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The tragic events of a blizzard occurring in January, 1888, are presented in the powerfully written narrative, “The Children’s Blizzard. ” A freakish series of meteorological events converged on the burgeoning western territories to create a never before seen violent weather pattern. Author David Laskin states that “Land, Freedom and Hope,” (9) were driving forces for many of the immigrants who arrived in early America.
The Homestead Act, signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln in 1862, opened the doors to all who met the criteria for ownership: one only needed to be over the age of twenty-one, have available the $18 filing fee, and live on land the individual had farmed for five years.
One Hundred and Sixty acres of farmland beckoned these earliest settlers to the new west, and they arrived anxious to begin new lives in America. The power of David Laskin’s story lies in his ability to bring the families and victims to life, through his artful crafting of words and descriptions.
The reader is privy to the motivation behind families who left all they had once known to travel to this new land, in search of a new life.
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Proficient in: Children
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“ She followed all my directions. It was really easy to contact her and respond very fast as well. ”
For the 16. 5 million who traveled to this new land between 1850 and 1900, the motivation was varied. Laskin’s story provides the reader with inside information about weather fronts, and the disastrous chain of events which led to the killing blizzard, adding to the understanding of the extreme power of nature. Life was not easy for these homesteaders. The weather was unkind, with freezing extremes of weather in the winters and sun-baked, unforgiving dry summers.
When the blizzard hit, no one was prepared.
After weeks of freezing days and nights, an unseasonably warm day, a threatening precursor of the dramatic change which was to come, brought families out of their homes and into their fields. Husbands left for town to fortify the larders with food; children went to school, many for the first time in several weeks due to the bitter cold which had gripped the area. Sons who did not go to school that fateful day stayed with fathers to gather lost cows and other farm animals and to repair barns which had been damaged by other storms.
The temperature fell dramatically on January 12th, with winds up to and often above 60 mph. Ice crystals fell; not billowy clouds of soft snow, but ice crystals which filled the nostrils and sealed eyelids closed. Farmers tried to get back to homes from nearby barns, but were unable to find their way. Many children were dismissed from schools, or led from their schools, on paths which led to their deaths. This was a killing children’s blizzard: a blizzard so named because of the more than a hundred children who died as they tried to find their way to homes, and to safety.
The children died cruel deaths: deaths from exposure and hypothermia. They had not dressed for bitter cold; the weather which began the day was mild. Even had they been dressed in winter garb, the protection could not have saved them. Laskin provides a graphic account of the effects of cold and exposure. “Physics dictated that their warm body tissues and fluids would eventually reach equilibrium with the cold fluid of the ambient air. ” (182) Internal body temperatures of 98. 6 rose slightly from the exertion as they attempted to plow through deep snow, fighting the blinding forces of the ice crystals.
Quickly, however, their core temperatures fell as their bodies lost heat to the air. Radiation, that same force which moves heat through the atmosphere, worked against the children. Heat is wicked from the body, further complicating the loss of body heat. Wet clothing took more warmth from them, as evaporation and condensation took their toll. Sweat, meant to cool an overheated body, served now to cool the bodies even further by taking what body heat may have been left and sapping it away due to evaporation on the surface of skin.
For others, as body temperatures dropped, hallucinations began and the body felt as if it were on fire. The urge to sleep was strong. For some, that was the end. For others, an indomitable spirit forced them onward. For those who stopped, core temperatures continued to drop. Heartbeats slowed to half the normal rate; the muscle was less able to respond to normal electrical signals to beat steadily. The heart fibrillated. They ceased to beat. Circulation stopped. Brain activity ended. Others were victims of extreme frostbite: the “irreversible freezing of living tissue. (213) Blood retreats from extremities to the center of the body to keep the heart and lungs functioning. When skin temperature reaches between 22 and 24 degrees, moisture within tissue freezes. Ice crystals form within the layers, freezing adjacent tissues in an unending pattern. The freezing spreads to muscles and tendons, irreversibly killing those tissues. The victim at this point feels nothing as all sensation is gone. For those who miraculously survived the ravages of the storm, the effects of prolonged cold and the resultant hypothermia continued.
Stories of survivors who were taken into the warmth of homes succumbed as a result of heart failure which resulted as the tissues surrounding the heart thawed. The Children’s Blizzard is a graphic, compelling narrative of indomitable spirit, tragedy, and the power of nature. The author’s artful presentation of historically correct accounts combined with meteorological explanations is compounded with medically accurate descriptions of the devastation brought by cold and exposure.
The Children’s Blizzard. (2020, Jun 02). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/the-childrens-blizzard-new-essay
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