Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs

PO'd to miss San Diego's big snow day

"I actually saw all the nuns smile, while they were playing in the snow.”

Daphne Mitchell's childhood home on San Marcos Road (now Encinitas Blvd.) got more than a dusting.
Daphne Mitchell's childhood home on San Marcos Road (now Encinitas Blvd.) got more than a dusting.

Fifty years ago yesterday, on December 13, 1967, from Borrego Springs to downtown to Oceanside, snow fell in San Diego County. Perhaps the most dramatic scene was a blanket of snow on the beaches of coastal North County.

Video:

San Diego's December 13, 1967 snow day (College Grove, 3400 block of Rowe Street)

Meteorologists at Lindbergh Field watched temperatures drop almost 20 degrees in the eight hours before the flurries began to fall at 7:30 a.m., and it was only 38 degrees. The official recorded amount at the airport measured two inches — it lasted for a little over an hour. In other areas, snow piled up several inches and allowed school kids to go out and play, if they were let out of class.

I inquired on an old-school Encinitas Facebook site for some local remembrances of that day.

Sponsored
Sponsored

Debbieleah Cochran remembered being in the fifth grade at Pacific View Elementary School. Her teacher, Mrs. Jones, would not let the class go out and play. Turns out it was the principal, Mr. Ufer, who wouldn’t let the kids go out. “We didn’t have snow gear,” was the reason posted by Catherine Green. “Can you tell I’m still PO’d?,” she added.

Joe Corder remembers the day the nuns at Saint John Catholic School were happy: the day it snowed. “In all my eight years of school that was the only day that I actually saw all the nuns smile, while they were playing in the snow.” However, the fun and games stopped when someone threw a snowball at a nun, said Deborah Cunning Koch. “The kids were immediately assembled into lines and marched straight into classes.”

Over at San Dieguito High School, Bob Moore remembered “an outa control snowball melee on the grassy knoll outside the gym. High school posturing disappeared, everyone became kids again.” Kathy Stanton remembered a snowman being built on the senior lawn.

In first grade at Carlsbad’s St. Patrick’s, Erin Lofthouse asked her mom if school would be canceled. Mrs. Lofthouse replied, “Who cares? This day is special, so you'll be playing hooky."

It was a “snow day” at Palomar College. Daphne Moore Mitchell was released from her morning classes, arriving home to her front yard in the 700 block of San Marcos Road (now Encinitas Boulevard) covered in a blanket of snow.

Anita Williams Weinberg remembers she didn’t have any snow boots. “My mom tied Baggies over my sneakers to walk to kindergarten.”

Snow in San Diego’s coastal suburbs only happened twice in the 20th Century, 1967 and in 1937. Could it happen again, even with indications of climate change?

“Yes,” says the National Weather Service’s Alex Tardy, a meteorologist in the Rancho Bernardo weather center. “Similar conditions repeated in December of 2014,” he said. Snow fell from Temecula to Escondido. And it wasn’t just on the surrounding foothills.

The weather pattern needed for countywide snow sets itself up about every 20 years, says Tardy. “We have to have a cold Arctic front come directly down from Alaska, through Washington, Oregon, and the Sierra Nevada. If it goes over the ocean, it picks up moisture and the high-elevation snow turns into rain.”

Tardy pointed out that if the current sunny and dry-through-Christmastime pattern of a high-pressure trough circulating around central California were 500 miles to the west, it would be the exact pattern needed to pull an Arctic cold front into San Diego.

“We thought it was going to happen in 2014 [snow on the coast], but the front just stopped over Temecula,” said Tardy. Temecula received about a foot of snow.

I can remember my disappointment in 1967. Although we had some snow play time on the football field during the morning, when the Oak Crest Jr. High School bus made its first stop at the corner of Lake Drive and Birmingham Drive, we only saw a tiny patch of snow left, under then blue skies.

The latest copy of the Reader

Please enjoy this clickable Reader flipbook. Linked text and ads are flash-highlighted in blue for your convenience. To enhance your viewing, please open full screen mode by clicking the icon on the far right of the black flipbook toolbar.

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

The danger of San Diego's hoarders

The $1 million Flash Comics #1
Daphne Mitchell's childhood home on San Marcos Road (now Encinitas Blvd.) got more than a dusting.
Daphne Mitchell's childhood home on San Marcos Road (now Encinitas Blvd.) got more than a dusting.

Fifty years ago yesterday, on December 13, 1967, from Borrego Springs to downtown to Oceanside, snow fell in San Diego County. Perhaps the most dramatic scene was a blanket of snow on the beaches of coastal North County.

Video:

San Diego's December 13, 1967 snow day (College Grove, 3400 block of Rowe Street)

Meteorologists at Lindbergh Field watched temperatures drop almost 20 degrees in the eight hours before the flurries began to fall at 7:30 a.m., and it was only 38 degrees. The official recorded amount at the airport measured two inches — it lasted for a little over an hour. In other areas, snow piled up several inches and allowed school kids to go out and play, if they were let out of class.

I inquired on an old-school Encinitas Facebook site for some local remembrances of that day.

Sponsored
Sponsored

Debbieleah Cochran remembered being in the fifth grade at Pacific View Elementary School. Her teacher, Mrs. Jones, would not let the class go out and play. Turns out it was the principal, Mr. Ufer, who wouldn’t let the kids go out. “We didn’t have snow gear,” was the reason posted by Catherine Green. “Can you tell I’m still PO’d?,” she added.

Joe Corder remembers the day the nuns at Saint John Catholic School were happy: the day it snowed. “In all my eight years of school that was the only day that I actually saw all the nuns smile, while they were playing in the snow.” However, the fun and games stopped when someone threw a snowball at a nun, said Deborah Cunning Koch. “The kids were immediately assembled into lines and marched straight into classes.”

Over at San Dieguito High School, Bob Moore remembered “an outa control snowball melee on the grassy knoll outside the gym. High school posturing disappeared, everyone became kids again.” Kathy Stanton remembered a snowman being built on the senior lawn.

In first grade at Carlsbad’s St. Patrick’s, Erin Lofthouse asked her mom if school would be canceled. Mrs. Lofthouse replied, “Who cares? This day is special, so you'll be playing hooky."

It was a “snow day” at Palomar College. Daphne Moore Mitchell was released from her morning classes, arriving home to her front yard in the 700 block of San Marcos Road (now Encinitas Boulevard) covered in a blanket of snow.

Anita Williams Weinberg remembers she didn’t have any snow boots. “My mom tied Baggies over my sneakers to walk to kindergarten.”

Snow in San Diego’s coastal suburbs only happened twice in the 20th Century, 1967 and in 1937. Could it happen again, even with indications of climate change?

“Yes,” says the National Weather Service’s Alex Tardy, a meteorologist in the Rancho Bernardo weather center. “Similar conditions repeated in December of 2014,” he said. Snow fell from Temecula to Escondido. And it wasn’t just on the surrounding foothills.

The weather pattern needed for countywide snow sets itself up about every 20 years, says Tardy. “We have to have a cold Arctic front come directly down from Alaska, through Washington, Oregon, and the Sierra Nevada. If it goes over the ocean, it picks up moisture and the high-elevation snow turns into rain.”

Tardy pointed out that if the current sunny and dry-through-Christmastime pattern of a high-pressure trough circulating around central California were 500 miles to the west, it would be the exact pattern needed to pull an Arctic cold front into San Diego.

“We thought it was going to happen in 2014 [snow on the coast], but the front just stopped over Temecula,” said Tardy. Temecula received about a foot of snow.

I can remember my disappointment in 1967. Although we had some snow play time on the football field during the morning, when the Oak Crest Jr. High School bus made its first stop at the corner of Lake Drive and Birmingham Drive, we only saw a tiny patch of snow left, under then blue skies.

Comments
Sponsored

The latest copy of the Reader

Please enjoy this clickable Reader flipbook. Linked text and ads are flash-highlighted in blue for your convenience. To enhance your viewing, please open full screen mode by clicking the icon on the far right of the black flipbook toolbar.

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

The vicious cycle of Escondido's abandoned buildings

City staff blames owners for raising rents
Next Article

Why did Harrah's VP commit suicide last summer?

Did the fight the Rincon casino had with San Diego County over Covid play a part?
Comments
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed Big Screen — Movie commentary Blurt — Music's inside track Booze News — San Diego spirits Classical Music — Immortal beauty Classifieds — Free and easy Cover Stories — Front-page features Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts Feast! — Food & drink reviews Feature Stories — Local news & stories Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore From the Archives — Spotlight on the past Golden Dreams — Talk of the town The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it Letters — Our inbox Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news News Ticker — News & politics Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated Poetry — The old and the new Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers Reading — The hunt for intellectuals Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds SD on the QT — Almost factual news Sheep and Goats — Places of worship Special Issues — The best of Street Style — San Diego streets have style Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves Theater — On stage in San Diego this week Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads Your Week — Daily event picks
4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs
Close

Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

This Week’s Reader This Week’s Reader