The Blizzard of 1978 in Most of Indiana, Michigan and many other states in America

[Inspeqtor]

I have lived in Elkhart, Indiana most of my life. Back in January 25, 1978 we got hit with a very strong blizzard that knocked us to the ground. I do not remember now how much snow we had before the blizzard came but I do remember we were able to drive around with no problem. We did go to the grocery store to get some food to make sure we had something to eat as we were warned on the television we were going to get some snow. When we woke up the next morning we could not go ANYWHERE!

I just Googled the story which is still news now 47 years later!

Quote:

The Blizzard of 1978 was a historic and catastrophic winter storm that paralyzed Indiana, including Elkhart County, from January 25 to 27, 1978. It is considered the worst blizzard on record for the state, characterized by heavy, continuous snow and hurricane-force wind gusts.

Impact on Elkhart, Indiana

• Accumulation: Elkhart measured 20.2 inches of snow, with average snowfall across Elkhart County reaching up to 3 feet in some areas. The region as a whole, often referred to as Michiana, saw between 28 and 41 inches of snow accumulation in various spots.
• Wind and Drifts: Sustained winds of 35 to 45 mph and gusts approaching 55 mph created massive snow drifts that reached heights of 8 to 25 feet, burying cars and houses and making travel virtually impossible.
• Paralysis: Elkhart County was effectively shut down. Roads in rural areas remained closed for 7 to 10 days after the storm, and many residents were stranded in their homes or at work for days. The National Guard was eventually called in to help clear major highways like I-65 with tanks and bulldozers.

I had a TINY snow blower that I used to blow out our driveway. I have before and after pictures of that which took me along time to do that. All this came in ONE night!!!

The night before we went to bed with very little snow on the ground. We went to the store to get some groceries. Here is a funny story about that.

After my neighbor saw I had blown out our driveway, he wanted me to blow out his drive way AND blow out the STREET!!!!!! so he could drive someplace to buy some BEER!! My GOD he was expecting a miracle!!! If I had been able to blow out OUR street, what about ALL the other streets that needed to be cleared??? It took the city several days to clear all the streets! LOL!!

He thought he sure needed his BEER!! I was 28 years old then, he was probably 10-15 years older I am guessing.

OK, here are the pictures. The first picture is what the house looks like with NO snow which I got from Google Earth Pro because I do not live there anymore.

 

[Levina de Ruijter]

OK, here are the pictures.

Looks amazing, Charles. So much snow.

I can add a bit to the story and will do that later today.

 

[Inspeqtor]

More Pictures

 

[Levina de Ruijter]

After my neighbor saw I had blown out our driveway, he wanted me to blow out his drive way AND blow out the STREET!!!!!! so he could drive someplace to buy some BEER!! My GOD he was expecting a miracle!!! If I had been able to blow out OUR street, what about ALL the other streets that needed to be cleared??? It took the city several days to clear all the streets! LOL!!

That's hilarious. The whole STREET? It is a miracle you managed to get rid of the snow on your own doorstep!

 

[Inspeqtor]

More Pictures

This picture is my wife blowing snow not knowing at the time she was pregnant with our second daugter who was born in August 1978

This is my wife holding our first daughter born in February 1977

That is all of my pictures from the Blizzard of 1978!!!

 

[Inspeqtor]

That's hilarious. The whole STREET? It is a miracle you managed to get rid of the snow on your own doorstep!

HAHAHA!! Yes it was! Looking at these pictures today I have no idea how I got it done with that very TINY snow blower.

I have a snow blower today twice that size but I would NOT want that same job today at my age of 75!! I would not ever try it any more.

 

[Inspeqtor]

Looks amazing, Charles. So much snow.

I can add a bit to the story and will do that later today.

Oh thank you Levina!! I will be waiting patiently (some how!!) LOL LOL LOL

 

[Levina de Ruijter]

Oh thank you Levina!! I will be waiting patiently (some how!!) LOL LOL LOL

I have some pictures too but they are not digitised so I'll see how I can do that. I should still have the negatives.

 

[LtDave]

I have some pictures too but they are not digitised so I'll see how I can do that. I should still have the negatives.

were you here in the midwest in 78?

i remember some big big snow storms growing up in michigan in the 70s but i cant remember much about this '78 snowmageddon. my neighbor was an old widow and she was always spending money on stuff, SHE would never use, but made sure my dad knew to come over and use it. gas powered lawn mower, self propelled snowthrower, and some hedge trimmers and the like.

i would have probably gotten the snow thrower out and started working the snow.

ive not done it lately because of work schedules (in the past several years) but i absolutely LOVED running the snow thrower at night even if its still coming down. best time for me to do it but my current machine is LOUD.

the storm hit some parts of the state hard, with well over 20" but even though the storm was east of most of the state, my side probably only got 8-12 inches (20-30cm).

i remember in 2001, a big storm hit while i was at work. i had a big 4x4 pickup truck with a big diesel engine and had zero problems getting home until, i tried to turn into my drive. it was originally a closed alley and when they did some sewer work, they replaced the apron into the street with one dimensioned for a driveway, and not an alleyway which was about 2 feet narrower. they didnt fill the grass up to the new concrete and when i made the turn in, i got the rear wheel down into this hole. i had to dig the truck out, to get it off the street.

the driveway was 22' by 153' (6.6m x 46m) plus an apron in front of the garage that was 14' x 22' (4.2m x 6.6m) and overnight we got about a 12-16 inches (30-40cm) it took me 11 hours to clear it with the snowthrower. it was so deep that the auger would tunnel under so i had to hit it, pull back and break it up, then go over it again. long long day

 

[Inspeqtor]

I have some pictures too but they are not digitised so I'll see how I can do that. I should still have the negatives.

I would "assume" your pictures are on 35mm film? Look up "35mm film scanner". Are your negatives in good shape? Some of mine are very bad, lots of scratches on them....sigh....
They used to make a printer that also doubled as a scanner but looking at Amazon now they do not make anything like that now but they do have individual film scanners.

HERE is one, I do not know what your budget is. Some are WAY MORE expensive than this one is. Is there an Amazon in the Netherlands or something similar?

 

[Inspeqtor]

were you here in the midwest in 78?

She told me in a Direct Messsage there was a Blizzard in The Netherlands also in 1978.
She will tells us about that Blizzard sometime soon.

 

[Inspeqtor]

I have some pictures too but they are not digitised so I'll see how I can do that. I should still have the negatives.

I just thought of something else you should get IF you are going to be handling 35mm Negatives, and that is Lintless Darkroom Gloves to keep from putting finger prints on the Negatives!

 

[Levina de Ruijter]

were you here in the midwest in 78?

No, but we too had a blizzard here in 1978 that lasted for days. We got snowed in. Never experienced anything that severe before or since. It's rather interesting that it happened in the same winter.

I do have a few pics of it and I'm looking for the negatives now.

 

[Levina de Ruijter]

@Inspeqtor

Thanks for the help and the links, Charles. We'll see. If all else fails I will just photograph the photographs!

 

[Levina de Ruijter]

When I saw Charles' account of the 1978 Blizzard it made me think of the blizzard we had in that same winter over here, in the Netherlands. It's interesting that both happened during the same winter.

Here's my story.

My husband and I were young newly weds and we had bought an little old house in the countryside as that was all we could afford at the time. We both worked full time and commuted, each having our own car. My husband would always be up before me, start breakfast. I would start to rear my head at the smell of coffee. But one morning in 1978 he didn't make coffee but woke me up. He said, you won't believe this, come and see. I get up, walk to the living room and couldn't see the road because of a blizzard obscuring my view.

Now our house was located in a polder, which is a "low-lying tract of land that forms an artificial hyddrological entity, enclosed by dikes". We lived on the dike. Or rather at the base of it, so if we looked out the living room window we only saw the sloping dike. On top of the dike was the road. There was a path from the dike down to our level. We usually just parked our cars on the dike itself, half in the grass although we could also park them below, next to our house (the property was quite large). The road was not a busy road, although there would be some traffic.

So, it was a snowstorm and we couldn't see what was going on outside. But then we began to see car lights through the snow up top, on the road. Cars were in trouble because not only was there a fierce blizzard, it was below zero and the road was freezing up and became very slippery. So cars got stuck. There was no way we could reach the dike as the hollow space between our house and the top of the dike had filled with snow, like a bowl with flower. We had a tall fence with an even taller fence post and they were gone, buried in the snow. When we saw cars stuck we called the police to ask them for help. I can only assume they did so.

I don't remember exactly how long the storm lasted but we were locked in for 3 days. We then dug a path through the snow to the road above and went to our neighbours who lived in a farm a 100 meter away or so. A few other neighbours also found their way there and we talked about how to get provisions because we still couldn't use the road. The road was clear of snow but the freezing wind had free rein there and the surface was frozen. It was like a slide, if that is the right word. You couldn't walk on it, you couldn't drive on it. So we decided to take sledges and walk across the fields to the nearest town. And that's what we did. It was freezing cold, there was still a fierce wind but no longer snow and we felt we were on expedition in Antarctica. But we got the provisions and didn't forget to buy a few bottles of brandy. It took the better part of the afternoon to get it done. I don't know what it must have looked like, a bunch of people, dressed for the arctic circle, dragging sledges full of groceries through the snow in the fields.

It took another few days before we could start clearing our path and reach our cars. By that time road salt had been used to defrost the road and we could finally leave and get to work again.

I took some photos of the snow, but I wasn't into photography at all at that time. I had a camera but used it only during vacation or Christmas or whatever. It simply didn't occur to me to document it properly. A pity. Anyway, I found three photos. And they are horrible. Image quality has degraded and the are greatly discoloured. I can't even tell if they were colour or b&w originally. I looked for the negatives. I know they are there but all my negatives are in a shoebox and I don't know which negatives belong to which photos. And then it's snow, so there isn't much on the negatives. I did look but couldn't find them.

So I photographed two of the photographs and took them to Photoshop, converted them to B&W and added contrast and sharpened them using a high pass.

The car on the dike is ours. There is a broad path starting somewhere in the lower left corner and then sloping upwards to the right, to where the car is. Halfway that path, just before it starts to go up, roughly between the bare tree in the centre and the left, is a fence. It was tall, chest high (we had a big dog) with a fence post that was higher still. They're gone, covered by snow.

Here's a view to the left, in the direction of our neighbours and their farm house. The dike is on the right.