A story of survival from the Armistice Day Blizzard

Einer Anderson had no idea a storm was coming when he set out with three friends of his — all faculty at the local high school, where Anderson himself was a teacher — for a weekend duck hunting near Virginia, Minnesota.

“We left Virginia early on Saturday morning for our usual hunting area at Vermilion River via Cusson and past Elephant Lake,” Anderson recalled. He was just 11 days away from his 28th birthday.

Although the high temperature in Virginia on that Saturday, Nov. 9, 1940, was 36 degrees — about average for that time of year — it had been a fairly mild November so far, with many of the previous days reaching well into the 40s across the Iron Range of northern Minnesota. That was about to change in a dramatic and — for some — deadly way, catching many hunters who were enjoying the pleasant weather off guard.

“Saturday was a beautiful warm day and we failed to dress as warmly as we would, had we received any warning of what lay ahead of us in the next couple of days,” Anderson said. “To my knowledge no weather people expected or reported the coming storm. I have a feeling that they studied their plummeting barometers and refused to believe what they saw. As far as I know no radio warning was given of this approaching storm which was to take 59 lives in Minnesota over the weekend. Certainly weather reporting was not the sophisticated science it is today.”

Anderson’s account of what happened in the days that followed, along with the accounts of others who survived, are memorialized in William H. Hull’s book “All Hell Broke Loose: Experiences of Young People During the Armistice Day 1940 Blizzard.”

The Armistice Day Blizzard has been memorialized in the annals of Minnesota weather history, raking No. 2 on the Minnesota State Climatology Office’s top five weather events of the 20th century.

Hull, who spoke to MPR News on at least two occasions in the years after his book was published, told MPR’s Loren Omoto in 1986 about the event. “It came so suddenly and unexpectedly,” he said. “Generally, it wasn’t forecast and people just weren’t ready for it.”

For Anderson and his party, the conditions they woke to on Monday — Armistice Day — gave the reason for concern. “We arose early on November 11 to a quiet, heavy, ominous, solid grey sky with a few large snowflakes floating gently to earth. Art and I walked to the river where it plunges through a narrow gorge about a mile away. We began to feel uneasy as more snow began falling so we hurried back to camp.”

That meant crossing the river where they had camped as snow mixed with water to create slush that froze, repeatedly closing off their passage. After making it back to their vehicles, they had another arduous trek ahead of them: battling the increasingly deepening snow drifts and bone-chilling wind gusts. After five agonizing hours of driving, they had managed to travel only 6 miles.

They decided to abandon their vehicles and began trudging through waist-deep snow. They walked through the night, stopping occasionally to build fires. After 18 hours without food or water, the endeavor became too much for Anderson and he collapsed. His companions found a large tree that had fallen, which provided some protection.

Arthur Stock was able to venture on another 2 miles to a Civilian Conservation Corps camp at Cusson, about 45 miles north of Hibbing. The next morning, a group of men from the CCC camp set out to rescue Anderson and the other two members of the party. All of them survived.

Recalling the ordeal 45 years later, Anderson — who died in 1991 — found it ironic that he ended up as the last living member of the hunting party. “We met each year for 30 years on November 11 to relive that adventure,” he said. “Now, alone, I drink a toast to all of them with a deep feeling of gratitude. Skoal! May the good Lord award each of you something very special.”