The new fangled naming of winter weather systems (many of which do not muster a second look) would easily enable the oooh moment for their green epiphany.
1940, 1966 and 1987 all had whopper snow storms as well as I recall and none of them were named. The blizzard of 93 (as it was the mediah’z adoringly named) was a fizzle from my perspective.
I think you're on to something important. First, the definition of a ‘blizzard’ is not dependent upon snowfall, but upon wind speed. It's essentially defined as a snowstorm with increased wind speeds, such that visibility is decreased. This was defined by the National Weather Service, which didn't exist with this name until 1970. Whose to say we didn't have significantly more storms in the past that would be characterized as blizzards today, but weren't then? Whose to say that our ability to detect and report blizzards hasn't increased substantially over the past 50+ years?
The first weather satellite wasn't launched until 1960, and it operate for only 78 days. Our ability to detect weather systems, and the criteria we use to characterize them has evolved, and is much different now than early and mid-1900s (and certainly than before this). Whose to say we aren't comparing apples to oranges?