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Rare S. Jersey snow day has sledders rejoicing

Sledders relished a rare South Jersey snow day yesterday. "We like gym, but this is way better," said Joshua Reed, 11, as he began his second hour at Mount Laurel's Laurel Acres Park.

Joe Armstrong shovels the sidewalk at Kings Highway and Haddon Avenue in Haddonfield early yesterday. (Tom Gralish/Staff Photographer)
Joe Armstrong shovels the sidewalk at Kings Highway and Haddon Avenue in Haddonfield early yesterday. (Tom Gralish/Staff Photographer)Read more

Sledders relished a rare South Jersey snow day yesterday.

"We like gym, but this is way better," said Joshua Reed, 11, as he began his second hour at Mount Laurel's Laurel Acres Park.

"We come here whenever it snows," said Keith Reed, supervisor of sons Joshua and Matthew, 8, and their buddies Jake Hogan, 11, and Ryan Anderson, 10.

"We break a leg, he takes us to the hospital," joked Joshua, of Mount Laurel.

The Browns of Moorestown chose Laurel Acres over their town's well-known Stokes Hill, famous as the testing ground for the Flexible Flyer sled.

"This is the better hill," said 11-year-old Emily, who flew on a plastic slide that her father had slicked with silicone lubricant. "I've gone farther than all my friends!"

By midmorning, about 100 vehicles had negotiated slushy side streets to crowd into Laurel Acres' cleanly scraped parking lot - a top priority on the Parks Department's plow list.

"Did you see all the cars out there?" a township spokeswoman said. "They're there first thing."

In Lumberton, dozens of children grabbed the season's first chance to make a fast, top-to-bottom run on that township's man-made hill on Municipal Drive.

"I'm 45, but not today," said Mark Kiriluk of Lumberton, who was joined by daughter Anna, 15, and son Matthew, 13.

They arrived about 8:30 a.m. and finally quit after about 21/2 hours.

"We're going home for some hot chocolate," said Kiriluk, a loan officer for First Pioneer Farm Credit in Bridgeton.

With the frigid wind, "I can't feel my face," said Anna, a freshman at Rancocas Valley Regional High School, which was closed for the day.

A block away on Waverly Drive, Michelle Venverloh helped her children Sarah, 4, and Nathan, 7, and their friends built a snow fort.

"This is a wonderful memory for them," she said as she used a plastic form to make snow bricks. "They wanted to go out into the snow as soon as it started falling."

In downtown Pitman, Patrick Rumaker paused in front of the Broadway Theater, pulled a camera out of his backpack, and snapped off a round of shots.

The editor with the New Jersey Education Association, who lives in Pitman, took advantage of an unexpected day off to take some photos of one of the few legitimate "downtowns" in Gloucester County.

"I just want to show what the town looks like under snow," said Rumaker, 45, who had been out for about 90 minutes.

Rumaker's lens captured the blue-collar Norman Rockwell scene that is the Pitman shopping district, a two-block string of stores and eateries anchored by one of the few single-screen movie theaters around. The Broadway's marquee touted the Marx Brothers classic The Cocoanuts, which runs through the end of the month.

Rumaker had taken between 50 and 100 shots of Pitman Grove, a Victorian mini-neighborhood of narrow, winding streets just behind the shopping district. The town was built around the Grove, a former Methodist summer camp meeting ground.

"It's unique," Rumaker said. "The snow covers a lot of blemishes and adds a beauty to the area."

Rumaker had been scheduled to take a different set of photos yesterday: "Gov. Corzine was supposed to be in Lindenwold for a Dr. Seuss-Read Across America event," he said. But like most other school activities, the event was canceled.

So Rumaker pointed his camera in another direction.

Lured by the relatively warm weather late last week, Frank and Lucille Romano of Philadelphia thought it might be a good weekend to visit their Ocean City home.

"They said it was going to snow, but I didn't believe it," Lucille Romano said.

The cold, windy conditions overnight and into yesterday left icy snow clinging to cars, sidewalks, and trees. That made for difficult shoveling and cleaning of windshields.

"My garage is packed with beach chairs and umbrellas and stuff like that for the summer, so I left the car out all night. Now I'm digging out," Frank Romano said.

"I've given up," said Lisa Starky, 23, of Longport. "I was going to go meet my boyfriend for lunch, but I can't get the car cleaned off. The ice just won't come off."

Dozens of people had sought snow shovels and scrapers, said Greg Karpinski of Ocean City Hardware.

"People aren't prepared for this. We've seen people coming in for snow supplies after the fact," he said.

A steady stream of morning commuters in boots, gloves, and hats streamed into the Collingswood PATCO station.

Denise Juliano, 44, of Woodbury, shook snow off her umbrella. So far, she said, her journey hadn't been that bad.

"The roads were passable. There wasn't much traffic. It was kind of nice, kind of easy," said Juliano, who works in information technology at a Center City firm.

At midmorning, Robert Mellett cleared the snow off his big red truck and made his way from his apartment in Haddon Township to the nearby Wawa on Haddon Avenue. Mellett, 42, a manager at the Deptford Wal-Mart, was on a mission.

"My wife sent me out as the guinea pig, to see how the roads were," said Mellett, whose wife, another Wal-Mart employee, was due into work at 1 p.m.

His assessment? Passable, but only if you're cautious.

Mellett had the day off. He was heading to his father's place in Cherry Hill to clear the driveway and sidewalk. But he couldn't help thinking about commerce and a missed opportunity.

"Yesterday I had 20 people stop me in my tracks at work and ask me if we sold sleds," Mellett said. "Unfortunately, we don't. We could have made a lot of money."