Snowplow

Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)

a device for clearing away the snow from sidewalks, roads, railroad tracks, and the like. The village snowplow used for clearing sidewalks is a simple affair of two heavy planks set on edge and framed together in the shape of a letter V. When drawn along a sidewalk or road, point forward, by a team, it crowds the snow outward on either side, leaving a clear passage. When the railroads first attacked the problem of clearing their tracks, a large V-shaped plow of this sort was mounted in place of the cowcatcher in front of the locomotive. When a locomotive drove into a drift, the snow was split and thrown out on either side of the track. When the engine could go no farther it backed down for a few rods or even a mile or two to gather steam and then "bucked" the drift again. Sometimes two engines were used to give additional force to the blow, and not infrequently both became involved in a drift so deep that they had to be shoveled out. This form of snowplow reinforced by a set of brushes to sweep the rails is still in use, but the great drifts of the Northwest are now handled by the rotary snowplow. Its apex consists of a huge wheel of oblique, paddle-shaped blades driven by steam. It whirls at the front end of an open drum. It looks something like a large ventilating fan. As the plow advances into the drift, these blades cut away the face of the snow bank, flinging out the snow with furious haste in a perfect cloud, visible miles away. Railroad cuts that formerly remained closed with snow all winter, requiring remote towns, especially on branch lines, to obtain their mail and other necessities at great inconvenience and often at real peril of life, are now opened up within a few hours by the steam rotary, just as a matter of course.