Great write up of: The great arctic outbreak of 1899

[kennyp2339]

The Incredible Arctic Outbreak In February Of 1899 Was The Greatest Of Them All | NY NJ PA Weather

Many winters have featured some very impressive surges of arctic air into the U.S. (1977 and 1985 come to mind immediately) but the most widespread and greatest arctic outbreak occurred during the first half of February in 1899. The overall coverage of this outbreak was remarkably impressive...

nynjpaweather.com

And we thought we saw cold a few times this winter.

 

[Ashful]

Cool post, kenny!

I remember reading about this once about 20 years ago, mostly its effect on cattle and other livestock in the midwest states. Not that long ago, in the grand scheme of things, within the lifetime of many relatives still alive as I was growing up.

I wonder how it compares to the "Little Ice Age" of our Revolutionary period in the 1770's, which is the cold snap we tend to hear most about around here.

 

[kennyp2339]

Yea, I saw this yesterday but got the chance to really read it this morning, impressive to see shot after shot of re-enforcing icebox air come into the country, what blew my mind was the parts of the write up that included Florida and obviously our area in the MA.
Makes you wonder the actual cultural impact of this event, right in the middle of our industrial revolution, potentially impacting our architecture with importing designs for coal shoots into homes, saltbox / Greek revival type construction that has everything from the home, garage to barn all interconnected to each other, transportation networks, stockpiles and small-town villages staying tighter together as more and more population incorporated with each other vs farming / homesteads.

 

[Ashful]

Just think how our utility systems fail today in the face of unusual weather, after an additional 120+ years of refinement and weather-proofing. Given so much of what is robust electronics today, used to be finicky and fragile electro-mechanical devices, it must've been a nightmare of failed early-adopter electrical and gas grid problems in major cities.

I'd bet the railroads were completely crippled, in terms of any switching and signaling hardware anywhere that had been already automated at that point. If there were any union for the switch signalmen being replaced by automation at the time, they were probably making noise in the wake of this.

I can't imagine central heating (eg. Philly) worked to well, against the sort of system losses they'd have had at these temperatures. For those who don't know, many older east-coast cities (eg. Philly, Bethlehem) are heated by centrally-piped steam: https://hiddencityphila.org/2012/02/all-steamed-up/.

The roots of Philadelphia’s district steam system date back to 1889, when the Edison Electric Light Company of Philadelphia–which eventually became part of the Philadelphia Electric Company–began to generate and sell electricity from its central station at 908 Sansom Street. Later that year, exhaust steam from the plant’s engines was used to warm a nearby house at 917 Walnut Street, creating an additional revenue source.

My family was scattered across farm land in Bucks County, northeast of the city. I'd bet they were not so badly effected, they wouldn't have had any electric, gas, or central heating, anyway. Their primary battle was almost certainly protecting their livestock from the cold, and not burning down the barn in the process.