ssed since the day that "Peoria Red" and I were caught
out of doors and entirely unprepared to face one of the worst blizzards
that ever swept down from the Arctic regions across the shelterless
plains of the Dakotas.

We had been "hoboing" a ride upon a freight train and had been fired off
by its crew at a lone siding about fifty miles east of Minot, North
Dakota. In those early days trains were few and the chances that one of
them would stop at this lone siding were so small that we decided to
walk to the nearest water tank, which in those days of small engines
were never more than twenty miles apart, and there catch another ride.

It was a clear winter morning, and the sun's rays were vacillating upon
the snow, that like a gigantic bedspread covered the landscape, and
which made walking upon the hidden and uneven track a most wearisome
task, the more so as neither of us had tasted a mouthful of food since
the preceding day's dinner hour. While we were debating and wondering
how and where we would rake up a meal amongst the few and widely
scattered ranches, the wind veered to the north and commenced to blow
with ever increasing force. Soon heavy, gray clouds followed in its
wake, and quickly overcast the sky, and by two o'clock in the afternoon
the rapidly growing fury of the wind commenced to drive sharp pointed
particles of snow before it, which, as the storm increased to cyclonic
proportions, changed to masses of rotating darts, which cut into the
exposed portions of our illy-clad bodies and made breathing a serious
problem.

We soon gave up the small hope of being able to reach a ranch house, as
to leave the railroad track would have spelled death, as we would have
lost our way in a few minutes, as even now, while it was yet broad
daylight, we could barely see a couple of telegraph poles ahead of us,
and when night approached the ever increasing fury of the blizzard
greatly reduced even this short distance.

Staggering against the snow storm our one ardent prayer was that we
would reach our only hope for succor--one of those railroad section
houses, which are located ten miles apart along the right of way of
every railroad, and are the homes of a foreman and a crew of laborers
who repair and keep the track under constant surveillance.

Every moment the cold increased, and although we were spurred on to
almost superhuman efforts by sheer desperation to thwart the fate we
knew would be ours should we falter by