Elderly farmer dies after venturing out into the cold

An elderly retired farmer fell victim to the cold this weekend in east-central Iowa. Keokuk County sheriff Ron George says his department got a call early Sunday morning that Kenneth Snakenberg was missing from his home in the town of Webster. Dispatchers got the call Sunday around 7-20 A.M. Sheriff George says he knew the old man personally, and family members told him he’d been discovered missing from his home so deputies scoured the small town, knowing Snakenberg suffered from Parkinsons Disease. The man was reportedly dressed only in pajamas and stockings. The sheriff says he might have been missing five hours, since his absence was first discovered around 5:30 but they don’t know for sure what time he’d left his house. When they finally found the man he was three-quarters of a mile from his house, quite a ways in the town of barely 100 people. Sheriff George says by the time deputies located the 90-year-old man he’d frozen to death. The man’s son says sold age and early Alzheimer’s may have been factors in his leaving the house.