We may get some snow this weekend in Bakersfield.

Since I've been here (28 years), it has snowed five times. Three were very light, one stuck to the ground and on Jan. 25, 1999 there was a bunch. Three to six inches.

But some interesting things happened before we set out to do work. An editor, Lois Henry, decided we should go in the Chamber of Commerce parking lot out back and have a snowball fight. Best decision as an editor she ever made.

 Lois,  myself,  and now former reporters Jonathan Nelson and Wendy Owen
had a wonderful time.  Wendy, a farm girl, threw like a major league hurler.  Lois threw like a girl.

We had one reporter call in (I will not embarass him by revealing who he was because he is still here) and wanted to know if he had to come to work. We suggested this snow thing might be a news story.

Bakersfield is not equipped for snow. We don't have a single snow removal machine. So as I went slip sliding around the community in a four-wheel drive (no chains), I encountered road graders and front loaders.

Almost everyone in the newsroom was on the story. Photographer Henry Barrios took a picture of people walking in front of palm trees on the Panorama Bluffs which ran in newspapers across the country. (It's on the front-page of today's paper)

Then reporter Bob Christie reported that Floyd's General Store in Shafter sold 30 pairs of snow boots right after the store opened. A lot of stores didn't open.

Wendy Owen reported that cattle had to be fed because they couldn't find grass under the snow.

Another Barrios photo shows Tim Oats snow boarding on the Panorama bluffs.

Photographer Felix Adamo took a picture of the Johnson family on Bay Street in Westchester where everything — trees, rooftops, cars, fences, hedges and the road — was covered in snow as snow continued to fall.

Columnist Herb Benham reported he had no trouble getting his kids out of bed that morning.

I wrote the top front-page story for that day. The lead was, "Kern County residents on the valley floor became discombobulated Monday as a record blanket of snow — the rirst in 25 years — disrupted just about everything."

A few days later, we received an e-mail from guys at a pub in London. They wanted to know if "discombobulated" was a real word.

Yes it is and it was the right word for that day.

Posted by Steve E. Swenson

Note: My name is Steve E. Swenson. I've been a reporter here for 28 years. This is the first of a series of periodic blogs I will post on my favorite stories and some behind the scenes antics that went with them. 

In September, 1986, I ran into then Deputy District Attorney Kyle Humphrey in the hallway behind what then were Bakersfield Municipal Courts.

Humphrey had a reputation as a zealous prosecutor. He now has a reputation as a zealous criminal defense attorney.

He mentioned that he had a case he just wasn't sure about. I knew this was going to be good. It was a story that got better and better.

He filed misdemeanor charges against Maury L. Davis, 28, the proud new owner of a pet store called Sea World, 3500 Ming. Ave. She took over the store three weeks earlier. The store no longer exists.

Davis was charged with "unlawful possession/sales of African clawed frogs." Fish and Game Warden Mary Mason seized two adults and 33 baby frogs from the store.

What's wrong with African clawed frogs you may ask? Is the Fish and Game prejudiced?

The deal is they are foreigners. And they eat like pigs. And thus, they can endanger the habitat of American frogs. Think of Toyota taking over Chevrolet.

The American frog is the bullfrog. Not so cute. Not so melodious. But it's ours.

What kind of woman was that Davis lady? Selling frogs that would harm American amphibians.

She just bought the store. The store has a policy of guaranteeing satisfaction. So when a customer brought the frogs back, she took them back. She thought she was pleasing her new customers.

And she found new buyers. Someone wanted the two adults for $24.99. But the F&G warden got them first. Plus the babies.

Davis thought the adults and babies were dwarf African frogs which are perfectly okay to sell. Davis was half right.

The babies were legal.

But they were also dead. The F&G "pickled" them — dunked them in rubbing alcohol to kill and preserve them.

They did that to one of the adult frogs too. The other one escaped!  We can't make this stuff up.

So I went to Thompson's Pet Land at 1030 19th St. (store no longer exists). I found two children, Rebecca Kuhn, 8, and her 10-year-old brother, Richard.  This is terrible of me to bring innocent children into these adult matters.

But I had Rebecca and Richard look at the African dwarf frogs ($2.98 each) which were in an aquarium. The frogs went to the top and then blew bubbles on the way down. "They're funny," Rebecca said.

I asked the children how they would feel if someone killed frogs like that. "Sad," said the girl. "Disgusting," said the boy.

The case against Davis was dismissed.

In the interests of justice

P.S. In the Kern Press Club competition for 1986, these stories won best news story, beating out the crash of a stealth bomber in the hills east of Bakersfield.

Posted by Steve E. Swenson