Hathcock History

Freeze warnings in Maine and three inches of hail falling in New Jersey are only several of the headlines Americans have read over the last few weeks, with an overall 593 new record low maximum temperatures being established during the first 23 days of June 2009. Many of these records go back to the early 1900s with some going as far back as 1880. Are these events hints of what's to come?

The new year of 1816 started out so mild that many New Englanders allowed their hearth fires to go out except for cooking. Though there were a few cold days, they were the exception with most of January being warm and spring-like. Some days in February were colder than in January, but still, the weather was about the same.

March came in like a small lion and went out like a lamb

April came in warm, but as the days grew longer, the air became colder, and by the first of May there was temperature like that of winter, with plenty of snow and ice. Young buds froze on the limb while a half-inch of ice formed on ponds and rivers. Cornfields were replanted, but it was too late to raise a crop. By the last of May almost everything in the fields had been killed by the cold.

The dawning of June 17 revealed a heavy fall of snow and below freezing temperature. Before leaving home to look for a flock of sheep sent to pasture the day before, a Vermont farmer jokingly said to his wife, "Better start after the neighbors soon, it's the middle of June and I may get lost in the snow."

An hour after he had left home it began to snow fast and thick. His wife became frightened when he failed to return and organized a search party. On the third day they found him lying in a hollow on the side of a hill with both feet frozen and half covered with snow, but alive. Close by, the hungry sheep nibbled on what scant vegetation they could find.

One farmer near Tewksbury Vermont planted a large field of corn. He built fires every night and he and his men took turns in watching that the corn did not freeze. His was the only crop in the region.

The cold continued through July with snow and ice as thick as window glass forming throughout New England, New York and some parts of the state of Pennsylvania. Indian corn, which had managed to thrive during May and June, gave up, froze and died.

Monsoon-like rainfall forced Mary Shelley, John William Polidori and their friends to stay indoors for much of their Swiss holiday. They decided to have a contest, seeing who could write the scariest story, leading Shelley to write "Frankenstein," or "The Modern Prometheus" and Polidori to write "The Vampyre."

August was no warmer with almost everything green in this country and abroad destroyed by frost. People lost their farms and the resulting mass exodus led to the settlement of what is now the American Midwest.

In the meantime, hundreds of thousands more starved around the world. Snow fell at Barnet only 30 miles from London miles from London. Food riots were rampant in England and parts of Europe. In the Atlantic, ships reported dodging icebergs while Alpine glaciers advanced down mountain slopes to exceptionally low elevations.

Winter arrived early with heavy snowfalls beginning in September and freezing temperatures lasting late into the following year.

Eventually, scientists linked the cause of the great freeze to the April 5, 1815 eruption of Mount Tambora, located on the Indonesian island of Sumbawa. The eruption column reached a height of about 28 miles and threw so much ash and debris into the atmosphere (about 150 times more than the eruption of Mount St. Helens in 1980) that
it changed the climate of the entire planet. An estimated 92,000 people were killed by the eruption itself while worldwide, another 100,000 died from starvation or disease.

It is hard for us, surrounded as we are by so many comforts, to appreciate the trying situations to which our forefathers were exposed and one has to wonder how today's society would deal with such a catastrophe. Could you survive a "Year of No Summer?"

Steve Hathcock serves as chairmen of the South Padre Island Historical Preservation Committee, is a member of the Cameron County Historical Commission and is one of the founders of the South Padre Island Historical Foundation.
Steve Hathcock and his partner Kay Lay own and operate Beachcomber's Museum of Local and Natural History at 104 West Pompano street South Padre Island (Open noon to 5 daily closed Monday). E-mail at stevehathcock@islandtraders.biz. Website at padreislandtraders.com.