Dear Mr. Skilling,
What is the best and worst that can happen around here, snow-wise, in the winter?
Mildred Dudek
Dear Mildred,
A whopping 4,563.1 inches of snow have fallen on Chicago (excluding this winter)
since the inception of snow measurements in 1884. That averages to 36.8 inches per
winter but, as your question implies, snowfall varies greatly from year to year.
Oddly, the city's two least snowy winters and its two most snowy winters were each
back-to back affairs. The winters of 1920-21 and 1921-22 brought 9.8 and 11.5
inches, respectively; the snowiest winters, 1977-78 and 1978-79, put down 82.3 and
89.7 inches, respectively.
However, Chicago weather historian Frank Wachowski once remarked, "Weather records
are made to be broken," and the point is well taken. Chicago's snowfall records are not
carved in marble; it's only a matter of time -- those records will fall.
