The Children's Blizzard by Melanie Benjamin

     The theme for the month’s Book Club was “Prairie Homesteading”.  I did some online searching to find something I might want to read, and happened upon this book, which I then read.  I was sure glad I had picked it, because it is both insightful, engrossing, and gripping.  Here is a review:

    This novel uses as its base, what is often called the “School Children’s Blizzard” or the “Schoolhouse Blizzard,” an extreme and devastating winter blizzard that swept through Nebraska and Southeastern Dakota on January 12, 1888.  It officially killed 235 people, but there were probably a lot more, since Indians weren’t counted and many of the corpses were not discovered until the spring when all of the snow melted.   

            The blizzard killed many homesteaders in the short distance between their homes and their barns, when people were unable to find their way through the blinding snow.  The name of the blizzard usually includes “children”, because most of those killed were kids.  

            Benjamin’s novel not only tells of the experiences of some of those children, but also gives a good deal of information about the difficult lives of those homesteaders on the prairies, who were sucked in by the unrealistically rosy propaganda put out by the railroads, in their attempts to sell tickets on their trains. 

    The lives of the homesteaders were usually very bleak, as they faced the hardships of building dwellings for themselves, poverty, isolation, loneliness, crop failures, and of course, the horrendous winter weather.  Sixty percent of those homesteaders gave up, abandoning their dreams of owning land.  Most men seemed to enjoy the struggle of building their own farm, but life became extremely disappointing and laborious for their wives, who had expected something better.  

    Benjamin centers her novel around two sisters in the Olsen family, homesteading immigrants from Norway.  Education for their children was a priority for the struggling homesteading communities, but it was difficult to find teachers for the isolated, poorly insulated, one-room schools.  

          The two teenaged Olsen girls took up the job and the responsibility of being teachers while still in their teens.  Eighteen year old Gerda, taught in a one room school in South Dakota, while her 16 year old sister, Raina, taught in a different community, across the border in Nebraska.  The two teenage teachers each lived in a different situation, boarding with families within the school areas where they taught.  

    Gerda lived with an older couple, who kept a close eye on her.  Despite this, she had become infatuated with a flighty, young  man who longed to be a cowboy.  On the day of the blizzard, her guardians had traveled to stay overnight in a nearby town while buying supplies.   

             Gerda had planned to take advantage of her guardian’s absence by dismissing school early, and having her boyfriend pick her up in his sleigh and take her back to the house for some intimate time.  When she dismissed her students, they started the long hike back to their homes, shortly before the extraordinarily strong blizzard began to hit.  

           Even though it was mid-January, the day had begun, by being  unusually warm, over the whole area where the blizzard hit.  This prompted both the teachers and the students to forsake their normal winter gear, and they had all dressed lighter.

    Sixteen year old Rainy, who was more conscientious, saw the dark threatening clouds and felt the temperature begin to plummet, and recognized the existential threat of the sudden blizzard, so she  immediately called her students in from their recess, into the school.    There they huddled together, inside the uninsulated schoolhouse.  Soon, as the temperature inside became very cold, it was discovered that there was very little firewood left.  

          None of the class had worn their winter gear to school. The snow outside was blowing with great fury which caused one of the glass windows of the school to break, and snow began blowing into the building through the window.  

    Sixteen year old Rainy had to figure out what to do to save the children.  She realized that the frigid school would soon become a death trap, but the only other solution that Raina could come up with, was to try to hike the kids through the blinding, freezing blizzard, in the dark of night, to a house, closet to the school.  She tied her students along a line, using their aprons, and bravely she led them out into the blizzard. 

    The novel becomes a harrowing tale of survival and death, brought on by one of nature’s most dangerous weather events.  It deals with the struggles of the two teenaged sisters during the blizzard, and also with its aftermath.   It shows the the personal repercussions of the two, who had survived the blizzard, but whose lives were profoundly effected differently by the event.  

           The Children’s Blizzard was an extremely engaging book, that was hard to put down.  It really gave the reader a thought provoking look at what life was like for those struggling homesteaders who settled the prairies.  

You can see my paintings t:  davidmarchant2.ca

Ummm. Popcorn

     I was happy to learn that popcorn is the healthiest snack food you can eat.  That is good news, because ever since I used to watch my mom crank the handle on the family’s old stove-top, corn popper, popcorn has been one of my favorite comfort foods.  I am sure one of the reasons I always enjoyed going to a theater to see a movie, was getting to eat popcorn, even when we sometimes smuggled our homemade popcorn in to avoid the inflated theatre prices.

    Research shows that popcorn has more beneficial antioxidants than fruits and vegetables.  The polyphenols are concentrated in the hull of the popcorn.  Popcorn is one of the few grains where you actually eat the “whole grain”.  Foods labelled as “whole grain” only have 50% by weight whole grain.  Eating one serving of popcorn gives you 70% of your daily requirement for whole grain.

    The bad news in all this is that they are talking about eating popcorn healthily, not covered with salt and butter.  To be really healthy, you need to air pop it, without the oil.  I guess a little butter and salt is okay, but I of course rationalize, that even with the butter and salt you still get the antioxidants and whole grain fibers.

    We make our popcorn without oil in our microwave, using a silicone popper called a Hotpop (below).  It is fast, very easy to use, and requires no cleaning.  We just put the popcorn kernels in the bottom of the bowl to the lines on the side, unfold the bowl, put on the silicone lid, then put it in the microwave.  Fortunately, our microwave has a button for Popcorn.

    Of course, I am not entirely healthy with my popcorn.  I always dribble some butter on it, salt it, then then I add MSG (I love the stuff), and finally for some fire, I sprinkle on some crushed red pepper flakes.  Okay, okay, I know you are shuddering, but I only eat it about once a month, and it is a “snack” after all.  Of course, now that popcorn has been given the “healthy” designation, I am sure I can justify eating it more often.

You can see my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Becoming Official Canadian Citizens

    In 1972, my wife and I made a life changing decision.  Tricky Dick Nixon had just been re-elected for a second term as President of the United States by an overwhelming vote, and I realized that I just didn’t trust the American voters, to determine what my future was to be living in the US, so we decided to try to immigrate to Canada, which is what we successfully did in 1973.  It was a decision, I am extremely happy we had made.  We have been very happy with our lives in Canada,

        In March of 2012, our door bell rung and I wondered who it could be.  Its a good thing I didn’t spend any time trying to guess, because I would have never been able to do it.  It was Vince Vecchio.  That’s Vince standing on the right hand side of the photo.  He is someone I had often seen in town, but I don’t really know him very well.

        Anyway, when I opened the door and saw Vince, he handed me the photo you see above.  I didn’t have my reading glasses on, but I could tell the photo was an image of a group of people, but little else.  Vince said he was rummaging through some of his old papers and found it, and he thought we might enjoy having a copy.  I thanked him and was appreciative of his effort, but I still didn’t really know what the photo was about.

        After he left, and I was back in the house, I put my reading glasses on and saw that what Vince had given me was a newspaper photo taken of the small group of us that had gotten our Canadian citizenship in March, 1979.  I had forgotten that it had happened on my mother’s birthday.  I went back and found my 1979 diary in order to refresh my memory about the event.   I hadn’t written much about the ceremony, except to say that we drove the 50 miles to Valemount and it had been short and sweet.

        It was really nice of Vince to bring the photo by.  I colorized my wife and I in the photo, so you could identify us among the small group of local, newly-legalized, Canadian citizens.

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Still Photos Compared: Camcorder vs iPhone

     For years, the photos you have seen on my blog have been taken with my Sony Handycam (FDR AX53).  I liked the way they turned out, and the comfortable easy way the camcorder sat in my hand.  I also love the focal range of the camcorder, from its zoom, to its very close ups.  When I would import the photos into my computer, I did often tweak them, giving them a little more contrast, and just a bit more intensity to the color.  

    I bought myself an iPhone 16 in December, and soon became very impressed with the photos that it was giving me.  I was amazed that the focal range on the iPhone, which gave me similar shots to my camcorder.  I do have more difficulty holding the phone in my hand when taking a photo. 

      Since I got the phone, I have been using more and more of the iPhone photos on the blog.  (Yesterday’s photos of the elk were taken with the iPhone.)  The iPhone is always in my pocket and is easier to take with me, for unexpected photos.

    I had read an article about how mobile phones do a lot manipulating of the photos you take, without you realizing it.  That made me curious, so I did a bit of experimenting.  I took a shot with my camcorder, then a shot of the same scene with my iPhone to compare.  On the photo above, the upper half was taken with my camcorder, and the lower half, with my iPhone.  

    You can see that the iPhone photo is a tad more colorful, and distinct.  (Those are both things I usually tweak on my camcorder photos anyway.)  The same differences in color and contrast show up in the photo posted below, with the camcorder shot on the top half and the iPhone photo beneath it. 

    I have noticed that sometimes the phone digital photos come out a bit “too much.”    I have really noticed that on some of the photos I took with my iPad--everything is just way too distinct, which I find disturbing.  

    Anyway, that was my little experiment.  I will keep using both my camcorder and iPhone for the photos on my blog.  I am satisfied with the photos I get from both of them.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

A Herd of Elk

     Most Saturday nights we go visit with friends over on Hinkelman Road.  Now that we have had the time change, it means that it is light outside, when we go.  Since then, it seems like we always see something photo-worthy as we make the trip.  Last time, it was the sunlight illuminating the top of Beaver Mountain.  Last night we rounded the corner, and there in front of us was a big herd of elk (Wapiti) feasting on some of Terry’s hay bales.

    As soon as I stopped the car, the elk became suspicious and in a line, started heading away toward the middle of the field.  I grabbed my iPhone and took these photos.

    Back in the 1970’s, there were no elk in the Valley, although there were some in Jasper Park.  It is believed that Parks, started shipping problem elk out of the parks and depositing them in the Robson Valley.  The elk found their new surroundings to their liking, with all the fields of crops, hay bales in the winter, and they really thrived and their population increased in their new home.  

    The elk were not welcomed by the farmers, because they causd a lot of problems, particularly in destroying the bales of hay that were stored outside over the winter.

    While it is always enjoyable for me to see the big herd of elk, local farmers don’t have the same reaction upon seeing them.  A friend of mine who has horses, had to continually get up in the middle of the night, after hearing her dog barking.  She had to quickly dress, run out into the field, and then chase the elk away from the hay she needed for her horses.  

    

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

A Throng of Thrushes

     While it may not be unusual to see a group of birds together taking advantage of some available food, I have been really surprised at the number of Varied Thrushes that have been feeding outside our house these last few days.  While I was aware that there are Varied Thrushes around here, it is a bird I usually just hear in the forests, it is a bird I rarely see.  

    I was surprised at the beginning of March to see a couple of them searching for food in the few spots that were free of snow.  When that snow had melted, they kept busy scratching around in the leaves, looking for food, which probably didn’t offer them much.  

    Then at the beginning of the week we got a foot of snow (30cm) which blanketed the ground, and the thrushes were in trouble, because the meager source of food they were depending upon was suddenly covered up.  I took mercy on them, and spread some rolled oats around in a few spots where I had seen the birds looking.

    I was surprised at what then happened.  Suddenly, there was a flock of Varied Thrushes that appeared in my yard.  I counted sixteen of them at one point.  It is the male birds that migrate first, giving them time to establish a suitable territory for  mating, the female will come later.  So all of the thrushes that appeared are males, and you know how males generally act;  they keep chasing other males away.  That is what the throng of thrushes are doing in my yard as they eat, they are also keeping busy chasing the other male birds away from the food.  

    Male Varied Thrushes look a lot like Robins, but are more decorative (photo below).  It is a treat to see so many of them, and watch all of the activity outside.

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

The McBride Snow Pillow Graph

     BC is largely made up of mountains.  Knowing how much snow (and rain) has fallen on those mountain tops during the winter is very important information.  It gives some indication of what kind of things the province might experience in the upcoming summer.  Might there be flooding?  Might there be drought conditions?  Will there be enough water in the rivers for the electricity that is generated by the dams?  It is good to know those kind of things in advance, so preparations can be made to help minimize potential problems.  

    To get that sort of information, BC uses a technology called “Snow Pillows” which they place in alpine areas around the province.   These pad-like items measure the weight of the snow that is on top of them.  If rain falls on the snow, that also adds to the weight that is measured.  That information is electronically sent to a center that has gathered and recorded the data for decades.

    The graph above shows what has been recorded this year (the dark blue line), the amount of snow recorded last year (the green line), and the pink line that shows the historical amount of snowfall (and rain) on our local mountains over the years

    Seeing that the blue line is just above the “normal” range is good news for the Robson Valley.  For several years we have been experiencing drought-like conditions locally.  Of course, we could still experience a summer of drought, but at least there should be a good deal of water in the local creeks and springs that are fed by the snow in the alpine.

    Sunbeam Creek, where we get our water, had a very low flow last year.  Hopefully, things will be back to normal this summer.

    Below is a photo of some of the snow-capped mountains, where the local snow pillow is located.

You can see my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca