The last time Jim Murphy saw snow in Los Angeles, he was 11 years old. It was December, 1968 — a week or so before holiday break — and the already unruly class was stirred into a frenzy when one sixth grader spotted the flurries outside.

“Of course, everyone ran out of the classroom,” Murphy recalls. “The teacher had no control.”

Northridge, where Murphy grew up, is a neighborhood of Los Angeles that sits at about 800 feet above sea level. Snow is more common there than in the heart o