Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1913-12-16
THE GREAT STORM
IN COLORADO
Extracts From Personal Letter to
Relatives in Wausau.

The following is an extract from |
letter written by G. E. Diamond Of |
Cripple Creek, Colorado, to Mr. and
Mrs G. w. Harger, telling of the
severe snow storm which recentlv
swept over that country
ION Thursday morning it began TO |
snow quite hard and about five
O'Clock in the afternoon the SNOW
storm became hurricane, pilino mn |
the snow in big drifts and blinding
people when they attempted to walk
out in the open. l decided to make
an attempt TO go home from nv
office and by taking it slowly. going |
few inches at time, | managed To
get there, after wading at times
through bitches up to nv waist
When l reached home | had to dig
my way into the house, for the doors
were AL .biockaded with snow. The
wind ragged all that night and all the
next day, through Friday night and
up TO about ten o'clock Saturday.
Friday morning we made no at
tempt to get out of the house at ALI
except to get coal. That night we
could hardly sleep and just dozed off
at about two O'Clock in the morning
when we heard big bump on the
house and thought the chimney had
blown over Next morning we found
that it was piece of corrugated iron
from the ice house, which was half a
block away. Saturday at about ten
o'clock the sun came out and we
found the windows and doors on the
south side OF the house completely
covered up, SO | had to dig away the
snow TO get sunlight in the house on
that side. The snow had banked up
to the caves of the house and over
the fences. We walked over the
front fence and went down town to
see the sights Windows in the stores
had been blown in, the snow had
drifted along the north side of the
street to various depths from three or
four to twenty feet, and the south
side of the street was swept clean
They had to make cuts in the banks
! at the crossings to let the wagons
| through, and CD the side streets they
now have gangs Of men at work cut
| ting passage ways for the wagons.
There is regular canyon cut along
| the sides of the streets on the north
side. There have been no trains in
or out of here since Thursday after
noon when the last passenger left for
Colorado Springs. This train stuck
| in the snow near Summit and they
have not been able to gee relief trains
| to them. We expect a rotary snow
| p1oW in here tonight or tomorrow and
this will probably also relieve the
| marooned train in day or two. In
the meantime we are getting no
| mail, express nor freight. Most of
| the grocerS are out of fresh meat.
| The mines are necessarily closed
down on account of no trains for the
| men to get to work and no way to
| ship out coal or ore. Many of the
mine plants are partially wrecked,
smokestacks down, pipes bursted and
| otherwise disconnected. 1t will be
days before they can get to running
| again in full blast. We were without
lights for couple of nights. Have
had power for the last two nights
and power for the mines will probably
be on in most places tomorrow. Sew
eral people were thought to be lost,
| but turned up when the weather
abated. 1t seems they had been kept
| in out OF the way places and were
| unable to communicate with their
| friends or relatives. | presume the
| result of all this will be loss in bust
ness for the next sixty days, but we
may be thankful it was not worse.
| Personally we were quite comfortable
and had little trouble keeping warm"