Excerpts from Dad’s Journal, 1969

1969

14 Jan
Temperature 15º above 0. Snowing. Got to go to Montreal.

16 Jan Temperature 8º below 0. Sunny. There is between 3 and 4 feet of snow in the wood. A real good winter for snow.

30 Jan Temperature 32º above 0. Rain and freezing on all over the north country. No school in any of them. Rain all day. Temperature went up to 44 above 0. Snow went down some more.

4 Feb Temperature 6º above 0. Cloudy, windy, stormy. No schools in local schools around today. Barometer down to 29. Road closed from Lyon Mountain to Dannemora.

26 Feb Temp. 22º above 0. Cloudy, windy, snowy. No school in local schools. Roads bad. There was about 1 foot of snow fell.

27 Feb Temp 16º above 0. Partly cloudy, school today. About 4 to 6 inches of snow last nite. Some claim up to 2 feet of snow.

14 Mar Temp 30º above 0. Cloudy. 24 inches of ice in the lake.

30 Mar Temp 18º above 0. Dogs are killing deer on the upper lake. We got four doe in one place at the old Jack Clifford Camp, 2 and 1 year old, and had 1 (apiece) fawn in them. There was 18 or 20geese on the upper lake today. No open water.

5 April Temp 38º above 0. Cloudy, foggy, rain. I know where there is 29 dead deer up at the upper lake area killed by dogs or coyotes

6 April–Easter Sunday. Temp 28º above 0. Clear, sunny. A little dust for snow last nite. Real nice day.

I found 29 dead deer killed by dogs between South Inlet and the Bluff. There is some more that other fellows found.

17 April Temp 50º above 0. Cloudy. Ice is getting black-looking. The water is up high this spring in the lake.

20 April Temp 20º above zero. Clear, sunny. I went with Carmen Merrill with snowsleds to Indian Point yesterday. He has found a blind deer. We could not find it yesterday.

22 April Temp 28º above 0. Cloudy, raining. Lake has gone down about 1 foot in the last four days. A lot of ice left yet.

27 April Temp 40º above 0. Cloudy. Rained last nite. Ice is down at this end of the lake this morning.

The ice went out of the lake today. It broke up and floated around until it disappeared. Two boys went swimming off the Banner House dock today. Young [John] Glennon and Bradley Perry. Rushing the season.

10 May Rain, snow most all day. Cold. A little sunshine. The peas are up in the  garden. Corn is sprouted. I planted some potatoes and some more corn and lettuce, radishes last weekend.

30 May Temp. 58. Cloudy. Rained last nite. Sunshine most of the day. Put the rest of the garden in. Marty, Johnny, Susan and I went fishing up at Blair’s Kilns with the canoe. They were  biting pretty good.

1 July I came down with the mumps.

4 July Nice day. We had green peas for the 4th. Real good garden.

26 Oct. Second day of deer season. A little rain with a little sunshine. Johnny and I went up back awhile.

16 Nov Johnny and I went deer hunting awhile today. Saw one deer. A little snow.

8 Dec Rain most of all day

It was real poor deer hunting this fall. I didn’t get a shot at one. Only saw four deer–two was fawns and I don’t know what the other two were. There was very few killed this fall. There was too many killed by dogs last winter.

18 Dec Temperature 8º above 0. Clear, cold. There is 6.5 inches of ice in the lake. There is about 6 inches of snow in the woods.

25 Dec Temperature 16º below 0. Clear & cold. 18º above 0 at noon. Partly cloudy.

26 Dec Temp 14º above 0. Cloudy, snowing and windy. Snowed hard all day at least 8 inches.

27 Dec. About 2 feet of snow has fell in the last two days. The wind is blowing. We went to Norwood to Steven and JoAnn’s wedding today. Susan was flower girl. The roads were in tough shape. We made good time.

28 Dec Temp 16º above 0. Windy, cloudy. Snowy the first part of the day. We got 2 to 2.5 feet of snow this storm. It was all over Central Western and Eastern part of NY State into New England and around Montreal and eastern Canada.