Ralph Voss’ column about the weather last week was quite interesting. We certainly do remember the winter of 1983. It was the winter following the May 1, 1983 tornado that destroyed all of our farm buildings and severely damaged the house. With lots of help, we had managed to repair the milk house and the house and to build new buildings for the free stall barn, the hay barn, a silo and the machine shed. However, the cold weather in December did not allow for the doors to be installed. So, Don attached heavy tarps to cover the openings of the barns and tied fence posts and steel tracks to the bottoms of the tarps. December 24 was extremely cold with temperatures of minus 25 degrees and very windy. In fact, the wind managed to pick up the tarp and fling it onto the roof of the machine shed, puncturing a hole in the roof! To this day, the roof still has a patch on it.
I also remember going to Mass at 6 p.m. Christmas Eve. We all piled into the cab of our old green pickup, Don and I and five children that were between the ages of five and 17. It was crazy to try to go anywhere in that weather, but it was Christmas Eve, so we went.
As Ralph stated, the next two months were mild, but it started snowing the last Sunday of February, and it continued to snow until we had about 22 inches of snow, with winds that created drifts of up to eight feet in spots. I remember this clearly because we were due to have a baby that week! Thankfully, baby Ricky was not born until Friday of that week, just a day after the roads were cleared.
Christy Brandt
Linn
