The journal. (Caldwell, Ohio) 1934-1961, 1948-03-04

ually good that year and also an
abundance of fruit.
1908 was fairly normal winter
but an eight inch fall of snow on
May 5, followed by hard freezing
frosts which killed the corn, most
of the fruit and other vegetables.
Consequently, there was very little
fruit or crops of any kind that year.
1910 was the next severe cold win
ter which caused great suffering
and loss to all domestic animals as
we'll as wild game and animals.
''The year 1916 is considered the
most historic by the fact that the
scientists and astronomers came to
conclusion that these disturbances
were caused by sun spot activities.
Sun spots were plainly visible this
year. The winter and spring were
unusual and snow fell in July.
Crops were almost an entire failure
"And now here is some really bad
news. The wise guy who came to
know all about the planets, sun
spots, ETC., advised us that sun spot
activities run in cycles of % years,
and as 1948 is in the sixth cycle
since 1816-l32 years ago, we are in
for white and cold winter. The
summer will be a severe failure
1880 was a cold winter but pro-
ductive summer Seasons were
about normal again until 1854 when
two severe frosts in that year, one
on June and one on June H.,
which froze all the corn and veg
etables. The corn was tall enough
fn 1yNNn nlI Hn
wheat was also frozen. The only
cereal that year of any kind was
buckWheat.
'The following winter was about
normal but the summer of that
year was hot and dry from spring
to fall. This is the first mention of
dry, hot weather by the early set
tiers. All small streams, even the
creeks, were practically dry and
the farmers had to depend on
springs for domestic animals and
fowl. The wild animals also flocked
to springs for water. There being
very few deep wells up to this time,
as the farmers usually located their
homes near some good springs, con-
sequently it had to be good one
to supply water for all purposes. |
will mention one such spring locat-
ed near a bridge over Duck Creek,
opposite where Tillie Gildow now
lives (and incidently, where the
writer was born). This spring is on
lands now owned by Joe Forshey
but has been completely obliterated
by relocation of a state road. This
spring never was known to dry up.
y>r0xyiInI Y>lnvotxy Of xultnr
this dry, hot summer and has since
been known as Deer Lick spring,
so named because of the great num-
ber of deer seen there and in the
vicinity.
Near normal weather prevailed
except for floods and freak storms,
of which l hope to write about at
some future time The most freak
ish weather of which I remember
was in the fall of 1881, at which
time I was ten years old. But / well
remember the weather was nice and
warm up to Christmas The young
men of the neighborhood had gath
cred in a meadow near my home
to play baseball. The grass was nice
and green and everyone was in his
shirt sleeves and some were even
bare footed But the following
spring the ground hog went back to
sleep and we had long wet spring.
"Perhaps it would interest the
younger generation to know the
system used by the government to
obtain information and data for ag-
riculture department use. Such in
formation as the number of acres
under cultivation, kind of crops
planted and the condition of same.
The approximate number and kind
of all domestic animals, poultry, etc,
the temperature, high or low, mean
or average, the estimated amount of
rain or snow fall for the preceding