@gloaming Hi, some good tips from you, and thanks for those! That’s very interesting that you did some training with the armed forces in Winnipeg, and so you too have experienced that biting, bitter, cold Winnipeg weather!
I was born and raised in Winnipeg and I still live in Canada but thankfully not in Winnipeg nor in the North any more!
I remember that, in Grade 6, I was honoured and proud to be selected as one of our school’s team of 6-8 school patrol members.
We wore white leather Sam Browne belts over our clothes in every season, and kept the belts well-polished.
In winter and all seasons, our task was to stand at the curbside on busy roads, flag the cars to a stop, then guide the little ones to cross the roads safely. We were on duty 1/2 an hour before school started and about 1/2 an hour after school finished.
The winter temperatures could get down as low as -40F. We wore our wool tuques, heavy overcoats, sweaters and undershirts, pants snow pants, woolen mittens over woolen gloves, woolen scarves wrapped around our heads above and below our eyes and noses, and double socks. We were poor kids, though, with only garbage boots. It wouldn’t take long before our feet were full of pins & needles when we stood outside for such lengths of time. Then, after the pins & needles stage, our feet would almost freeze, to where they felt solid and you couldn’t really feel them any more. Then, after the shift was over, and our feet were warming up again, they’d turn from blue to white to red and the pins & needles would set in again. I have to kinda wonder now whether or not being a young school patrol for a full year - freezing cold in the winter and muggy heat in the summer - would have done some permanent damage to our feet? It didn’t do our feet any good, I’m sure.