Almost exactly a year earlier in 1887 the "Great Die-up" blizzard hit Montana and Wyoming and killed half of the cattle on the northern plains. People could walk for miles and miles atop cattle carcasses stacked three or four deep on the fencelines and the carcasses dammed rivers. It wiped out all the great herds built up since the cattle drives after the Civil War.
It changed the course of history for both states as the great foreign-owned ranches were wiped out and smaller outfits took over. It set the northern areas back 30 years in development.