I am not quite as advanced in years or knowledge of the natural world as the esteemed Editor Emeritus of this newspaper, Bill Mardis, but I do recall a thing or two and perhaps some of you do also.
I have heard a lot of whining about this winter being so terrible that I just had to say a few things about some of the winters we have experienced in this area in times gone by. I recall one, I think early 1961, when the snow was at least three feet deep. Or so it seemed to a boy of 13. Dad had gone to Florida on a fishing trip with some friends and it snowed while he was gone. We lived at Estesburg and the only vehicle that came to see us was a tractor driven by a friend who had the unenviable duty of keeping an eye on our family. We knew when Dad was coming home and we all watched out the window all day until finally we saw a lone figure trudging through the snow. Dad had to walk from what was U.S. 27 in those days about a mile and a half carrying all his gear, a bag of oranges and a bag of grapefruit. No fish. I didn’t think we would ever get back to school that year.
The winters to top them all were the back to back winters of 1976-77 and 1977-78. We had fairly pleasant weather until just after Christmas each year and then it started. I can’t really differentiate between those years but I do recall lying face down in the snow repairing a water line two feet deep. The temperature was 10 degrees as I recall but it could have been 10 degrees below 0. Not sure.
The first of the winters was the worst according to my memory. (I am relying on that notoriously unreliable source for my information). But in either winter we did not see blacktop on U.S. 27 for what seemed to be weeks. Perhaps someone else remembers more clearly. Salting was useless since the temperature never got high enough to thaw and before traffic would beat tracks down to blacktop another snow would come. The temperature stayed below freezing for 45 days one time and below 0 for ten days. Excess snow was piled in the parking lot in front of Big K which is now Big Lots. It didn’t thaw until June. In New York they were trucking snow down to the harbor and dumping in it the river. I don’t know what those people would do it they had one like that now. If you recall it differently I would be interested in hearing of it as long as it doesn’t dispute what I have remembered.
As I said, those two winters are inseparable in my mind so any thing I say could have been one or the other. Or both but not none. Lake Cumberland froze over in many locations and I was told that the ice froze the boats in at Lee’s Ford Dock. The water then dropped about 10 to 15 feet before enough of a thaw came to plunge the boats back into the water. I would like to have seen that.
I have never been one to allow snow to stop me when there is fun to be had and the first winter I drove a 1969 Chevy Caprice to get around. By the next winter I was unstoppable with a Toyota Land Cruiser FJ. Traffic would be snarled for miles on I 75 and Jellico Mountain was littered with trucks in seemingly impossible contortions. Still, in the face of this a friend and I made a trip to Paintsville out the Mountain Parkway and back one day. Traffic was light, which was good since you couldn’t see the lane dividers.
A group of us would usually go hiking on Sundays somewhere in the National Forest. Yahoo Falls was a handy spot but the trail at Dog Slaughter Creek was a favorite. It would take all afternoon to walk to the Cumberland River and back which, as I recall, was a round trip of 6 miles. Many times the temperature would be in single digits and a lot of snow cover. Where the water falls over the rocks going down to the river was gorgeous. At Yahoo Falls the water had built a giant ice cone at least 30 feet tall with the water falling through the center which was hollowed out and coming out at the base. That was the year we all became acquainted with down filled parkas and Herman Survivor boots. This was the first we had ever heard of El Nino.
For a young man those were tremendous times. We were unstoppable and bulletproof. Since then we seem to have lost that quality. I am now twice that age and I can pretty much promise you that the only way I am going to do that again is as a matter of life or death. It is difficult to imagine that being fun again but who knows?
Those two winters are the yardstick I use when I measure winters. It’s too late for this one to measure up.
That’s my take on this winter. Bring it on.
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