Good morning, Whitewater.
Monday in the Whippet City will be cloudy, with morning thunderstorms, and a high of sixty-eight. Sunrise is 5:35 and sunset 8:06, for 14h 31m 20s of daytime. The moon is in its third quarter with 49.6% of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Planning Commission meets tonight at 6:30 PM.
The Dust Bowl, also known as the Dirty Thirties, was a period of severe dust storms that greatly damaged the ecology and agriculture of the US and Canadian prairies during the 1930s; severe drought and a failure to apply dryland farming methods to prevent wind erosion (the Aeolian processes) caused the phenomenon. The drought came in three waves, 1934, 1936, and 1939–40, but some regions of the high plains experienced drought conditions for as many as eight years.[1] With insufficient understanding of the ecology of the plains, farmers had conducted extensive deep plowing of the virgin topsoil of the Great Plains during the previous decade; this had displaced the native, deep-rootedgrasses that normally trapped soil and moisture even during periods of drought and high winds. The rapid mechanization of farm equipment, especially small gasoline tractors, and widespread use of the combine harvester contributed to farmers’ decisions to convert arid grassland (much of which received no more than 10 inches (250 mm) of precipitation per year) to cultivated cropland.[2]
During the drought of the 1930s, the unanchored soil turned to dust, which the prevailing winds blew away in huge clouds that sometimes blackened the sky. These choking billows of dust – named “black blizzards” or “black rollers” – traveled cross country, reaching as far as such East Coast cities as New York City and Washington, D.C. On the Plains, they often reduced visibility to 1 metre (3.3 ft) or less. Associated Press reporter Robert E. Geiger happened to be inBoise City, Oklahoma, to witness the “Black Sunday” black blizzards of April 14, 1935; Edward Stanley, Kansas City news editor of the Associated Press coined the term “Dust Bowl” while rewriting Geiger’s news story.[3][4] While the term “the Dust Bowl” was originally a reference to the geographical area affected by the dust, today it is usually used to refer to the event, as in “It was during the Dust Bowl”. The meaning of the term “bowl” – a hollow container – in this context is however still not quite clear.
The drought and erosion of the Dust Bowl affected 100,000,000 acres (400,000 km2) that centered on the panhandles of Texas and Oklahoma and touched adjacent sections of New Mexico, Colorado, and Kansas.[5]
….Beginning on May 9, 1934, a strong, two-day dust storm removed massive amounts of Great Plains topsoil in one of the worst such storms of the Dust Bowl.[17] The dust clouds blew all the way to Chicago, where they deposited 12 million pounds of dust.[18] Two days later, the same storm reached cities to the east, such as Cleveland, Buffalo, Boston, New York City, and Washington, D.C.[19] That winter (1934–1935), red snow fell on New England.
Puzzability begins a weekly new series entitled, Prom Going:
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This Week’s Game — May 11-15
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Prom Going
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We’re having a senior moment this week. For each day, we started with a word or phrase, removed the four letters in PROM, and rearranged the remaining letters to get a new word or phrase. Both pieces are described in each day’s clue, with the longer one first.
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Example:
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Julie Kavner’s cartoon alter ego; quality of the taste of venison
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Answer:
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Marge Simpson; gaminess
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What to Submit:
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Submit both pieces, with the longer one first (as “Marge Simpson; gaminess” in the example), for your answer.
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Monday, May 11
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