April Snowstorm at the Soft Drink Parlor

On this day in 1921, Cuba City residents spent their Sunday digging out from a freak 24-hour spring snowstorm that local newspapers called the worst of the entire season. The Platteville Journal* reported that thunder and lightning accompanied the Friday evening snowfall, and blizzard conditions prevailed Saturday when winds reached 30 miles per hour. Travel by automobile or train was impossible, as was communication between neighboring towns, and snow drifts were higher than many had seen before.

Cuba City's Main Street. April 17, 1921.

Thank you to Rachel Butts for sharing the photograph above, which captures the substantial snow on Cuba City's Main Street in front of the Wiederhold "soft drink parlor" (Doolittle's today). Prohibition was in place at the time, so alcohol was not technically being served at the former tavern. Proprietor George Wiederhold would be arrested later in the year, however, and on several subsequent occasions during Prohibition, for possessing liquor.

 

*"April Showers? No, Blizzard," Platteville Journal, April 20, 1921, 1.