A major winter storm of record-breaking proportions left Wood County and much of Texas in a week-long deep freeze that will make Valentine’s Day and Presidents Day 2021 memorable for decades to come.

And after temperatures dropped below zero Tuesday morning, another round of winter precipitation was in the forecast for Wednesday, putting school reopening in doubt for the remainder of the week.

The benefit of the storm coming on the night before Presidents Day was that many offices and entities already had plans to close for the holiday, including schools, post offices, financial institutions and county, state and national offices.

Most other businesses quickly followed suit, as the storm pushed temperatures into the single digits overnight Sunday while dumping historic snowfall.

The temperature was not forecast to rise above freezing until the weekend, leaving the deep snow with little opportunity to melt, especially with another layer scheduled to fall on top of it.

And that second round was expected to only compound the problems, that included rolling blackouts as the Texas power grid struggled to keep up with high demand for heat.

Schools had already taken steps to take additional days off with the possibility by week’s end to switch to the virtual learning models they were forced to adopt last spring when the coronavirus pandemic shuttered school campuses.

Quitman canceled school on Tuesday and moved its school board meeting a week later, to Feb. 22. Then on Tuesday the district announced it would be closed for the remainder of the week.

The district said that the virtual learning model would not be in place this week, as power outages could impact students’ ability to work online.

Mineola announced school would not be held Tuesday and Wednesday and then would reevaluate the rest of the week on Wednesday.

Superintendent Cody Mize said the district had enough minutes built in to its calendar that those two days would not have to be made up, but if weather interruptions continued into Thursday, the virtual model could kick in.

Alba-Golden closed on Tuesday and Wednesday and planned to start virtual learning on Thursday.

Yantis also closed school Tuesday and Wednesday.

The Alba-Golden girls were scheduled to play an area basketball playoff game Tuesday, but it was postponed indefinitely as the University Interscholastic League scrambled to adjust playoff certification schedules as the storm impacted a large swath of the state.

Districts also had to delay the start of classes on Thursday, Feb. 11 after icy conditions hit the area overnight.

Wood County government also announced its offices would remain closed Tuesday after the Monday holiday.

Mineola city hall closed Monday and opened its drive through on Tuesday for payments, with the lobby remaining closed.

The city’s trash contractor, Republic Services, announced it would not run on Monday or Tuesday and would reevaluate each day.

Among the cancellations was the Mineola Kiwanis Club on Tuesday. Club members had scrambled to get American flags out last week well ahead of Presidents Day in anticipation of the storms, and those flags could likely remain up another week until they can thaw and dry.

The official low temperature in Mineola Tuesday morning was minus-4, according to The Weather Channel. Snowfall overnight Sunday was measured at eight and a half inches.

SWEPCO and Wood County Electric Co-op were dealing with some outages Monday, after previous outages from the ice last week also left some areas without power for extended periods.

SWEPCO mobilized repair crews ahead of the weekend storm.

Those spot outages were in addition to rolling outages announced around the state on Monday, though they did not appear to impact Wood County that day.

Even this week’s edition of the Monitor is in jeopardy, with the power outages impacting the press in Henderson on Tuesday and road conditions making deliveries dangerous.

BTH banks remained closed Tuesday while City National Bank and Mineola Community Bank opened at 10 a.m. First National Bank of East Texas Mineola and Quitman locations opened drive throughs at 10 a.m.

Area churches canceled or moved services online Sunday and Wednesday.

The Wood County Economic Development Commission meeting Wednesday was canceled.