Jack Frost makes early visit | News, Sports, Jobs

WINDOW SCRAPERS came out of the glove It stayed just long enough to frost windshields of compartments for the first time since last spring cars out in the open. It set a record low for Sept.3 when frost coated windows of cars this morning. Previous low was 35 in 1946. Kevin Krueger was The temperature settled to 32 degrees at 4 am, an early scraper then under the freezing mark to 30 at 6 am (Photo by Ron Grieser)

The early morning frost today in New Ulm was the earliest report of frost in history, according to records at the KNUJ transmitter.

September 11 was the earliest frost that had been recorded in New Ulm. The coldest previous temperature was a 33 degree recording in 1931 on Aug. 31.

The frost appeared to be general over the area and may turn out to be the “killer” that turns off crop growth, ready or not. Most corn in the area appears to be over the danger line and ready for frost, but much of the canning crop, sweetcorn, may suffer damage as a result.

The stealthy cold snap caught many gardeners by surprise and tomatoes and other common late season vegetables will have to be gathered and “put up” to prevent spoilage.

The silage-like odor of plant juices common the morning after the first frost was apparent on the dawn air today.

Bill Fischer, manager of New Ulm Farmers Co-op Elevator, explained this morning that the corn won’t be harmed by the frost, but that beans will be hurt to some degree. Just what damage will be done to amount of bushels per yield is hard to decide, he added.

Mike Weelborg, manager of the Morgan Farmers Elevator, said this morning that farmers were dropping by and telling of a hard frost in most areas.

“I know the beans are frozen,” said Weelborg,“but the question is how bad the frozen corn is.”

He said a lot of the corn was in the denting stage in that area and the frost could cause the crop to finish up light-weight and chaffy.

The later beans, he added, will definitely be hurt and yields will drop drastically.

The later beans will definitely be hurt and yields will drop drastically.

“I know it froze hard around here, but I guess we’ll just have to wait a day or so and see just how much damage was done.”

Weelborg pointed out that a damaging frost could cause some serious problems to area farmers and be a direct turnaround in the face of recent prosperity on the farms.

New Ulm Daily Journal

Sept. 3, 1974

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