“If the groundhog came out today — and this is the day for his coming-out party — it’s going to be Spring right away.

“Any groundhog with sense, of course, wouldn’t come out on a day like this, what with a lot of snow turning to slush.

“But the groundhogs pay no attention to snow or slush. They wait for Feb. 2 and then they come out, and, if they see their shadows, why back they run and there’s six more weeks of Winter. There being no shadows today, your 1932 groundhog no doubt stayed around, playing with the little snowflakes and singing ‘Good Times Are Here Again.’

“In the Bronx Park Zoo the [New York City’s] official groundhog came out at noon, saw no shadow, but did catch sight of a banana, which he nibbled, and a camera, which he sniffed. He made no efforts to return to his hole.

“But over at the Weather Bureau, Forecaster Scarr wouldn’t commit himself except as to the immediate future. Mr. Scarr sneers at groundhogs as unscientific. He said the snow wouldn’t last, that it would turn to rain before night and that temperatures, then hovering just above freezing, would rise.

“But he declined to say whether Spring and good times are here again.

“Air traffic was nearly at a standstill. At the Newark Field only two planes weathered the storm. One was from Atlantic City and the other from Cleveland. At the Long Island fields no planes took the air.”