The Armistice Day Storm

As 1940 drew to close, the news was almost universally depressing. The Nazis had roared into France on May 10, and entered Paris just over a month later. Belgium,Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Holland and Norway had also fallen. Meanwhile, Italian Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini, who had already taken Ethiopia, looked to continue to recreate the Roman Empire, first by invading Egypt in September, and then Greece on October 28. Only England, under the leadership of new Prime Minister Winston Churchill, had managed to throw back the German air force in savage air battles over Britain. In Asia, Japan continued its march through China and moved south into Indochina, occupying the city of Hanoi in September. That same busy month, Japan, Italy and Germany had agreed to be military allies and now stood against the world as the major Axis powers.

While all this was bad, Minnesotans on Monday, November 11, 1940, still had a few reasons to feel good. The University of Minnesota’s Golden Gophers football team had just beaten Michigan and seemed on their way to another national title. Democrats in the state were still gloating over the unprecedented third term President Franklin Roosevelt had just won. But most of all, residents looked forward to the Armistice Day celebrations to be held honoring Great War veterans. Thousands awoke that morning and checked their newspapers and radios for the day’s weather reports. A light rain continued to fall from the day before and there had been predictions of “snow flurries.” There was no real worry as temperatures for the morning were in the 50s. Longtime residents had lived through many cold winters which were almost a state trademark. What was not mentioned in the weather reports was that the U.S. Weather Bureau in Chicago, which was responsible for predicting weather in five states including Minnesota, had closed its doors for the night after making these predictions, and did not follow the low pressure system which moved up through Texas and Oklahoma overnight. This new system would bring more than a few flurries.

Minnesota had been blessed with an unusually mild winter. Only 22.91 inches of snow had fallen for the entire year, and temperatures had, for the most part, managed to stay in the 40s. Even so, many welcomed the chance for snow. Hundreds of men who wanted to enjoy duck hunting season were glad the weather forced their prey to begin their natural migration south, offering plenty of targets. They got in their cars and trucks and headed to the Mississippi River and the state’s many lakes. Most other residents went to work for the day. The weather was warm, so there was no need to bring heavy coats.

It was in this early atmosphere that Ruth Kincaid, wearing only a light coat, gloves and hat, along with regular shoes, headed to work in Minneapolis. The rain continued, but as the hours passed, temperatures began to plunge and what fell from the sky was no longer watery mist. “We began to see people coming in covered with snow,” she recalled. By 10:00 a.m., “We could see outside that the snow was getting heavier, and by noon it was blowing almost parallel to the street and piling up at an amazing rate.”  Winds had indeed picked up, reaching a steady 32 miles an hour with gusts as high as 60. Soon word reached Kincaid that the store would close at 3:00 p.m. Leaving work, she remembered, “I walked into a much changed world. Huge drifts of snow lined the streets and sidewalks were buried under many feet of wet packed snow.” Several automobiles were abandoned on the side of the road, but so far the street remained open. Kincaid decided to go to a nearby restaurant and wait for a trolley to pick her up. Hours passed, but the car never arrived at her stop. Finally, two other trolleys were spotted at stops a short distance away. Kincaid and others climbed aboard, but the cars proved no match for rails, which had frozen solid and were buried under layers of snow. After a short time, the motor stopped. But luck was with the passengers. After a chilly hour stranded on the immovable trolley, a city bus pulled up alongside and welcomed the grateful passengers. By 9:00 p.m., Kincaid was home. But the snow was still falling.             

Kermit Carlson was a 26 year old machinist’s apprentice working in Minneapolis. He remembered, “The weather was getting bad when I left for work that afternoon, but I didn’t think much of it.” As it got worse, Carlson heard that the upstairs cafeteria in his building was offering free sandwiches and coffee for those stuck in the growing downtown traffic jam. Still, he continued to work until his shift ended at midnight. Finding the streets impassible for vehicles, Carson said, “I decided to walk home, which was approximately two miles.”  However, as Carlson made his way on foot through the storm, he “found it necessary to go through drifts and to zigzag into doorways of closed shops.” After considerable time in the freezing wind, Carlson was growing extremely tired but still believed he could make it, so he pressed on. “When I reached Cedar [Street] there was a drift so high it seemed to be only four or five feet from the trolley wires,” he remembers. He was within two blocks of his home when he became disorientated and had an overpowering urge to go to sleep, the initial stages of hypothermia. Carlson lay down in the middle of the street and was about to drift off when he noticed a house that looked familiar. With his last ounce of strength, he trudged to the porch, rang the doorbell, pounded on the door and collapsed. He felt himself being pulled inside, and discovered he’d reached the home of his neighbors. His friends gave him coffee and his parents walked the block from his home to get him. “If I had not been heard by those people that night, it might have been the end of me.” Carson said.      

Bob Enersen had a similar experience. Enersen was scheduled to work until 4:00 a.m. on the morning of the Nov. 12 at Honeywell in Minneapolis.  At first all went well. Enersen had heard about the bad weather throughout the day, and grabbed heavy clothing, including mittens, hat and thick scarf. As he drove into work, Enersen noticed a number of cars and even a trolley abandoned along the road, but he managed to make it to work without incident. Once at work, he and other men in his building were told that due to the weather, the company would allow them to sleep there for the night. Enersen decided instead to head home early. As he drove back, trouble began. A policeman pulled him over and told him that there was no way he would make it home in a car with the current road conditions. Enersen pushed on, but within moments he was stuck and had to abandon his car. As the wind roared around him, he found himself crawling on all fours over piles of snow and slick ice in the relentless blizzard. “My legs felt like lead. There was ice around my nose and mouth and my breath came in quick gasps,” Enersen remembered. With still blocks to go, “I actually thought about how nice it would be to lie in the soft snow and go to sleep.” But, “the thought of my beautiful wife and two-year old son depending on me kept me from ever considering it.” After six slow, agonizing blocks of struggle through impossible freezing conditions, Enersen finally made it safely home at 3:00 a.m.

As the storm ranged through the afternoon and into the night, many people decided to stay where they were. Norma Burton remembers her mother taking her and her younger brother to a hotel to stay the night; her father rode out the storm in a plumbing store. John Heryla made it to his job at the Great Northern Pacific Railroad, only to discover that almost no one else was there. As a result, he worked for the next 32 hours with only a brief stop, just to keep all of the equipment moving. Others who could not make it home were taken in by friends or even strangers. One woman remembered how her boyfriend became stranded at her house and had to sleep in the baby’s crib. Mildred Foss, who worked in the Hennepin County Courthouse, found a bed downstairs in the jail hospital. Still, others somehow managed to drive home. Betty Johnson said her stepfather, who had one good eye, drove from Minneapolis to Shakopee, a distance of twenty miles, with one hand on the wheel and the other holding open the car door in order to see outside. Even some trolley drivers reached their destinations, albeit several hours late.

In some locations, a party atmosphere prevailed. Olive Earley, who worked at Dayton’s Department Store, remembered that the management got rooms for the employees at a nearby hotel and allowed the customers and passersby to stay in the store. At the hotel, the employees found a room full of food and drink. “It was a glorious, hilarious night for everyone,” Early recalled. Robert Hayes, at a fraternity at the University of Minnesota, said years later, “Beer and booze had magically come out of the woodwork and there was plenty of food in the kitchen.” His fraternity brothers felt so good that Hayes and five others piled into a car and drove to a packed bar. They came home to an overcrowded fraternity house. By the early evening, temperatures were in the single digits, all car traffic in Minneapolis and St. Paul had stopped. Vehicles were stranded for miles around, including all major highways. Snowdrifts covered storefronts, and cars had been transformed into huge white mounds. Power and telephone lines, which had been straining under the weight of the accruing snow all day finally snapped, causing power outages across the state.

But as bad as things were in the cities, they were even worse for people who lived outside of them. At many farms without power, people burned firewood around the clock. When wood ran out, they burned boxes. Cows and turkeys not corralled by farmers began dropping dead from the cold, and roosters froze perched on fence posts. A conductor on a train to Minneapolis had asked to stop the train in the town of Watkins in the central part of Minnesota and was told he could, since no other trains were coming. Dorothy Taylor, who was onboard the train, said that suddenly “I was thrown from my seat and piece of luggage from the overhead rack hit me on the head.” A freight train had collided with the Minneapolis train, head on. Many residents in the town, who would still remember the sound of the collision decades later, formed a line and got the passengers off. Taylor was badly shaken up, but otherwise unharmed. Amazingly, no one was killed.   

Hunters in the rural forests were the most unfortunate. Many, who had left that morning as well as the day before thought the warm weather would hold through weekend and were wearing only light clothing. One was E.A Anderson, who, along with three others, had gone duck hunting on the Vermillion River in northern Minnesota on the morning of November 10. Soon after they awoke on the morning of the storm, Anderson and another man found the river frozen, making it almost impossible to use their boat. The four decided to pack up and leave. At first only a few flakes fell, but soon the dense flakes made it hard to see. The men had to stop often and push the car through the slippery snow. They reached a small resort in Elephant Lake six miles from their camp at 4:00 p.m., but there was no phone and they didn’t want their families to worry, so they continued on. After more trouble navigating the buildup of snow on the roads, they left the car, their packs and rifles, and started to walk home, taking only their knives. “The howling wind drove biting snow into our faces. Walking became extremely difficult because we were battling drifts waist deep interspersed with stretches of road blown clear by the fierce wind.” Anderson said. The four tried several times to make a fire, but wind blew so hard that the weakened flames failed to give off enough heat to make a difference. The men were still walking at 4:00 a.m. when Anderson collapsed. Two men repeatedly slapped him to revive him, but it did nothing. “I was beyond resuscitation and even when angry and determined, my body refused to respond. I simply caved in again.” The men built another fire next to a large fallen tree, which blocked the wind and allowed the fire to blaze enough for warmth. Anderson and other man fell asleep while a third spent the night keeping the fire going. The fourth man, named Art, decided he needed to get help and began to crawl toward a Civil Conservation Corps (CCC) work camp two miles away. At 10:00 a.m. the next morning, Anderson heard footsteps. Art had made it to the camp, and several workers who happened to know them, had gone out to find them.  Another duck hunter named Neil Beebe found himself stuck on a tiny island on Blackduck Lake. Beebe recalled, “Hundreds of ducks tried to land on the slush, and with the spray from the waves and the snow their feathers froze, dispelling any chance of flight again.”  Stranded, he and his brother in law survived the night by eating one of the ducks. On Tuesday, November 12, ice on the lake cleared just enough to allow the men to make it to the shore. There they found a cabin owner who gave them food and coffee, and they got home later that night. It would be thirteen days before they could bring their supplies out. All across the state, shocked hunters came stumbling out of the forests, seeking shelter at nearby farms and cabins. One hunter survived for three days in a Packard. Still, for all they had been through, these were the lucky ones.

Snow finally stopped falling on the morning of November 12 as the storm system made its way east. In the coming days, as search parties went into the woods, bodies began to be discovered. A picture soon reached the papers of two hunters who were found frozen still wearing their gear. Two others were found when the snow was removed from the top of their car.  W.P. Arndt remembered two brothers who stopped in his town and later became lost and were found dead the next morning. In all, sixteen inches of snow fell in the Twin Cities area during the day, and an additional twelve fell in the countryside. Nearly every part of the state had been hit. 49 people had died; half were hunters who had been unable to find their way back to shelter. Roughly another hundred died in the Great Lakes region. For the next three days, thousands of cars remained stuck on the country roads, city streets, and highways. When they were finally removed, car repair shops were overwhelmed.  A million turkeys were dead, and thousands of other livestock were frozen as well. One man remembered that on a farm where he lived, “The women canned 200 jars of breasts and thighs in two-quart jars.” Herbert Kortz, who worked at Hide and Tallow, a company that picked up meat scraps, said in the days after the storm, “turkey growers picked up their frozen turkeys and brought them to Minneapolis to sell but were stopped by the health department. Then they brought them to our rendering plant where we had at least 500,000 dead turkeys.” The turkey industry had lost as much as $1,000,000 which would be $16,000,000 today. While Kortz and others disposed of the dead livestock, city and town residents dug their way to neighborhood buildings. One man would later remember how his friends a dug a path for three miles to get cigarettes. Others dug out department stores and houses. Then 17 year old Don Robinette recalled, “At the time I was living in Isle, a rural town in the northern part of the state.” He continued, “After the storm, the roads in town were completely impassible for weeks afterwards. The state had to bring in rotary plows from outside using flatbed train cars to finally clear them.” Later, it was estimated that the storm had caused $6 million in damage as it went through the Midwest and to the East Coast. Just to clear the roads would cost Minnesotans half a million dollars.  

In the wake of the storm, Minnesota Governor Harold Stassen wrote angrily to several government officials complaining of the inadequate warning from the Chicago Weather Bureau. As a result, a forecasting center was set up in Minneapolis and given enough staff to run around the clock and technology was vastly improved. Still, the storm was forever imprinted on the minds of those who lived through it. Decades later, people could still remember where they were when it happened and would always hold it up as one of the worst natural disasters in the state’s history.