[BITList] True grit in the face of snow - Telegraph

[HUGH]

One of the commentators mentioned the 1962-63 snow as being much worse than the present.  I don't recall, but I've every confidence he's correct.  One of the few entries in a 1963 diary reads. "Slight thaw.  Back to work. Roll on Friday!"  That was Monday, the 14th January.  The next entry, for 15th February, is a recipe for trifle, so no help there.

The media are all over the place with their recollections of past weather.  Worst in history, worst for 50 years, etc. Much later than 1962-63 my cousin was in hospital awaiting an expert to get through the snow to have a talk with him about his MS.  He had expected to turn up, have a chat, then go home, but in the absence of the expert, and the presence of dreadful road conditions, he was offered a bed for the night which extended to a couple.  He accepted this and, being a very skilled motor mechanic, ran a surgery for medical staff whose cars were suffering from ailments.  The commonest ailment was related to frozen radiators and cyl head blocks.  I recall him telling me they couldn't understand why they were having problems after not skimping on the anti-freeze.  He directed their attention to the label on the anti-freeze, where it was good for temperatures higher than the minus 20C we were getting.  Val is fine now - drives, carries a folding stick, but no longer has 20-20 vision without glasses.  I believe that period was famous for 20- foot drifts burying cars and occupants on country roads.

Part of our problem is that we are bombarded with useless information about the snowfall in places we can't spell, let alone find on a map.  In the 1947 deep freeze my parents and family were only a year in our new council house up the hill.  The area is only accessible via a long, ie, long, and steep hill, and the gearboxes of the one bus an hour were not up to it even without the 18" of snow and ice that lay around us for weeks.  So we did without coal, and survived on what food was available from the occasional heroic trudge into town, an hour each way.  For fuel we cut down most of a birch wood a couple of miles further into the wilderness and brought it home on sledges.  We hadn't a clue what was happening elsewhere, and we didn't feel deprived thereby.

Hugh.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.bcn.mythic-beasts.com/pipermail/bitlist/attachments/20100107/ff261965/attachment.shtml