Snow stories from the past... where to start as there are more than a few. The first one that comes to mind, happened in the mid 80s in Omaha. A friend and myself, had driven to Omaha to attend the Shorthorn Polled Congress. It was raining when we arrived at the Howard Johnson hotel, at 8 pm. We checked in and when we looked out the window in the morning, all we could see were humps where our vehicle was parked, and it was snowing hard. We were able to get our of the parking lot after quite a bit of shoveling, and got to the Ar-Sar Ben grounds for the show and sale. It continued snowing all day and by the time the sale was over, the streets were almost impassable with a 4X4 truck. We made it back to the hotel, and found out that all the highways had been closed. It snowed another two days, and we were stuck there. We were stranded there for three days in total. The hotel was very obliging, and although it took some convincing on our part, they opened the lounge at 8 AM for us. I shutter now when I think of what our bar bill was for that trip.
The morning following the show and sale, I went with Ric Hoyt ( Hoyt & Sons) and we managed to eventually get to the fair grounds. Between the two of us, we carried water and hay to about 50 head of sale cattle. It was a lot of work, but we decided no one else was going to make it there. After 3 days stranded, we awoke to bright sunny skies and not a breath of wind. We checked at the front desk to see if the Interstates had been opened yet, and found out that another storm was coming and would hit later that day. My friend and I decided we would try to get out of Dodge. The baracades were still across the Interstate, but we were able to move one enough to get our truck past it. We started out, and it took us over 5 hours to get to Sioux City ( about 100 miles away) but we made it. I would guess that there was 800- 1000 abandoned vehicles in that 100 miles. Some semis were jack knifed right on the Interstate, some were on their sides in the ditch, and everything in between. We were still driving on extremely bad roads when we got to Sioux City, but by the time we got to the north side of the town it was clear with absolutely no snow. It was this way all the rest of the way home.
Another thing I remember about that storm was the late Mike Dugdale had his herd of Shorthorns a few miles out of Omaha, and when he finally got out to them, 8 cows had died, along with several calves. We offered to go out with him and help get some feed to them but he would not let any of us go and see the mess. I will always remember Mike crying when he returned to the city, after finding some of his best females dead in the snow and mud. I also remember driving by a large feedlot on the way home, with cattle standing in mud half way up their sides. You could see many dead cattle in all the pens.
By the way, it is 800 short miles from my house to the outskirts of Omaha. I am sure some of you think that I live at the end of the earth... it isn't..... but on a clear day I can see it from here!