State

Winters of Yesteryear You may tliiuk we’ve hail it coltl in North Carolina this year, hut hark back for a moment to the severe weather uliicli held the state* in its grip in 1857 anil 1898. Ill/ >IO/.i:i l i: PAYNE КЕЛМ TIIK recent prolonged cold spell <eems anything but mild and easy to bear what with the inconven¬ iences of frozen and bursted water pipes, increased fuel hills, and other annoyances due to the unusual weath¬ er — but when it comes to real bitter cold, we Tarheels of today don’t know the half of it, according to the “old timers.” Now in grandfather’s day, the North Carolina winters really were winters. And we don’t have to take granddad’s word for it either, or trust to his more or less hazy mem¬ ory. Old newspapers and clippings attest to the fact that the winters of yesteryear wore more severe than those of today. The Storm of 1893 The heaviest storm of many years, for instance, visited North Carolina in January, 1898. The record was broken in Wilmington then. Accord¬ ing to the Wilmington Messenger of January 18: “Three times in the past week Brunswick River has been frozen over, and on Monday the Cape Fear River was frozen over with ice an eighth of an inch thick from shore to shore. This was at the Navassa Guano works, five miles above this city. It remained for yesterday morn¬ ing to break the record, however, as the Capo Fear at Wilmington, and two miles below, was frozen clear across with ice an eighth of an inch thick, while the Brunswick River was covered with ice thick enough to skate on. Considering that the tides ebb and flow in the river here, it is a remarkable circumstance that ice would form clear across the river, hut early risers witnessed that sight yes¬ terday morning. The tugs and steam¬ boats, however, soon broke it up. The oldest inhabitants say that the river has not been frozen across since Jan¬ uary, 1857, thirty-six years ago, when the sheet was very thin. “The weather we are having now is unprecedented not only for its severity but for the length of the spell. Our own citizens will be surprised at the statement that since the 21st day of Decern l>e r, nearly a whole mouth, the thermometer has ranged from 13 to 30 degrees minimum, and at no time has it gone higher than Г>2 maximum an<l then only twice.” It was court week in Newton during that bitterly cold January of 1893. And court-attending citizens found it very necessary to frequently thaw out their chilled spirits with the mel¬ lowing. warming aid of their own na¬ tive-made spirits. “The term of the Superior Court convened here this week (19th)," a news article read. "The weather being intensely cold this week a large quantity of ‘mountain dew’ was consumed by the attendants. The thermometer got ns low as two degrees Wow zero during the cold spell this week. All the cotton factories in the eastern part of the county on the Catawba River, had to shut down on account of the ice on the river, which was 1 '/•• inches thick.” Crossed River on Horseback “At the same time, the Catawba Riv¬ er was crossed by three men on horses at Sample's Ferry. The men, who had been visiting in Gaston County, wished to return to Mecklenburg, and as the river was frozen from hank to hank, they proceeded to the shore and crossed on tiie ice. Parties living near the hank of the river said they had lived there many years hut had never wit¬ nessed such a sight before." It was cold in Raleigh, too, in Jan* uary, 1893. Governor Carr was inaugurated in Stronach’s auditorium in Raleigh, on January 18, 1893, “amid pomp and circumstance.” "As far as the Senate was concerned the seating arrange¬ ments (at the place of the inaugura¬ tion) were bad, as not enough space was reserved, and some of the Senators became very angry. The fault was that of the legislative committee, not of Raleigh people. In the hall were four stoves, hut these did little to raise the temperature, which just outside was three above zero. People were clad in heavy clothing and ladies in furs, and 'hats on’ was the rule. There never was so cold a ceremony in North Carolina." Incidentally, part of the Governor’s speech must have warmed the hearts of parents attending the inauguration. He said: "The State will never have done its duty until it has complied with the mandate of the Constitution and provided a four-months’ school." Plenty of Ice at Edenton On the 17th of January, of that year, a correspondent to the Raleigh News ami Observer, writing from Edenton, stated that the bay and sound at that point hud Ixmoi frozen over for 10 days and all navigation was closed. “A party of four gentle¬ men with a sled and 600 pounds of baggage crossed the sound on the lfith from Edenton to Rapcr, a distance of eight miles." A big snow affected two county offices in Buncombe in 1880, records slate. R. II. Cole had been elected register of deeds, and .1. V. Hunter, treasurer. The two were to present their bonds to the county commis¬ sioners on Docomber •!. but a heavy snow had fallen the week before and they could not get about to prepare their bonds. When the commissioners met on the 6th, in the absence of tin* regularly elected officials, with their IhuuIs, they proceeded to appoint .1. II. Patterson and J. II. Courtney, the defeated candidates, to the offices. Severe weather marked the winter of 1857. There were ten days of in¬ tense cold without snow, in Hills¬ boro, and then it began snowing, and snowed for several days without stop¬ ping. Says a newspaper article: “The snow was over two feet deep. The snow began falling on Friday, and every Friday for six weeks afterward there was a heavy fall of snow. The snow that winter lay on the ground until April. Tile snow was so intense that barrels of whiskey froze and burst, and the people, to keep from freezing, carried it in bottles in their |>ockets.” And those were the “good old days!"