Do You Recall The Big Freeze Of 1962 ?

[Bazile]

It certainly is a good deal better nowadays ( although i appreciate that it depends where in the uk you are ) .

I certainly remember awful winters as late as during the last two decades ; when for example snow turning to ice , laid on the ground for weeks .

Would you agree that the winters nowadays aren't nearly as bad as they used to be ?

[Bazile]

Sorry . here is the story that prompt my post


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20785406

[BRIGHT SPARK]

Yes I agree Baz.....ice today is not as cold as it used to be.

[emmie]

i do, fun when you are young, not so much so when you are an adult. several winters ago was a horrible nightmare here. The council in their wisdom or lack of, failed to clear not just the roads, but the pavements, thus creating a massive skating rink to fall on. I can't remember a time when i hated going out more.

[Baldric]

We were living at the foot of the Berkshire downs at the time, I was 11, I remember walking to School with a single track open and snow way above head-height on both sides, but at 11 it was fun, not seen anything like it since, at least not in the UK.

[Cruciformist]

1947 was very bad!

[New Judge]

Yes I do remember 1962. Where I lived in the south it first snowed on Boxing Day. Everybody said “Ah, what a shame it didn’t snow yesterday. Then we’d have had a white Christmas”

However, by mid-March, when the said snow had not melted and a good bit more had fallen on top, attitudes were a bit more strained. But, as the article said, the country did not grind to a halt. Schools still opened. I reported back to school after the holidays and I don’t think my school lost a single day to the weather. We were occasionally sent home an hour or so early if fresh snowfalls came, but that was about it. We still played sport (playing field was some ten miles from the school and we had to make our own way there) . We had to set to with shovels to clear the football pitch markings before we kicked off. I used to row for my school (boathouse nine miles away) and that was not disrupted.

Unemployed people were drafted in to help the local authorities clear roads and pavements. None of them bleated about their rights. Basically, we just got on with it.

[vulcan]

Yes I remember the big freeze of 62, I'd just returned from the middle of the Pacific, couldn't believe how cold it was and it lasted into march 63. These day's the winters seems wetter and windier.

[owdhamer]

Nowhere near as bad.

[emmie]

NJ, indeed people did get on with it, unlike now. Boris Johnson, lord love him, shut the entire London bus service down for a day, absolutely not necessary. The weather was snowy, but not so much that he had to do that.

[anotheoldgit]

The winter of 1946-1947 was far the worse.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-423054/BBC-weatherman-remembers-Britains-whitest-winter-ever.html

[sp1814]

There was a documentary on (I think) CH4 last week or the week before, examining Britain's weather and positing whether it's actually getting worse. It listed the recent floods, tornados snow storms etc - and whilst it acknowledged that 1947 and 1962 were more extreme in terms of absolute cold, we are getting more extreme 'weather events'.

[puternut]

I remember 2 things about that winter - I was 9.

While walking to school after going home at dinner time, I slipped and fell face first onto the ice, Broke front two teeth in half and couldn't get them repaired for a number of years.

Also it snowed on my May 4th 1963 birthday, so lasted longer than usual for the depths of Bucks!

[DTCwordfan]

Last time Lake Windermere froze over.

There were cars out there on the ice though they did lose one as some plonker decided to leave his engine running while they went for a walk and skated, coming back to a big hole in the ice. Quels Plonkeurs.

Summers were hotter and drier though.

[starone]

Ice was so thick - it was really bad.

[Mosaic]

I can remember walking past the pithead on Raikes Lane in Clifton, Pendlebury in deep snow. I must have been very small - 4 or 5 - and my mum made me walk behind her putting my feet in her footprints.I think she was worried about me! I know I was wearing those zip-fronted fur lined ankle boots that were available at the time - I won't say fashionable as even as a 5-year-old I knew it made me look as if I was wearing plant pots.
I don't recall feeling cold.

[anotheoldgit]

/// I was wearing those zip-fronted fur lined ankle boots that were available at the time ///

Fur Lined Boots???????????

Luxury, some have had it so good.

I had shoes with a piece of cardboard inside to cover up the hole in the sole, and we were considered rich.

[pilotlight]

I'll never forget the winter of 1962, I was a second-year apprentice gasfitter at the time.
The frost had gone so deep into the ground that it caused many of the gas mains / services to crack, in turn causing dangerous gas leaks. The distribution ( outside ) engineers were so overworked that they didn't have time to actually repair all the leaks, so they opened up a large hole in the ground above the leak, and left it to ' vent ' to atmosphere. This action prevented the gas from finding its way int the nearest building. The job of all the gasfitters ( including apprentices ) was to stand near the hole, and warn off anyone from throwing down cigarette ends. This had to done all hours of the day for a period of around five weeks.
I'll never forget the Saturday night when a leak was discovered outside the front of our local cinema. There's me in my Gas Board overalls stood near this hole, while my mates were 'taking the p*ss'.
Still, the wage packet made up for it.

[VHG]

Nobody who lived through the winter of 1962 / 1963 will ever forget it.

It snowed then froze on Boxing Day I think and never went above freezing till March.

I remember loads of football was cancelled, some matches being cancelled many many times.

They could not play any FA Cup matches and when they did the later draws it was Villa or Fulham or Leeds or Brighton will play Wolves or Spurs or Arsenal or Liverpool, that sort of thing.

It says on wikipedia that "From 8 December to 16 February, Bolton Wanderers played no competitive matches".

More here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Freeze_of_1963

[Canary42]

I remember 62/3 well - I was living in Norfolk at the time and we went for walks on the Broads - a few brave souls even took their cars on the Broads.

But I still commuted to work every day by rail - no cancellations in those good old days of British Railways.

[jno]

you had shoes, aog?? Luuuuxury.