Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 17, 1993 TAG: 9303170373
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GEORGE KEGLEY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
BLIZZARD OF 1890 LED TO ECONOMIC BUST
The weekend's crushing snowfall approached that of a Dec. 16, 1890, blizzard, "a public calamity" that dumped 3 feet of snow on Roanoke Valley and led to a business downturn.That long-ago blizzard damaged many buildings and marked the turning point from the boom of the 1880s to the bust of the 1890s.
The sheer weight of a yard of snow caved in the Roanoke Machine Shops' blacksmith shop, killing Eddy Linkenarber and costing an arm for Matthew Tiplady in that storm 102 years ago.
Damage to the blacksmith shop was estimated at $50,000 and citizens "left their comfortable homes to face the blizzard and look upon the scene of disaster," the Roanoke Times reported.
"Southwest Virginia never does anything by halves," the Times said in an editorial the next week. "When she [Southwest Virginia] goes into real estate, she booms; when she mines, she digs deep; when she builds, buildings rise by magic; when she snows, she snows."
That blizzard, raging from Pennsylvania down to the Carolinas, was the most remarkable snow storm since 1857, the newspaper said.
"All over Roanoke, flimsy buildings collapsed," Raymond Barnes wrote in his 1968 "A History of the City of Roanoke." The Times had estimated the damage "will easily foot up $200,000," a fraction of what it would be with today's currency value.
The heavy snow wrecked the roof of a new water company pump house at Crystal Spring. Knepp's Livery Stable, at the present site of Heironimus department store, collapsed and a nearby skating rink was heavily damaged.
In Salem, the snow smashed the Fitzgerald machine shop and a stable near Lake Spring and damaged Deyerle's Brick Works, Hockman Machine Works, the Darst Smith & Co. building and evergreens on the Roanoke College campus, according to Norwood Middleton's "Salem A Virginia Chronicle."
As the snow fell, Peyton Terry, an early entrepreneur, gave "a grand reception" at Elmwood, his downtown Roanoke home above the present Main Library, according to Barnes. Also, a group of members of First Baptist Church that night planned the formation of what would become Calvary Baptist Church.
Cleanup of the snow was time-consuming and expensive and it led from good times to bad times. Two Roanoke companies failed by mid-January, the first since the depression of the mid-1880s, Barnes' history said.
Another several inches of snow fell on Christmas morning of 1890, he said, and "it looked like nature was using her efforts to cool the boom fever. . . . no one seemed to realize the curtain was slowly descending on the fortunes of Roanoke."
In Salem, a "terrible recession" started in 1891 and "most of our citizens lost practically all of their investments in Salem's unprecedented land boom," said Dr. J.L. Stearnes, a developer. The snow "contributed mightily in burying Salem's overwrought land boom," he said.
Barnes gave an estimate that 750,000 tons of snow fell on Roanoke. "So many roofs caved in, many verged upon being destitute," he wrote. "So many mechanics in the various trades were so idle they wielded shovels to earn a little money. What these people wanted was work - not charity. In the coalfields, railroads were so blocked, no train ran for two days."
After the storm, Barnes said, no women were seen on the street for 36 hours. "Their long skirts, which dragged the ground, did not permit walking at all in the deep snow."
The Times editorial looked at the heavy snowfall with understanding: "About all the public can do under the circumstances is to shovel their sidewalks cheerfully and pray that the snow may go more gradually than it came. If it melts in a day, the lower levels of the city will have to swim."
Memo: ***CORRECTION***