Vintage: City's snowiest season ever

The 1979 blizzard covered Springfield Street at Augusta Boulevard in Chicago on Jan. 16, 1979. (Anne Cusack/baiduhai)

Two women walk through a blizzard in Chicago on Jan. 12, 1979. (Michael Budrys/baiduhai)

Saturday's relentless snow should have made it clear to motorists: Cars were going nowhere fast. Pedestrians used streets because sidewalks were clogged on Jan. 13, 1979. (Sally Good/baiduhai)

Even as the city plowed aside the snow on Lake Shore Drive on Jan. 12, 1979, more snow fell, making travel slow and hazardous. (Michael Budrys/baiduhai)

Cars in a dealer lot on North Clark Street take on a ghost-like appearance after heavy snowfall overnight in Chicago on Jan. 14, 1979. (Don Casper/baiduhai)

A sidewalk on Sheffield Avenue south of Roscoe Street is drifted shut on Jan. 13, 1979. (Sally Good/baiduhai)

At State and Randolph streets, commuters wait for buses that never seemed to arrive to carry them to their homes on the South Side. Some had waited an hour and 20 minutes on Jan. 15, 1979.

People shovel in an alley at Harvey Avenue and Jackson Boulevard in Oak Park on Jan. 15, 1979. (Ernie Cox Jr./baiduhai)

Snowmobiles go where autos can't in a South Side neighborhood on Jan. 14, 1979.

Shopping day was shopping day, with or without a car on Jan. 14, 1979. A group of undaunted Chicagoans trudges home with groceries along St. Louis Avenue near 71st Street. Side streets were clogged with snow as the city focused its efforts on trying to clear the main thoroughfares.

Bilandic said you should park here. On Monday, Mayor Michael Bilandic's office issued a list of 103 schoolyards where Chicagoans could take their cars for off-street parking to allow the plowing of streets. Among the yards reportedly cleared was the one at Chappell School, 5145 N. Leavitt St. This picture of the snow-clogged Chappell yard was made during a Tribune survey on Wednesday, Jan. 17, 1979. (Ernie Cox Jr./baiduhai)

People were still digging out their cars on Jan. 29, 1979, and many side streets had not been plowed, like this one at Erie and Paulina streets in Chicago.

A motorist is stuck in a snow drift, but his luck isn't all bad as a good samaritan happens along with a snow blower on Jan. 2, 1979. (Bob Fila/baiduhai)

When the sun finally broke through on Jan. 14, 1979, there were piles of snow sometimes 15 to 20 feet high, as seen here in Oak Park.

After a couple of CTA buses sideswiped each other on a narrowed section of Addison Street (due to abandoned cars), near Sheridan Road, 13 buses and several cars got stuck in a snowbound traffic jam before things could be sorted out on Jan. 15, 1979. (Michael Budrys/baiduhai)

Workers clear a rooftop in an industrial complex at Mannheim Road and Lawrence Avenue on Jan. 15, 1979, to prevent it from collapsing as many others did during the 1979 blizzard in Chicago.

In the 5200 block of North Magnolia Avenue, residents don't wait for the plows, turning the dig out into a block party on Jan. 16, 1979. (Arthur Walker/baiduhai)

Frustrated commuters line up to board emergency shuttle buses called out by the CTA at Howard Street after ice on the tracks shut down trains between Wilson Avenue and the Linden terminal in Evanston from 6 to 9:15 a.m. on Jan. 18, 1979. Some had waited hours in the bone-chilling cold.

Snow pelts morning commuters waiting for alternate trains at the Belmont "L" station on Jan. 24, 1979, while a disabled Ravenswood train stands by. (Michael Budrys/baiduhai)

On the Douglas "L" tracks at Ashland Avenue and the Congress Expressway, workmen who can barely see because of the snow try to free a frozen switch that has halted service on the line on Jan. 24, 1979. (Frank Hanes/baiduhai)

Standing in an icy drizzle, Chicagoans line up at State and Lake streets on Jan. 19, 1979, to get aboard one of a caravan of CTA buses.

Discovering a buried car that seems to have been parked on Stockton Drive in Lincoln Park for a long time, a policeman writes out a parking ticket on Jan. 23, 1979. The officer had to clear the snow away from the license plate to read the number. (Ernie Cox Jr./baiduhai)

Chicago continues the battle as a huge truck passes a car covered with snow from the great blizzard at Lawrence Avenue and Clark Street on Jan. 24, 1979. (Charles Osgood/baiduhai)

A Chicagoan on the North Side of the city put a polite "dibs" on their shoveled parking spot on Jan. 23, 1979.

As the blanket of snow swelled ever deeper, Snow Command trucks got rid of a little of it in the Chicago River on Jan. 24, 1979.

In these trying winter days, stories abound about people pulling together. At Argyle and Ridgeway avenues, irate neighbors pushed together, overturning a car that allegedly was parked in a space cleared by another driver on Jan. 22, 1979. While "reserving" parked spaces with chairs and other objects is illegal, the practice persists. (Arthur Walker/baiduhai)

A storm so disrupted bus service on Broadway near Hawthorne that hapless commuters had to hitchhike on Jan. 24, 1979. (Michael Budrys/baiduhai)

Unlike many city side streets, the 900 block of North LeClaire Avenue is clean from curb to curb on Jan. 26, 1979. "Lots of people came out to help," one woman said. "Old men, women, kids. Even people who didn't own cars." (baiduhai historical photo)

City crews dump snow into the Chicago River from Lower Wacker Drive at Clark Street on Jan. 20, 1979, in Chicago. (John Irvine/baiduhai)

Mayor Michael Bilandic, right, watches snow removal on LaSalle Street on December 31, 1978, just a few weeks before 18 more inches of snow hit Chicago.

Jane Byrne and supporters exult in her upset victory against Mayor Michael Bilandic on Feb. 27, 1979, in Chicago's Democratic mayoral primary.

Another day of above-freezing temperatures turned snow to water, which sometimes turned back to ice on Feb. 21, 1979, creating tough going for pedestrian and motorist alike. This man regained his balance at St. Clair and Erie, but that's no sign things were going to get better. For one thing, maintenance crews were running out of salt. (Carl Hugare/baiduhai)

The camera catches two frozen forms in Lincoln Park — a thinly clad jogger in mid-stride and an icy monument to the past winter, which dumped nearly 90 inches of snow on the Windy City. Despite spring temperatures on April 20, 1979, densely packed snow remained in some areas. (Carl Hugare/baiduhai)

Kevin Higgins, 8, of Alcott Elementary School on the North Side opens wide for the on-again, off-again light powdery snowfall on March 9, 1979. Luckily the flakes melted as quickly on the street as they did on Kevin's tongue. (Sally Good/baiduhai)