Blizzard memories

Tell us your stories of the big snow 30 years ago.

Memories from our viewers

From Kira Maloy of Point Place -- The folks in my apartment building all got together and called out to the Red Cross for emergency food. I'm not all that fond of baloney sandwiches, but those were the best baloney sandwiches I ever had! (I was down to 5# flour, a quart of milk, & a few eggs and I had a 2-1/2 year old child at the time. We had been getting by on biscuits and eggs.)

4x4 vehicles were not all that common at the time, but they and snowmobiles were the only private vehicles allowed on the streets, mostly to ferry medical personnel to work and deliver emergency medications and food to the home bound.

The winds were so strong, that a snowdrift nearly 8 feet high developed against my (first-floor) living-room window and was there for well over a week! My power went out for just a few hours. However, a friend of mine who lived only about 1/4 mile away had no electricity for nearly a week. He was very glad he had a gas stove and plenty of candles!

At one point, so many businesses were closed, that there were announcements on TV and radio as to what was open.

The snow got piled so high along the curb when Summit St. was cleared that someone had cut steps into the snow bank at the bus stop to make it easier to get on and off the TARTA busses. The drivers were really nice about doing their best to stop at the snow steps. (Back then TARTA had Flexible busses, which had very high steps and rode much farther off the ground than do the current fleet of busses.)

I was one of many people glad to hear of the National Guard's arrival to dig us out and get the city going again.

From Paul Groat -- I was in the Navy, stationed at Great Lakes Naval station in Illnois. That weekend my roommate from Texas, who had never seen snow before, was to accompany me to my parents home in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

We got as far as Valparasio, Indiana before all the traffic on I-94 just stopped due to the snow! After about 2 hours sitting in the car, watching our gas gauge go down, an Army reserve half-track truck showed up and said we needed to abandon our car and go with them to the National Guard armory. From our hair cuts they soon found out that we were military and put us to work helping to feed and take care of the over 100 people that were stranded on the highway.

We met a lady there who was from a Green Bay newspaper and was in Chicago to do a story during the week about snow removal in a large city. After her week was up (with no snow to write about) she decided to go to Michigan to visit family. She didn't get the story about the BIG CITY snow, but she did get a story.

On Sunday afternoon we were told the National Guard would be returning us to where they had towed all the cars in order to plow the highway. That's when we found out that in order to tow the cars, they had to break the passenger side windows!

We never got to Kalamazoo and we had to work very hard all weekend on what was supposed to be time off, but at least my room mate got to see snow! As to the broken window in the car, it was his!

My name is Debby and I was a Senior at Start High School in 1978. During the blizzard I was working at a command post staffed with Amateur Radio operators, located downtown at the Salvation Army building. Along with my sister, father and many other Amateur Radio operators, we were focused on getting doctors, nurses, police and fire personal to their designated places. We had volunteers who drove 4 WD vehicles, which were the only vehicles allowed on the roads, taking those hospital and safety personel to work. You were also allowed to drive a snow mobile.

If you were lucky, you might find a grocery store open. We would walk with a sled strapped with a small plastic crate on it and head to the store for bread, milk and maybe a few other items. We would be walking down the middle of Laskey Road from Secor Rd to Wernerts Corners. That is the only time I can remember walking down the middle of a main street without any fear of being hit by a car. This is only some of the memories of the Great Blizzard of 1978.

From Sue Hamen of Pemberville, OH -- I was 3 months pregnant and living in the tiny town of New Rochester (Wood County). When the blizzard hit, all of the towns people gathered in the 2 largest homes that could be heated manually. We had 16 people at our location and about the same number at the other. We all brought food to share and spent most of our time playing board games or cards. We used snow for cooking water and for flushing the toilet. We had the distinction of having the oldest town member (age 90) and the youngest (age 3 months) in our house. We managed to sleep wherever there was room.

On day 2 someone came down with the flu and it quickly spread throughout the house. By the end of our 3 days together just about every one of us had contracted the flu. Inspite of this, we had a great time together and managed to stay warm. This was one of those times that we will never forget and always cherish.

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