The Blizzard of 1888 and its Effect on Immigrants

The choice was either submission to the Russian army, to send the children to the Russian school, or to emigrate to America, apparently they elected to flee. The Schweitzer stayed in New York for a while and was waiting for more people to travel to America before moving. As the previous Schweitzer family letters talked about the vast and healthy lands and how they help to settle new immigrants, they eventually chose to move to Yankton in the Dakota area.

On the day of 1888, the so-called "Blizzard of School Children" killed 235 people in the plains of the northwestern part of the United States. Many of them were children on their way home. There was no warning about Arashi, and some said that temperature fell nearly 100 degrees in 24 hours. Last Thursday afternoon, warm weather beyond time continued from eastern Montana to Corta and south to Texas. Suddenly in a couple of hours the Arctic air from Canada rapidly advanced to the south. In most parts of North Dakota State, the temperature dropped to minus 40 degrees. With the cold air, the storm brought strong wind and heavy snow. This combination produces blindness

A snowstorm occurred in Dakota State in Nebraska State and Southwest of Minnesota State before Friday 's Friday, January 13, 1888. The last gust blows into the snow flow and sag, then the high pressure system enters, the air becomes pure, dry and cold. The temperature fell further, and in the morning the bright sunlight twinkled with white light. Regional towns and cities are paralyzed. The street was floating, the shops and schools closed, and the railway garden was empty. Later, residents later wrote that the team also had no vehicle movement of any sort. It is reported that there is a 20-foot drift. The train was abandoned on an unreachable railroad track. The locomotive along the main route from Aberdeen, Sioux Falls, Omaha, Lincoln was equipped with plow, but could not break through the drift of the wind. The heavy snow dropped the telegraph line, and most of the western part of Iowa did not say or say