The international wire service at the Raccoon News picked up an item this morning from the smalltown newspaper, THE WAUKESHA FREEMAN, and reprints it herewith for a wider audience.
The Great Blizzard of 1947 is of particular interest to us. An ode we wrote is seen at the bottom of this posting.
In that wonderful and terrifying drifting storm, our father was on his commute on the interurban (electric trolley) from his job in Milwaukee to our home at Waukesha. It took four hours to complete the journey. He was carrying a small maple rocking chair on the train, a gift for his wife purchased that day at a dowtown Milwaukee furniture store.
After arriving in Waukesha, he carried that rocker through nearly impossible snowdrifts to make his belated but happy presentation. He was then home for a delightful snowbound 'vacation'.
BLIZZARDS: Part 3 of 5
Blizzard of '47 all but paralyzed Waukesha
Storm remains standard by which others judged
(by John Schoenknecht)
Many people still living recall the snowstorm of 1947. When I was a child, whenever we had a blizzard my mom would say, “This is nothing compared to the storm of 1947.” She would then recall her experiences in rural Port Washington. Most vivid in my mind is her description of a tunnel that they had to dig to get out of their front door.
In Waukesha, the great storm of 1947 surprised everyone, disrupted daily life and isolated and paralyzed the city. Snow began falling on Tuesday, Jan. 28. The wind was from the northeast, which seasoned Wisconsinites know causes the worst snowstorms. During the morning of Jan. 29, snow turned to light drizzle and sleet, coating the streets with ice which made them slippery and dangerous.
At 5:30 a.m., the county dispatched 22 snow plows to scrape county roads and sand hills and curves. However, in the city, engineer Walter Dick sent out two trucks to sand intersections at 8 a.m., but held off on plowing until Wednesday evening. A general plowing operation was scheduled for 2 a.m. Thursday, and all vehicles were ordered to be off the streets then.
Snow continued to fall and the winds increased. Eighteen inches of snow fell, creating drifts of 10 feet. Streets drifted shut and efforts to plow the streets were unsuccessful. Winds from the northeast reached 60 miles per hour. Thursday’s headline read “Raging Snow Storm Isolates City.”
Only four staff members of the Freeman were able to make it to work, but almost the entire production crew braved the storm. Editor Gib Koenig arrived to work on skis. The paper published a special four-page edition which some subscribers did not receive. The city had eight snowplows, and they were dispatched at 2 a.m. Thursday morning. By 10 a.m., four of them had broken down.
To replace the plows, the city rented three plows and two bulldozers from private contractors. Some streets were plowed by Thursday afternoon, but most were not cleared until sometime on Friday or Saturday, and then there was only one lane open to traffic. Two of the worst streets to open were Buena Vista Avenue and Barstow Street. Both had huge drifts which came as the winds howled down from the large open area of the Moor Mud Baths.
The city’s bus and cab services were stymied. Some cabs ran Wednesday night into early Thursday morning, but eventually all of them stopped. Some resumed traveling only on main streets by noon on Thursday. City buses stopped completely Wednesday afternoon and did not resume until Friday.
The interurban trains stalled Wednesday night, It took four hours to make the trip between Milwaukee and Waukesha, Service stopped on midnight on Wednessday.
The highways were a mess. The county highway commissioner, E. J. Stephan, conservatively estimated that 500 cars were stalled between Milwaukee and Waukesha. Drivers spent the night at farmers’ homes or in barns. Schoolchildren riding buses home were also victims of the storm, and throughout the county they spent the night sleeping on the floors of kind farmers who took them in. All three of Waukesha’s railroads were stalled. The last train left Waukesha at 7:32 p.m. Wednesday and the next train to arrive was at noon on Thursday, and it traveled behind a plow. It was seven hours late.
Several expectant mothers were taken to the hospital in special vehicles or delivered their babies at home. Mrs. Henry Buege of rural Waukesha was taken to the hospital late Wednesday night by Herbert Becker. Becker was a dynamiter and he owned a 4-by-4 ex-GI truck, equipped with a snow plow. He made it through the roads on which ambulances and squad cars had no chance. He brought Mrs. Buege to the hospital shortly before her child was born at 11 p.m.
(John Schoenknecht, a retired Waukesha art teacher and a local historian, is the author of “The Great Waukesha Springs Era: 1868 – 1914.” He can be reached at thbolt@milwpc.com)
...........
Epilogue
Blizzard, Waukesha, 1947
The snow that falls so white and fresh
is quickly pushed to the sides of
the already salted streets
and more salt is spread behind the blades
The snow no matter how persevering
can't win a temporary victory
because it's not allowed to repose there
delaying commerce anymore
Snowbound in the city is an anachronism
The big blizzard of 1947, though, closed
businesses and schools, everything for days
in Waukesha Wisconsin
until the handful of plow-equipped trucks
could get around to opening all the streets,
and the Inter-Urban electric train did not run
into Milwaukee, so Dad was home for five days
The snow was dominant then, keeping everyone blessedly
at home, happy captives of unanticipated pass-times,
skiing to the grocers or to the post office, drinking
cocoa and digging tunnels outside, dawns to dusks
During cribbage games and radio shows, the wind blew
unending heavy snow all around town
And the ice-blinkered Fox Dairy horses struggled
to pull their milk wagons until they couldn't
negotiate the drifted valleys formerly known
to them as their street routes
And everything was rounded off white
for many deepening days
But now, when there is a forecast of snow
heavy or slight
armadas of municipal plows and reinforcements
of free-lancers idle their engines everywhere
loaded with tons of salt, waiting at checkpoints, ready
to make short work of any white that quietly comes
and to make the trains, trucks and everything else
run on time
The esthete dreaming of snow having dominion
over him for a just a little while
loses to technology and industry
and loses no precious time at work or school
thanks to economies dedicated to rumbling
street-clearing machines
and salt, lots of salt
And fervent salty neighbors
keeping their sidewalks absolutely clear
of Old Devil Snow, running neck and neck
toward the inevitable loss against the plowers
who fill and re-fill the grumblers' driveways
Over clear but gray-skied days, whizzing traffic splatters
more salt onto the salt-laced drifts and the sun melts
and re-freezes the mounds into darkened, pitted reefs
of dingy black coral
And you wish for another clean, crippling snow, as in 1947
The snow that falls so white and fresh
is quickly pushed to the sides of
the already salted streets
and more salt is spread behind the blades
The snow no matter how persevering
can't win a temporary victory
because it's not allowed to repose there
delaying commerce anymore
Snowbound in the city is an anachronism
The big blizzard of 1947, though, closed
businesses and schools, everything for days
in Waukesha Wisconsin
until the handful of plow-equipped trucks
could get around to opening all the streets,
and the Inter-Urban electric train did not run
into Milwaukee, so Dad was home for five days
The snow was dominant then, keeping everyone blessedly
at home, happy captives of unanticipated pass-times,
skiing to the grocers or to the post office, drinking
cocoa and digging tunnels outside, dawns to dusks
During cribbage games and radio shows, the wind blew
unending heavy snow all around town
And the ice-blinkered Fox Dairy horses struggled
to pull their milk wagons until they couldn't
negotiate the drifted valleys formerly known
to them as their street routes
And everything was rounded off white
for many deepening days
But now, when there is a forecast of snow
heavy or slight
armadas of municipal plows and reinforcements
of free-lancers idle their engines everywhere
loaded with tons of salt, waiting at checkpoints, ready
to make short work of any white that quietly comes
and to make the trains, trucks and everything else
run on time
The esthete dreaming of snow having dominion
over him for a just a little while
loses to technology and industry
and loses no precious time at work or school
thanks to economies dedicated to rumbling
street-clearing machines
and salt, lots of salt
And fervent salty neighbors
keeping their sidewalks absolutely clear
of Old Devil Snow, running neck and neck
toward the inevitable loss against the plowers
who fill and re-fill the grumblers' driveways
Over clear but gray-skied days, whizzing traffic splatters
more salt onto the salt-laced drifts and the sun melts
and re-freezes the mounds into darkened, pitted reefs
of dingy black coral
And you wish for another clean, crippling snow, as in 1947
