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Memories of the big snow storms

ESCANABA -- The silver moon above the maples,

The torrents of wind and snow whipping through the white pines,

Evergreens encased in ice and fence posts and mailboxes erased by snow,

All true Yoopers have love/hate feelings towards the biggest winter storms of all times.

The big blizzard of 1938 buried many Michigan towns with snow as high as utility poles. The endless snowstorms back in the early 1970s created mountainous snowbanks around town. Many cars had orange Styrofoam balls or red ribbons place on their antennas to make them more visible at intersections.

The post-Thanksgiving snowstorm of 1985 blanketed the central U.P. with heavy drifts right when so many travelers were heading home after the holiday.

That particular storm really put a damper on my family's weekend. Friends and relatives attended my cousin's Bills wedding in Manistique on that Saturday after Thanksgiving. After the "I do's," some good food and a few beers, many of the guests did not make it home until Monday or Tuesday instead of Sunday.

The blizzard hit.

My brother and his wife and baby son spent an extra day on the Door County Peninsula trying to make it back home to Washington Island. My sister Lori went in the ditch trying to make it back to Northern in Marquette. My brother Mike did not make it back to his home in Minnesota until Tuesday.

Everybody that has lived a number of years in the U.P. has a favorite big blizzard story to tell.

Maybe this winter, as we long for some snow and traditional weather, we can all gather around the kitchen table talk about the snowy memories.

Some snow memories are fun like the time my sister and I delivered our Escanaba Daily Press paper route on snowshoes in a blinding blizzard. Most of the snowdrifts were even with the porches and mailboxes so we just strapped on our big shoes and went. The roads were not even plowed yet.

Some snow memories are a little scary like the time when I was about thirteen and snowshoeing at camp. I decided to go alone on a trek out into a new slashing past the big swamp. When I was out in that big clear cutting, a sudden storm came up. The wind and the falling snow created an instant white-out. I could see nothing.

With my snowshoes I could barely feel my old tracks and I slowly followed them back to the safety of the big trees and camp.

Back in the 1980s, my brothers, die-hard deer hunters, wanted to black powder hunt in early December. The snow was so deep that year that they had to snowshoe into camp pulling their gear for a half a mile from the plowed road. They both admitted that they were happy that they saw nothing to shoot at. It would have been a long haul out with meat.

Snow memories include shoveling of the roof of the camp and the out buildings. Making countless snowmen, snow cats, snow dinosaurs and snow rabbits over the years makes me wonder now, how did we lift all the heavy wet snow?

I have four brothers so I was fortunate that I did not have to shovel too much snow. My oldest brother Jim was responsible for keeping the front of the house clear to the porch and mailbox. My brother Mark had to scoop out the driveway and all the way to the back door. The boys went off to school/got married and Dad finally got a snow blower.

Reminisce with your family about the days when the big snows covered the fence in the backyard and when the whole community slowed down and worked together. Reading Karl Bohnak's book "So Cold A Sky" will help take you down memory lane.

Look up. Is that a cloud? Are those snowflakes dancing in the wind?

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Karen (Rose) Wils is a lifelong north Escanaba resident. Her folksy columns appear weekly in Lifestyles.