Memories of Griffis Drug Store snack bar during a 1959 snow storm by Lenna Broatch, 2019

It was about the middle of December, around 1959, and there was our High School Christmas dance at the Old Town Hall on King Street on that Friday night. We lived in Salem because it was snowing hard Dad took me to my best friend’s home on Elgin Street for the dance and the night. Well it did snow and our dance was cancelled.

Early in the evening cars from both directions got stopped on King Street and could not move (at that time the 401 did not exist). Many people in Colborne took these stranded people into their homes for the night and breakfast. Arlis, my best friend and I walked uptown, went into the drug store snack bar and found them very busy with little help.

That night Arlis and I served coffee, peeled potatoes for chips and anything else that needed doing. When we left uptown and walked back to Elgin Street, we found that Arlis’s room had been given to strangers and we climbed in bed with her sister that was approximately 4:00 am. Later Bill Griffis gave us each a box of chocolates for our help.