Blizzard of '78: Heroic trucker, Supermarket sweethearts
1/25/08


CLEVELAND -- Two Northeast Ohio families will never forget the Blizzard of '78, for completely different reasons.

The family of truck driver Jim Truly looks back at the blizzard's 30th anniversary this weekend with mixed emotions.

Truly survived six days in the blizzard, trapped in the cab of his truck under a 30 foot snowdrift that was nearly half a mile long.

"They didn't think that, you know, he could have survived that long," recalls his widow, Carol. Jim Truly died of natural causes eight years after the blizzard.

"It was terrible, it was just terrible," she says sadly, taking a pause while paging through the yellowed newsclippings of her husband's amazing survival story. "I wish he was still here today."

Jim Truly was hauling steel from Cleveland to Mansfield when the blizzard hit. He had pulled over to help another driver then decided to wait until the heavy snow passed. It never did.

"It was a difficult time for him, a difficult time for the family," says Truly's daughter Susan Pogue, who was a teenager at the time of the Blizzard of '78. She remembers the day well, and wonders how her dad survived in a dark, freezing truck for so many days.

"Either he had some oxygen trapped underneath there, which is hard to believe, or he had some real good guardian angels blowing air in there for him," Pogue figures.

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DANG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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We were pulling tractors out of that snow storm on hwy 28 in Indiana with big Farm tractors. We had a snow drift up to our roof at our house.

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A wise man will hear, and will increase learning; and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels:

You aint THAT old ................... are you?

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I was 16. Have worked full time ever since then. Left home when I was 16. Worked for a farmer. He was charging 50 bucks to pull these trucks out.

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A wise man will hear, and will increase learning; and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels:

I was thinking you were in your mid to upper 30s, thats why I was giving you a hard time.

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I got socks that old!

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A wise man will hear, and will increase learning; and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels:

I was nine and in Northern Illinois on a dairy farm 6 miles from the Hampshire truck stops at the 36.5 mm I remember we dumped milk down the drain 6 days in a row as the milk truck couldn't get through to pick it up. Dad spent 4 days on a 4600 ford tractor with a loader plowing 1 lane to hwy 20 over a mile away to get the milk truck through. We still had snow piles in our yard in July that year..........

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[B] Good concealed carry laws reduce crime. That is a proven fact. When law abiding citizens carry guns criminals go somewhere else to do their dirt.
"Make your attacker advance through a wall of bullets. I may get killed with my own gun, but he's gonna have to beat me to death with it, cause it's going to be empty."

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[B] Good concealed carry laws reduce crime. That is a proven fact. When law abiding citizens carry guns criminals go somewhere else to do their dirt.
"Make your attacker advance through a wall of bullets. I may get killed with my own gun, but he's gonna have to beat me to death with it, cause it's going to be empty."

I remember that storm. We were in living in Michigan at the time, but my whole family and I was down in Atlanta visiting with my grandparents. I was about 12 years old at the time.

When we got back to Michigan, I recall my dad having to park the car in the road so we could all pitch in to shovel the 8 foot drift from the end of the driveway. Later that day, my brothers and I were climbing on the roof of the garage and jumping from the peak into the drift beside the garage. The peak is about 15 feet and the snow was almost that high at some points. We'd jump, and then tunnel our way over to the house, make our way along side the garage and then pop out of the snow bank near the driveway. It was some hella good fun.

I'm sure the adults weren't having too much fun with the snow, but 8-10ft snow drifts are magical to a kid!