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JOSHUA HARTZLER |
Growing up in West Liberty, everyone knew Joshua James Hartzler as the “Snow Baby.” Kelli Phillips couldn’t visit her childhood doctor without hearing the nickname “Stormy.”
The two were born in Logan County during the height of the Blizzard of 1978 and still carry the notoriety of being blizzard babies around with them as they prepare to celebrate their 40th birthdays.
“The Snow Baby, that’s how I was known to everyone in West Liberty,” Hartzler, who currently lives in Galena, said. “Being 40 years old now; when I go back and run into someone who’s older, I hear that still and it always makes me chuckle. It’s how I was known for the first 15 years of my life. I would go into stores or the restaurant downtown and someone would say, ‘So this is the Snow Baby.’”
It’s much a similar for Phillips, who was ushered to the hospital by a a team of dedicated volunteers who had worked through the night to reach her mother.
“It’s certainly a story that, 40 years later, I still love to hear (my mother) tell,” Phillips said. “It’s a story that my family still recounts in detail every year at my birthday. I have always said it’s my ‘claim to fame’ but I will never be able to lie about my age.
Terri Pulfer gave birth to her daughter Kelli Phillips in the comfort of Mary Rutan Hospital after a team of volunteers made a daring effort to clear the roads leading to her isolated home.
“My childhood doctor, Dr. (George) Nixon, always called me Stormy. I don’t know if he ever called by my given name. He was a special person to our family, as were Ed and Dixie Beair. I’ve always hoped all of the volunteers knew how much our family appreciated their hard work.”
While Hartzler was born at home in West Liberty and Phillips came into the world at Mary Rutan Hospital, it took an army of dedicated individuals from throughout Logan County to make sure each of them arrived safely.
Both Phillips’ mother, Terri Pulfer, who now resides in Lakeview, and Hartzler’s mother Deborah Winchester of Bardstown, Ky., went into labor in the early morning hours of Friday, Jan. 27, 1978, after the blizzard had been spent a day dumping and drifting nearly two feet of snow and leaving the highways of Logan County entirely unpassable by most forms of transportation.
Both mothers, however, were fortunate that snowmobiles and CB radios were in their heyday and a cadre of dedicated volunteers were at the ready to come to their aid.
Read complete story in Friday’s Examiner.
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