So I’m biking home and I see a dusty cloud rising above the sylvan Aberdeen skyline. What the heck is that?
In a minute, I’m biking through swirls of leaves and dust as a front passes through, turns the wind from southwest to northwest, and brings the top eighth-inch of McPherson County to town:
O.K., it’s not quite The Plow That Broke the Plains. The view above suggests visibility was under a mile.
This dust front also dropped the temperature a good ten degrees in less than an hour. Looks like the box elder bugs are done sunning for the day!
“Daddy’s Bare & Grill?” That used to be a greasy burger drive in. What a loss for Aberdeen’s fine dining life.
BTW, doesn’t Spearfish hold the record for the biggest temperature change in 60 minutes?
Indeed, Ms Geeldottir. Back in the day there was an icy blast from space which caused windows to break and chickens to freeze place.
It blew through Brookings about 15 minutes ago. Nutty. I was outside for less than two minutes, had to take a shower to get off the grit, might have a beer to get rid of the taste!
It hit 84 degrees today in Southern Mn, which broke a record set in 1934. Absolutely gorgeous and still warm at 72 right now. Weather report says we’ll get that cooler stuff tomorrow.
Deb Geelsdottir,
Spearfish indeed does hold the record. On Jan. 22, 1943 it was -4 degrees at 7:30 in the morning. Two minutes later it was +45 degrees. A change of 49 degrees in two minutes.
I was with my family in Rapid City today, and when we left for the hotel, it was hot. This was around 10:30am to 11am MT. We decide to go to Kmart and after we are done, the wind is blowing hard and leaves and dust fly across the Kmart parking lot. We noticed the temperature drop as well along with cloudy skies, which cleared up later on.
By Gettysburg driving in the windless day I could see a wall of dust before I drove into it. Like a thunderstorm with no rain, a blizzard with no snow. Temperature went from 93 down to 83 in just a couple of minutes. Tumbleweeds blew across the road and piled along fence lines.
No loss, Deb: they still serve good greasy burgers. It used to be called Scotty’s, right? I think I like that old name better.
Ah, the famed Spearfish chinook! The temperature also dropped just as quickly when the front reversed course and swept back over the foothills. The National Weather Service offers this historical account, complete with a forecast map (check out those tight isobars!):
http://www.weather.gov/unr/1943-01-22
I was in Pierre for the annual Fallen Firefighters Memorial Service at the Capitol. The service was over by 3 PM and the front hit about 30 minutes later. The dust and dirt blowing made downtown Pierre and Ft. Pierre look like one of those dust storms in Phoenix. I noted one poor soul on Hwy 83 about 5 miles south of Ft Pierre heading north on a motorcycle. He was doing about 20 mph, no helmet and wearing light clothing. He was getting sand blasted. I also saw several camping trailers and motorhomes that had the wind get into the rolled up awnings and rip them open.
Didn’t “Scotty’s” used to be a chain of some sorts? I remember as a very little kid (under 5) there being one in Mitchell or Madison I think.
so much for the liberal weather report (jaco’s band)
Used to be a Scotty’s chain similar to BK,Mickey D’s and others,only smaller. Cherokee,iowa had one back in the early 70s. Bldg is now a credit union.
Scott, interesting! Yes, as Mike notes, Scotty’s was a regional chain. One online aficionado says there are only three Scotty’s locations left: Bismarck, Scottsbluff, and Idaho Falls.
If there was a Scotty’s in Madison, it disappeared before I was old enough to pay attention in the early 1970s… although Daddy’s in Aberdeen reminds me of the old Kreme Kastle on 81 in the northwest corner of Madison.
WR: on motorcycle? Ouch! I was taking enough sting and eating enough grit just riding bicycle into the storm in town.
Scottys were few and far between because the one in Cherokee was the only one I ever saw. Used to be a small hamburger shop in Cherokee where they fried hamburgers in a pool of grease about a half inch deep. They dropped meatballs in and smashed them flat and then swamped them with grease. Man were they good. We called them gut bombs because they were greasy and delicious. Shop had stools for about a dozen customers and Canada Dry soda was all the liquid refreshment you could get. Memories and they cost 19 cents at one time.
It was Scotty’s when I was a student in the 70s.
Isn’t it Nick’s in Brookings that makes hamburgers the same way Mike just described? I got the occasional burger there in the late 70s when I taught school in White. Go Deubrook Dolphins!!!
There was another place in Brookings, Pizza King (?), run by a Greek whose name escapes me. The pizza was cut in squares, thin crust, and we sometimes dabbed the surface with napkins to soak up a little of the grease before we ate it. It tasted gooood.
In Rapid City in the late 60’s, early 70’s the cheap place to get a burger was Griff’s Burger Bar. Fifteen cents for a burger, or fries, or a shake. That’s all they had, nothing else.
As an aside Rapid had a McDonald’s in the early 60’s. Ms. McDonald, Joan Kroc, was originally from Rapid. Probably among the first McDonald’s in the nation. There is still a McDonald’s there, behind Baken park