Winter’s Fury

Men and women huddled on a corner for protection from a storm playing no favorites between people and horses. A terrific snowstorm with 75 mph winds on February 14, 1914, caused the New York Central’s Twentieth Century Limited to arrive in Grand Central two and a half hours late.

“Storm Played No Favorites with Men or Beasts,” an editor wrote in 1914 as part of a winter-misery photo spread titled “New Yorkers Playthings in the Blizzard’s Grip.” If you think shoveling your car out is a pain, imagine coaxing a horse from its stable into a driving snowstorm. Over the course of the 20th century, the number of horses in New York would dwindle from as many as 200,000 to just a few hundred, but in 1914, the city remained a place where the majesty and the mistreatment of horses were both everyday facets of life.