about this or anything else, we're History Podcast 0:20:20.880 --> 0:20:23.760 at Discovery dot com. We're also on Facebook at facebook 0:20:23.800 --> 0:20:26.760 dot com slash History class Stuff, and on Twitter at 0:20:26.760 --> 0:20:29.719 missed in History. Are Tumbler is missed in History dot 0:20:29.800 --> 0:20:32.879 tumbler dot com, and we are on Interest. If you 0:20:32.880 --> 0:20:35.040 would like to learn more about what we've talked about today, 0:20:35.200 --> 0:20:38.000 come to our website. Put the word blizzard into the 0:20:38.040 --> 0:20:40.320 search bar and you will have an article called ten 0:20:40.400 --> 0:20:44.120 Biggest Snowstorms of All Time. These are all even bigger 0:20:44.119 --> 0:20:47.600 than this swamp. They're also individual snowstorms and not an 0:20:47.720 --> 0:20:50.240 entire season worth of snow. So do all of that 0:20:50.320 --> 0:20:52.720 and a whole lot more at our website, which is 0:20:52.720 --> 0:20:58.879 how Stuff Works dot com. The more on this and 0:20:58.960 --> 0:21:01.280 thousands of other topics, because it has to have works 0:21:01.280 --> 0:21:14.280 dot com. 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