{"id":579285,"date":"2026-02-10T07:07:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-10T07:07:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/579285\/"},"modified":"2026-02-10T07:07:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-10T07:07:10","slug":"the-warmest-coldest-snowiest-and-wettest-weather-since-1871-chicago-tribune","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/579285\/","title":{"rendered":"The warmest, coldest, snowiest and wettest weather since 1871 \u2013 Chicago Tribune"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here\u2019s a look at the warmest, coldest, wettest and snowiest Valentine\u2019s Day in Chicago, going back to 1871.<\/p>\n

Data is from the National Weather Service\u2019s Chicago office<\/a> and measured at the city\u2019s official recording site, which has been O\u2019Hare International Airport since Jan. 17, 1980. For almost a century prior to that, sites around downtown Chicago, the University of Chicago and Midway International Airport were used to gather definitive weather data.<\/p>\n

\n

Vintage Chicago Tribune: Love bites \u2014 delicious Valentine\u2019s Day recipes from our archives<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Warmest<\/b><\/b><\/p>\n

The record high temperature for Chicago on Feb. 14 was 62 degrees<\/b> in 1954<\/a>. The warmth brought a larger number of people to outdoor attractions including the Brookfield Zoo, which was visited by an estimated 6,000 people that day. The number of people \u201cfeeding peanuts and cookies to the animals\u201d at the zoo was twice that of the previous year, then-director Robert Bean told the Tribune.<\/p>\n

The normal high for Valentine\u2019s Day in Chicago is 35 degrees<\/b>, according to the National Weather Service.<\/p>\n

The coldest high temperature on Valentine\u2019s Day was just 8 degrees<\/b>, which was recorded in 1879 and 1943.<\/p>\n

The high was 26 degrees <\/b>in 2025.<\/p>\n

Coldest<\/b><\/b><\/p>\n

Chicago experienced its lowest Valentine\u2019s Day temperature in 1905 with a recording of minus 11 degrees<\/b>. It was the lowest of six negative-degree lows recorded on Feb. 14 in almost 150 years. Though the frigid weather was not front-page news, there were several instances in the Feb. 15, 1905, edition of the Tribune describing fires started by overheated furnaces<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n

Vintage Chicago Tribune: St. Valentine\u2019s Day massacre<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The normal low on Valentine\u2019s Day in Chicago is 20 degrees<\/b>, according to the National Weather Service.<\/p>\n

The low was 3<\/strong> degrees <\/b>in 2025.<\/p>\n

Wettest<\/b><\/b><\/p>\n

Valentine\u2019s Day has been mostly dry with no rain or just a trace recorded during 103 of the past 155 years<\/b>.<\/p>\n

Precipitation of half an inch to 1 inch has occurred five times<\/b> since 1872, according to the National Weather Service.<\/p>\n

In 1950, almost an inch of rain<\/b> fell on Chicago \u2014 the most ever recorded on Feb. 14. The precipitation was part of \u201cone of the worst ice storm beatings (Chicagoland) has ever taken<\/a>, and counted its loss in millions,\u201d according to the next day\u2019s Tribune.<\/p>\n

Just 0.15 of an inch<\/b> fell in 2025.<\/p>\n

Snowiest<\/b><\/b><\/p>\n

Since 1872, snowfall of three inches or more has been recorded just three times<\/b> on Feb. 14.<\/p>\n

A record snowfall of 8.3 inches<\/b> fell in 1990. The storm brought \u201ca fierce combination of relentless winds and biting snow<\/a> that left rush hour travelers stranded for hours on snarled roads and expressways, or sitting helplessly at a virtually shot down O\u2019Hare International Airport,\u201d according to a story in the next day\u2019s Tribune.<\/p>\n

\"ThereThere was no help for Kennedy Expressway drivers on Valentine’s Day in 1990, when a storm stretched rush hour past midnight. (Michael Fryer\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n

Less than an inch of snow<\/b> fell in 2021, but snow depth was estimated at 15 inches \u2014 the highest snow depth for the day since 1979.<\/p>\n

Just under two inches<\/strong> of snow fell in 2025.<\/p>\n

Sources: National Weather Service Chicago; Tribune archives and reporting<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Here\u2019s a look at the warmest, coldest, wettest and snowiest Valentine\u2019s Day in Chicago, going back to 1871.…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":579286,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5124],"tags":[960,6387,3158,251383,2096,5410,5386,1818,6773,71178,219142,223110,313],"class_list":["post-579285","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-chicago","tag-chicago","tag-chicago-history","tag-cold","tag-february-14","tag-heat","tag-ice","tag-il","tag-illinois","tag-rain","tag-snow","tag-valentine","tag-valentines-day","tag-weather"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116045076510785590","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=579285"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579285\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/579286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=579285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=579285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=579285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}