The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1884-10-08
The Year Without a Summer.

The year 1916 was known Throughout
the United States and Europe as the
coolest ever experienced by any person
then living. Very few persons now
living can ~rccollect it. June was the
coolest ever known in this latitude; frost
and ice were common. Almost every
green thing was killed, fruit nearly all
DESTROYED. Snow fell to the depth OF
ten inches in Vermont, seven in Maine,
three in the interior of New York, and
also in Massachusetts. There were a few
warm days. All classes looked for them
in that memorable cold summer sixty
eight years ago. 1t was called a dry
season. But little rain fell. The wind
blew steadily from the north cold and
fierce. Mothers knit extra socks and nit
tens for their children in the spring, and
woodpiles that usually disappeared during
the warm spell in front of the houses
were speedily built up again. Planting
and shivering were done together, and
the farmers who worked out their taxes
on the country roads wore o~verceats
and mittcns. In a town in Vermont a
flock of sheep belonging to q farmer had
been sent, rs usual, to their pasture. On
June II a heavy snow fell; the cold was
intense, and the owner started away at
noon to look for his sheep. "Better
start the ncighbors soon, wife," he said
in Jest before leaving; "being in the
middle of June I may get lost in the
snow" Night came, the storm increased,
and he did not return. The next morn
ing the family sent out for help and
started in search. One after another OF
the neighbors turned out to look for the
missing man. The snow had covered
up all tracks, and not until the end of
tile third day did they find him on the
side of a hill, with both feet frozen, un-
able to move. A farmer who had a large
field of corn in Tewksbury built fires
around it to ward off the frost; many an
evening he and his men took turns
watching 1t. He was rewarded with the
only crop of corn in the neighborhood.
Considerable damage was done in New
Orleans in consequence of the rapid rise
of the Mississippi river; the suburbs
were covered with water and the roads
were passable only in boats. Fears that
the sun was cooling off abounded, and
throughout New England all picnics
were strictly prohibited: ,
July was accompanied with frost and
ice. On the 9TH ice was formed of the
thickness of window glass throughout
New England, New York, and some
parts of Pennsylvania. Indian corn was
nearly all destroyed; some favorably
situated fields escaped. This was true
of some of the hill farms of Massachu-
sets. August was more cheerlcss, If
possible, than the summer months which
preceded it. Ice was formed half an
inch in thickness. Indian corn was so
frozen that the greater part was cut down
and dried for fodder. Almost every
green thing wa destroyed in this coun-
try and in Europe. On the 3Oth snow
fell at Barnet, forty miles from London.
Papers received from England stated
"that it would be remembered by the
present generation that the year 1916
was a year in which there was no sum-
mer." Very little corn ripcned in New
England and the Middle States; farmers
supplied themselves from corn produced
in 1915 for seed in the spring of 1917. 1t
sold at from 81 to SIS per bushel.
September furnished about two weeks
of the mildest weather of the season.
Soon after the middle, it became cold
and frosty; ice formed a quarter of an
inch in thickness. October produced
more than its share of cold weather;
frost and ice were common. The sum-
mer and autumn of 1916, cold, rainy.
and ungenial throughout Europe, were
peculiarly so in France. Constant rains
fell during the months of July, August,
and September. But for an abundant
potato crop, famine, with all its horrors,
would have been her lot. The minister
of the interior established granaries
throughout the kingdom, where corn
was sold to the destitute at o reduced
price. Prices rose, however, to more
than double, and hundreds persisted of
actual want. November was cold and
clustering; snow fell so as to make good
sleighing. December was mild and COM
Portable. -B0ston Transcript.