1888: Now THAT was a blizzard

The Great Blizzard

The power of the "Great White Hurricane"

Chris Wild

1888

As trains pass by on either side, a lone person walks across the Brooklyn Bridge after the Blizzard left the bridge and tracks covered in snow, New York. Credit: Wallace G. Levison/Dahlstrom Collection/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images

Before daylight dawned yesterday a remarkable storm, the most annoying and detrimental in its results that the city has ever witnessed, was in full progress. - NEW YORK TIMES, MAR 13 1888

Downtown at 1:30 p.m. on Park Row as people and horse-drawn vehicles struggle to make their way through the snow of the Blizzard. Credit: Wallace G. Levison/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images

Up to five feet of snow, winds of 45 miles per hour and higher, snowdrifts of 50 feet and higher. This was the "Great White Hurricane" of 1888.The storm struck around midnight on Monday, March 12, and for some people it would be an entire week before they could leave their home again. The blizzard raged for 36 hours. Combined with the constant winds, drifts scaled over three-story houses.All road and rail traffic ceased in New York City. Two hundred ships were run aground of wrecked, killing around 100 sailors; in total, around 400 people died as a result of the blizzard.The New York Stock Exchange was shut down for two days. As a direct result of the storm, New York's overhead cables were moved underground, and the city's began building its underground subway system.

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Following the snowstorm, a women on a brownstone-lined street sweeps the sidewalk near where two horse-drawn buggies are parked in Brooklyn. Credit: George B. Brainerd/Dahlstrom Collection/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images

A trolley pushes through the snow and ice brought by the Great Blizzard, Washington, DC. Credit: Herbert A. French/Buyenlarge/Getty Images

Thousands of New-Yorkers, when they had to get through their breakfasts without their favorite newspapers, their hot buttered rolls, and their fragrant coffee enriched with the boiling milk, began seriously to question whether life was worth living after all - NEW YORK TIMES, MAR 13 1888

Snow-covered exterior of the Grand Opera House at Elm Place and Fulton Street in Brooklyn. Credit: Wallace G. Levison/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images

Carts haul snow and ice, cleared from city streets, to the river for dumping in the East River in New York. Credit: Buyenlarge/Getty Images

Carts haul snow and ice, cleared from city streets, to be dumped into the East River. Credit: Buyenlarge/Getty Images

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People vexed at the collapse of all the principal means of intercommunication and transportation became reflective - NEW YORK TIMES, MAR 13 1888

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