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Black Sunday - 14 April 1935
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I was asked recently if I could remember the terrible sandstorm that occurred in the Texas Panhandle on 14 April, 1935 and earned the title of "Black Sunday" for that date and I am afraid that I could not give a cogent answer. It is not that I didn’t remember the events of 1935. I was seven years old on that date and remember events of that year quite clearly. It was the year of my many childhood diseases of that day. I had mumps, chicken pox, measles, whooping cough and a tonsillectomy that year which made it very memorable from a medical standpoint. I consulted my perpetual calendar and sure enough the 14th of April in 1935 did fall on a Sunday. As usual we didn’t live in just one town in 1935. We lived in Haskell, Clarendon, Lubbock, and Brownfield Texas and ended the year in Carlsbad New Mexico. I spent the three months of summer vacation at my grandfather’s farm which was located between Plainview and Lockney, Texas. The problem is that I don’t remember one horrible sandstorm to earn that name for the day, I remember maybe ten or fifteen. All of those locations I mentioned above were subject to blinding sandstorms in 1935. It was the time of the "Dust Bowl".
It is certainly understandable that 14 April got named Black Sunday. When the sandstorms came
It seems to me that they usually came out of the northwest and the first indication was a wall of dark purple rolling in that got darkened to almost black as it approached. For those with any kind of a breathing disorder the advent of a sandstorm was a dangerous affair and the weak and disabled frequently died as a result of the breathing difficulty. The air was literally filled with a choking, gritty dust that there was no way to keep out of your lungs. The best plan was to get to an inner room of the house and cover your mouth and nose with a damp handkerchief or napkin.
Nearly every farm had a root cellar and I have sat out many a storm of both sand and rain in the root cellar because someone in the family predicted the simultaneous occurrence of a "cyclone" with the sand or rain.
My grandmother was an immaculate housekeeper but I have seen her attack the accumulated sand and dust on her kitchen floor with a scoop shovel after the sandstorm and then repeatedly mop and sweep to get rid of the dust.
A sandstorm or dust storm usually caused a great increase in the static electricity in the air. My dad at this time was a lineman for the Southwest Associated Bell Telephone Company and I remember one incident about halfway between Brownfield and Levelland when he was on a pole splicing a telephone line that had broken. I was on the ground watching him work and acting as his "grunt" tying tools he needed to his rope handline when I saw a ball of fire coming down the wire. His back was to the approaching static charge and he had the wire under his arm when the ball of fire hit him and jolted him off the pole He was hurt more by the fall from the pole than he was by the burn of the electricity. Being static electricity the burn was very minimal. He nevertheless had some difficulty in driving back to Brownfield.
By 1935 a definite effort was being made by the farmers to plant multiple rows of trees and bushes like Russian olive, juniper, and elm called "shelter belts" around each field to break the wind force and changes in plowing techniques were developed by that time to reduce the damage from high winds and prevent sandstorms from forming.
So I cannot swear that I remember the awful sandstorm of 14 April 1935 but I am certain that if I didn’t remember it I at least remembered several other sandstorms that occurred that year and in previous years which could easily have earned the title .
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