The above photo shows the incredible effects of a cold winter on the Niagara Falls, ca. 1936. Small human figures dotting the base of the American Falls section give perspective to the depth of the freeze. Ice bridges forming across sections of the falls due to unusually cold winters are rare, with freeze-over events even more so.

According to historical records, only once in the year 1848 has freezing weather caused the thousands of cubic feet of water per second flowing over the entire Niagara Falls to run dry, an event thought to have been caused by ice jamming and damming upriver. Unfortunately, no verifiable photos of this complete freeze-over are known to exist.