Chapter 17, The Blizzard of 1947
We Kids were up early Christmas Day, December 25th, 1947 to rush see our presents. It had been a good year for Poppa and Momma both had jobs; their salaries and the income from the sale of the candy store must have made them secure enough to place toys under the Christmas Tree instead of the usual socks and underwear that was always disappointing and made us whine and act like un-appreciative brats. We were insanely happy to see our new toys.
Baby Brother, Matthew, then 6 got a tricycle. My little Sister Theresa age 10 got a doll almost as tall as her and a doll’s baby carriage and I got a Gilbert number “B” Erector Set and joyously set about building a motorized Ferris Wheel. On the night of Christmas Eve, after my parents went to bed, I crawled like a Commando under the tree, opened the toy’s metal box and began building in a glorious frenzy. It didn’t look anything like the picture on the box but I thought it “neat-o” and it worked.
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Poppa gave Mom a Wilcox-Gay Recordette on the singer Sewing Machine stand on the left and Momma gave Pop an Emerson Portable Radio both of which really gifts to us kids to make up for the “hard” years.
It didn’t start out as a “White Christmas” there was no snow on the ground but, around noon a few big wet flakes of snow started falling and didn’t stick until early evening when it looked like we would have an average winter accumulation. Was I and everybody in the City wrong? You Betcha! We were completely caught by surprise. We were all in our beds off in the land of Nod when we were slammed with the biggest and heaviest storm since the “Blizzard of ’88! By 7am the next morning we awoke to an accumulation of almost 26 inches of snow with drifts up to eight feet almost covering the first story of our building Later the official recorded total was listed as 25.8 inches. I’ll tell ya, that weatherman didn’t stick his ruler in the snow of my neighborhood or anywhere near Georgia Avenue because the only way to reach us would have been with Eskimo dog sled and Huskies!
The entire City was completely paralyzed—stopped dead in the snow—very deep snow not even Emergency Vehicles could move and I don’t remember how many but, quite a few people died and those that needed rescue were left to survive as best they could.
For children, young and old, it was fun, fun, fun! Momma made a big hot steaming bowl of Oat Meal, helped us with our snow suits and mittens and we went out to play. We weren’t sent we went and gladly. Plows never came down our street, ever, because it was cobble stoned and the snow remained there into late spring.
Cleanup with shovels and useless brooms began as soon as the snow stoped but the real clean up would take days from an overworked and fatigued Sanitation Department. Nobody got fines for not cleaning their sidewalks—are you kidding me? Anyhow “Fines” are latter day annoyances and just a way to generate income for money hungry Mayors. William O’Dwyer was Mayor and that year one of my childhood hero’s, Fiorello La Guardia died of a “new to us” disease called “Cancer!”
We Kids played on mountains and ridges of snow 12 and 15 feet high. We built forts into them and had snow-ball fights. I remember we built snow cave and brought in candles and toasted sliced bread and ate the sooty things claiming they were as delicious as the “Mickies” (Potatoes) we tried, futilely to candle roast and anyhow ate raw. Yes, in our childhood, it was always summertime except when there was snow on the ground…
Asta Dido
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