It SEEMED Colder Years Ago, Anyway

By CHARLES M. GUTHRIE

of the Minneapolis Tribune editorial page staff

published by the StarTribune

January 29, 1955

   WITH the wind whistling through the pants and the body braced against the blow, it may be a poor time to argue that winters are milder now than they once were.  Old-timers will tell you, though, that this is a fact and I am enough of an old-timer to suspect that they're right.

   At least winters seem warmer now.  Back 30 to 40 years ago they not only seemed rugged, they were rugged.  They were rugged because we had such frail defenses.  The old pot-bellied stove, sheathed now in nostalgic and coy memory, provided comfort in wicked weather at five paces or so.  But when you were further away the frame tended to shake and the teeth to knock together.  To keep the occupants from going numb, there had to be a stove in about every room but the one closed off until spring.

   BUT THE OLD stove was under considerable handicap.  It operated in a shell.  There was little to keep winter from the hearth.  In those days of no insulation, no storm-sash and no weather stripping, the invading blasts were sufficient to rustle the hair.  It wasn't true that you could hurl a cat through the wall, but you could come close.

   Frost gathered at the keyholes and on the threshold and ice formed on the windowpanes.  If you wanted to see out you made a peephole by pressing a finger to the glass.

   You got relief on going to bed but not absolute relief.  Our sleeping companions included heated flat-irons, soap stones and hot-water bottles and we piled on enough quilts and blankets to stagger a pack-mule.  Sleep was made more zestful than necessary by the fact that the fresh-air craze was taking hold and the windows had to be open.  It was customary to park pants and shirt under the covers to blunt the agony of next morning's dressing.  We slept, of course, in our underwear.  

   The only weather-worry we have now that was absent then involved the water system.  You could lock the place up and flee south for the winter without draining the pipes.  There was no indoor plumbing.  But this nebulous convenience was easily counterbalanced by the agonies inherent in the outdoor facilities.

   NOBODY in his right mind would return willingly to such battles with the elements, particularly if there were chickens to feed and eggs to gather, a cow to milk and a Model-T to contend with.  Milking our fractious cow was murder even in summer.  In winter the job was appalling even to contemplate.
   The Model-T was no soft touch, either.  Ninety per cent of the profanity Pop ever permitted himself came on cold mornings when he flung himself at this four-cylinder tormentor.

   First he poured boiling water into the radiator, then more of the same on the manifold.  Next he put the car in gear and jacked up a hind wheel, spinning the crank vigorously between each operation and cussing with progressive earnestness.

   Once the motor roared to a start, robes and blankets were lashed over hood and radiator and there had to be repeated drainings and fillings between stops and starts because nobody had yet had the brains to put antifreeze on the market.

   The sheepskin coat was in high style then.  It was the nearest thing to armor since King Arthur's time and almost as heavy.  But he who drove more than a couple of miles needed such raiment to survive.  The side-curtain was a mere flapping mockery.

   A WOMAN'S work was on the ghastly side in winter, too.  Monday morning meant more than stuffing the laundry into an automatic washer and dryer.  It meant drawing water from the pump, polishing the knuckles on a washboard and "drying" the clothes on the line outside.  Milady's fingers froze at this chore and the shirts, underwear and petticoats quickly followed suit.  The term "rough dry" well may have originated in those times.

   I doubt if we could revert to those days and stay alive.  Softened up as we are with closed cars, automatic heat and electrical appliances that brew the coffee, warm the beds and dispose of the garbage, we would have small stomach for it.  We might be inclined to wonder if staying alive was worth the effort.

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