The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado

L >> Logan Marshall >> The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado

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The Child Saving Institute was a veritable death house after the storm
had spent its fury. Every available room was pressed into service, and
one after another the dead and injured were brought into the house.

INTERRUPTED MERRYMAKERS

At the home of Patrick Hynes, a party in celebration of his eighty-first
birthday was in progress. The guests had just begun dinner and were
drinking a toast to the health of their host when the storm swept the
house away. All the party succeeded in getting out with minor injuries,
except a grandchild, who was internally injured.

"The party had just begun dinner," said Mr. Hynes. "The young people
were making merry and, old as I am, I had entered into the spirit.
Suddenly there was a roaring sound. The next minute the house was in
ruins. I wiggled around and out and aided the others in escaping."

FAMILY MEET DEATH TOGETHER

Cliff Daniels, his wife and their two children met death together. When
soldiers, digging about the ruins of their home, found the four bodies,
the two little girls were clasped in the arms of their mother, while the
body of the father was over them, as if he had tried to shield them with
his own body.

When C. Saber discovered the crushed and almost unrecognizable body of
his wife he fled down the street shrieking at the top of his voice.

E. H. Smith, a private of the Signal Corps from Fort Omaha, became
insane after helping carry several bodies, and collapsed. When he had
regained consciousness it was necessary to take him to the post
hospital, where he was placed under restraint.

A. L. Green was on his back porch watching the storm when it broke. He
said:

"It came like a rushing and roaring torrent of water and passed right by
us to the east. I went to my attic window immediately afterward and saw
fires bursting forth from houses along the path of the storm. I could
see five fires burning at once. The flames made a ghastly sight as they
illuminated acres of razed buildings nearby."

FREAK TRAGEDIES

Among the freak tragedies of the tornado none is more remarkable than
that at the Idlewild pool hall, Twenty-fourth and Lake Streets.
Twenty-five negroes were killed. The story is told by the single
survivor, John Brown, who was dug from the wreckage twelve hours after
the demolition of the building.

"Eight men were playing pool at one table," Brown says. "The rest of us
were standing about watching. Without a moment's warning a terrific roar
swept down through the room. The roof suddenly was lifted from above.
The pool table shot straight upward, many feet into the air.

"All of us still were unhurt."

Insane with fear, but wondering, the negroes rushed beneath the open
roof and gazed upward. Then the heavy pool table and pieces of the roof
shot down. All were caught. Brown was dug from the wreckage twelve hours
later, uninjured.

HOUSE SPLIT ASUNDER

Huddled with his family in the basement of his home at 3229 Cuming
Street, Prof. E. W. Hunt saw the house split asunder. When he recovered
consciousness beneath the wreckage he discovered that a last summer
straw hat was cocked on the back of his head. It had been hanging in a
bedroom closet three stories above before the tornado struck the house.

The body of a girl about four was dropped into the arms of a pedestrian,
Charles Allen, at Forty-fifth and Center Streets. Efforts to identify
the child failed.

In a field half a mile from their home were found the bodies of Mrs.
Mary Rathkey and her two grown sons, Frank and James. All three were
dead but no bruises were found. The wind had cut their clothing
completely away.

Mrs. F. Bryant, ninety-two, lived with her son, Dr. D. C. Bryant, at
3006 Sherman Avenue. She was in bed on the third floor of the house when
the tornado struck. The three floors beneath her were shifted out and
her bed fell to the basement. Except for the shock she was uninjured.
Dr. Bryant and his wife were dropped to the basement from the ground
floor. They, too, miraculously escaped injury.

VIVID TALES OF THE STORM

Perhaps the most vivid single description of the tornado's havoc was
given by John Porter:

"I stood on the rear porch of my home when the great cloud of the storm
began its race across the city," he said. "Before it rushed the
traditional 'ball of fire,' which was in reality a yellow cloud,
spherical in shape.

"My wife was visiting at the moment in the home of her father. I saw the
house caught in the vortex of the cloud. It rose straight up into the
air, its walls shattered and broken, but holding partially together. I
am sure that I could not have moved an eyelash, if my life had depended
upon the exertion.

"From the risen house I saw a myriad of black specks falling to the
earth. Then I watched that home soar upward. It hurtled five blocks
through the murky twilight, sustained at a height of one hundred and
fifty feet.

"The Sacred Heart Convent was the target at which it was hurled. It
struck the fifth story. The convent was demolished. The home of my
father-in-law became splinters.

"Then I recovered my senses partially, and ran to the site of the
structure. God himself must have directed that storm, for my wife, her
father and her mother had been dropped behind, only bruised."

CHAPTER XVIII

STRUGGLES OF STRICKEN OMAHA

A BLIZZARD-LIKE STORM--COUNTING THE COST--"THE GREATEST CONCEIVABLE
BLOW"--SEARCHING FOR THE DEAD--A DAY OF FUNERALS--MORE CASES OF
DESTITUTION--PLANS FOR REBUILDING.

As if the storm of Easter Sunday were not enough calamity, a
blizzard-like storm descended upon the city of Omaha on Tuesday, adding
to the grief and horror. The storm, which began shortly after midnight,
and continued with gathering force, seriously hampered the work of
rescue. More than three inches of snow covered the debris in the section
of the city struck by the cyclone. It rendered uninhabitable the houses
of many who had prepared to retain temporary homes in partly demolished
structures.

Women tugging at heavy beams, hoping against hope to find dear ones
beneath the wreckage, men gruffly cheering their sorrowful mates,
sniveling children wrapped about with shawls and blankets were the
scenes which the sunrise this morning disclosed to the federal soldiers
as they patrolled the afflicted district.

Later, city officials gathered within the lines drawn around the
district by the soldiers and distributed clothing and other necessities
among the sufferers who had been rendered homeless by the tornado.

COUNTING THE COST

For the first time the people began to count the cost in lives and
dollars. When a resume was made it was apparently more appalling than
those who had studied the result were willing to admit.

One hundred and fifty-four lives were snuffed out within the city
proper. Nearly five hundred were injured and eight of these died in
local hospitals during the day.

All Omaha rallied to the assistance of the desolate victims of the
tornado. Hundreds of citizens responded promptly by offering their homes
and money to aid in caring for the stricken.

The City Commissioners appropriated $75,000 for relief work, and
citizens at once subscribed to an equal amount. Governor Morehead sent a
special message to the Legislature asking for an appropriation to care
for the homeless throughout the state.

"THE GREATEST CONCEIVABLE BLOW"

After making an inspection of the devastated district, the Governor
said:

"This is my conception of hell. It is horrible, and it has presented a
most complex situation. The loss of life and damage to property is the
greatest conceivable blow, not only to Omaha, but to the entire state of
Nebraska. I will call upon the state of Nebraska to render every
assistance and I am sure the state will respond.

"My horror and grief are beyond my powers of expression."

SEARCHING FOR THE DEAD

Groups of men, aided and encouraged by women and children, labored
incessantly all day Tuesday among the ruins of homes and other
buildings. Only portions of the ruins of some buildings within which
persons were known to have been killed were removed. As quickly as
bodies were found they were taken to temporary morgues. Relatives
claimed most of the bodies, but some remained unidentified. Funerals and
burials were held from all churches and homes. Cemeteries were thronged
with grieving friends and relatives.

MILITARY LAW

Military law was strictly enforced throughout the storm area. Upon the
soldiers rested the responsibility for looting and fires. The city
Health Department made every effort to place the district in a sanitary
condition as rapidly as possible. Garbage wagons and trash carts were
the only vehicles admitted within the patrolled section. The water
supply fortunately remained unimpaired.

A DAY OF FUNERALS

Another period of unseasonable cold followed Tuesday's snowstorm and
increased the already long list of sufferers from the storm.

Paying last rites occupied the time of thousands of persons on
Wednesday. Fifty-two funerals silently wending their way to cemeteries
brought home with greater force to the people of Omaha the full
realization of the extent of Sunday's tornado. All day long, as fast as
hearses could deposit the bodies at graves, a continual death procession
was kept up.

Many of the bodies recovered from Sunday's storm were cared for at
undertaking establishments, and a great number of the funerals were held
from those places. Whenever possible friends of stricken families took
care of bodies and had them prepared for burial. In many instances
churches were demolished in the districts covered by the storm and
others were so badly wrecked as to prevent their being used for burial
services.

LITTLE CEREMONY

There was little ceremony. As quickly as one funeral was over another
began. Undertakers co-operated in arranging burials. In several
instances where entire families were killed or where more than one
member of a family awaited burial one funeral service was held. The
funerals were a constant procession.

One of the most pitiful of the funerals was that of Mrs. Mary Rathkey
and two small children. Surviving Mrs. Rathkey is the husband and
father, who is nearly demented over the disaster. Mrs. Rathkey and her
children were killed in their home.

MORE CASES OF DESTITUTION

Many cases of destitution were reported on Wednesday. It took much time
to prepare card indexes of sufferers' wants and to make requisitions on
the central relief station at the Auditorium for supplies. While these
formalities were being carried out want stalked through disconsolate
homes from one corner of the city to the other. The task of caring for
those needing food, clothing, supplies and money seemed to be too large
for the relief forces.

PLANS FOR REBUILDING

As early as Tuesday plans for rebuilding the city were under way. The
business men formed a corporation to conduct the undertaking in a
systematic way, and to assist the unfortunates who lost their homes and
personal effects.

The Real Estate Exchange immediately took steps to prevent the raising
of rents. Cases of alleged attempted extortion, however, were reported,
some of them by members of the Exchange itself. Executives of that body
decided to deal harshly with any owners found taking advantage of those
forced to secure new homes on account of the tornado.

A public appeal sent out by the Commercial Club stated that 642 homes
were totally wrecked, 1,669 were damaged and 3,179 persons made
homeless. There was need of reconstruction, indeed!

[Illustration: Photograph by Brown Bros.
This scene shows the desolation caused by the tornado wrecking a whole
street of houses at Omaha, Nebraska]

[Illustration: Copyright by George Grantham Bain.
A view showing the destructive force of the tornado at Omaha, where
happy homes stood a few hours before. Many residents were caught as in a
trap and instantly killed or fatally maimed]

CHAPTER XIX

OMAHA: "THE GATE CITY OF THE WEST"

LARGEST CITY IN NEBRASKA--GATE TO THE WEST--GROWTH OF
INDUSTRIES--SPLENDID INSTITUTIONS--A PROSPEROUS CITY--REMARKABLE
ACTIVITY.

Omaha, "the Gate City," largest in Nebraska, is a typical plains town,
proud of its industry and its climb on the census list. It stands eighty
feet above the Missouri on the west bank of that river opposite Council
Bluffs, Iowa. For twenty-four square miles stretch its many churches,
educational institutions and large manufacturing plants, with the
pleasant residential section lying above.

On the site of the present city Lewis and Clark in 1804 held council
with the Indians. There were a trading station and stockade at the place
in 1825 presided over by pioneer J. B. Royce. The first permanent
settlement was made there in 1854. A tribe of Dakota Indians that lived
in the region gave the city its name.

When the Union Pacific Railroad was stretching steel hands westward in
1864 Omaha was the most northerly outfitting point for overland wagon
trains to the far West. At that time it took its name of "Gate City"
and then its sudden growth began. In 1910 the population was 124,000.

GROWTH OF INDUSTRIES

Because of its location it soon began to draw industries. Packing is one
of its leading industries today. So extensive is this business that
Omaha ranks third among cities of the United States in packing. Silver
smelting, distilling and brewing are some of the other pursuits that
keep its citizens busy.

SPLENDID INSTITUTIONS

Among the more important buildings are the Federal Building, Court
House, a city hall, two high schools, one of which is among the finest
in the country, a convention hall, the Auditorium and the Public
Library. Omaha is the see of Roman Catholic and Protestant Episcopal
bishoprics. Among the educational institutions are a state school for
the deaf; the medical department and orthopedic branch of the University
of Nebraska; a Presbyterian Theological Seminary; and Creighton
University under Jesuit control. The principal newspapers are the _Omaha
Bee_, _World-Herald_ and the _News_. The _Omaha Bee_ was established in
1871 by Edward Rosewater, who made it one of the most influential
Republican journals in the West. The _World-Herald_, founded in 1865 by
George L. Miller, was edited by William Jennings Bryan from 1894 to
1896.

Omaha is the headquarters of the United States military department of
the Missouri, and there are military posts at Fort Omaha, immediately
north, and Fort Crook, ten miles south of the city.

REMARKABLE ACTIVITY

Prairie freighting and Missouri river navigation, were of importance
before the construction of the Union Pacific railway, and the activity
of the city in securing the freighting interest gave her an initial
start over the other cities of the state. Council Bluffs was the legal,
but Omaha the practical, eastern terminus of that great undertaking,
work on which began at Omaha in December, 1863. The city was already
connected as early as 1863 by telegraph with Chicago, St. Louis, and
since 1861 with San Francisco. Lines of the present great Rock Island,
Burlington and Northwestern railway systems all entered the city in the
years 1867-1868. Meat-packing began as early as 1871, but its first
great advance followed the removal of the Union stock-yards south of the
city in 1884. South Omaha was rapidly built up around them. A
Trans-Mississippi Exposition illustrating the progress and resources of
the states west of the Mississippi was held at Omaha in 1898. It
represented an investment of $2,000,000, and in spite of financial
depression and wartime, ninety per cent of their subscriptions were
returned in dividends to the stockholders.

The original town site occupied an elongated and elevated river terrace,
now given over wholly to business; behind this are hills and bluffs over
which the residential districts have extended.

CHAPTER XX

OTHER DAMAGE FROM THE NEBRASKA TORNADO

GREAT HAVOC IN NEBRASKA TOWNS--DESCRIPTION OF THE TORNADO--YUTAN A
SUFFERER--THE TUMBLING HOUSES OF BENSON--CURIOUS TRAGEDIES--HOUSES
TUMBLING ABOUT.

The storm which lashed its way through Omaha on Easter Sunday had
already carried havoc into other Nebraska towns. William Coon, president
of an automobile company of Lincoln, Nebraska, gave a stirring
description of the tornado as he saw it from the platform of an
observation car on the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad:

DESCRIPTION OF THE TORNADO

"For miles," he said, "it seemed as if the train were being pursued by
the storm. We were approaching Ralston, Neb., when I first noticed the
strange cloud mounting the sky. Before that it had been clear."

Mr. Coon, from his observation car seat, saw the storm strike Ralston.
"The passengers sat as if glued to their seats when the cloud struck,"
he said.

"The engineer brought the engine to a stop and the passengers ran over
to the wreckage of the houses. We could hear the groans of dying men and
the wails and shrieks of injured women and children. I entered a house,
or rather what had been a house, and beneath me lay a woman. I looked
and I knew that she was dead. We got all of the injured out of the ruins
and brought them to the train.

"We were about to leave when our attention was called to a little house
some distance from the others. It had been wrecked and moved from its
foundation, but we found a mother and her little baby lying upon a bed
uninjured.

"The cloud wheeled and made towards South Omaha. We were not far behind,
but our way was blocked by the debris the tornado had thrown on the
tracks. Then, too, we stopped frequently to pick up the injured. There
were some with their limbs torn off and all were cut and bleeding."

A Chicagoan, who withheld his name, told of the scenes at Omaha when the
train stopped there. He said:

"I was just recovering from what I had seen on the train when we pulled
into Omaha with the injured. It was night then, but such a night. The
sky was lighted with a red glare, and the streets were filled with
people who acted as though they were mad. Frequently the cries of the
wounded, unloaded at the station, were drowned by terrific peals of
thunder."

It is difficult for any one who has not lived through a tornado to have
any conception of what such a storm can do. Tornadic force means
anything more than one hundred miles an hour. There have been instances
where tornadoes have shaved off the stone sides of buildings as if they
had been sliced away by a stonecutter. Forecaster Scarr, of New York,
said that the tornado that wrought destruction in Nebraska may have been
of the resistless kind that simply ground stone and brick to dust and
carried up its electrified funnel the remnants of every building it
struck. The tornado finally became almost like a mass of whirling steel,
revolving faster than the blades of the swiftest planer and cutting
everything to pieces in its course.

YUTAN A SUFFERER

The tornado first struck the little village of Yutan, southwest of
Omaha. Yutan was practically wiped off the map and its population of
four hundred left desolate. After the buildings had been razed the
wreckage caught fire. "The town is burning! We'll all be killed!" some
kept crying, and this added to the fears of the others. Many persons
were killed and many injured. Waterloo, a village of about equal size to
the northeast across the Platte River, suffered like damage. Wires were
snapped off in all directions, and it took many hours to gather and
circulate news of the disaster.

Leaving desolation behind it the tornado swept at a rate of possibly one
hundred and fifty miles an hour into Berlin. This little village had a
population of about two hundred. The storm killed seven and injured
thirty. The habitations were virtually wiped out. A church, an elevator
and part of the residence of State Senator Buck were all that remained
standing of what was a prosperous town.

THE TUMBLING HOUSES OF BENSON

On its way to Omaha the tornado struck Benson and Yutan. Benson is a
thriving town of over three thousand. Here property damage was great and
many persons were injured. As the houses began to tumble a little girl
dressed in white started from one of the houses and ran down the street
with her hands above her head. Just then the side of a house came
soaring through the air, and shooting suddenly downward it struck the
child and buried her beneath it. When the storm had passed, the injured
were lying all about the streets.

At Ralston, a suburb of Omaha, many were killed and much injury and
destruction left in the path of the tornado. Late in the afternoon a
copper-colored cloud was seen mounting toward the sky. The cloud grew
rapidly and was traveling at tremendous speed. It assumed the form of a
funnel and the air was filled with a curious, piercing noise. It swished
across the railroad track and swept on its way toward the little town.

Then the storm struck the town. Houses collapsed as though they were of
paper. The roofs went sailing away and the sides fell in. Passengers in
a passing train watched the destruction, and a cry of horror went up
from every one. It was an awful sight.

A farmer was standing on the doorstep when he noticed the funnel-shaped
cloud. He called his wife and four children, and they all sought refuge
in a cyclone cellar. Five minutes later their house went sailing away.

CURIOUS TRAGEDIES

Edward Mote, his wife and three children were sitting in their home
chatting when the tornado suddenly carried them and their home to Paio
Creek, one hundred yards away, and dropped them into the water. Mrs.
Mote was drowned.

Postmaster D. L. Ham, his daughter, Mrs. Kimball, and his grandchildren
were standing in the doorway of their home when the wind struck. Mrs.
Kimball and her two-year-old daughter Frances stepped outside the door,
which slammed shut. Their bodies were found among the debris. H. E. Said
and wife, bride and bridegroom of a month, were in the Ham house. Warned
of approaching death by Mr. Ham, they sought solace in each other's
arms. Thus they were found dead. Mr. Ham was slightly injured.

HOUSES TUMBLING ABOUT

There was a big threshing machine standing near one of the houses, and
when the cloud struck it shot straight up into the air and was carried
about forty rods. Houses were rolling and tumbling along the ground. A
box car was carried along by the terrific air current for a quarter of a
mile. When it split open six or seven men, who turned out to be part of
a repair gang, dropped out. Some lay very still, while others feebly
crawled about.

A dozen other towns in the section of Nebraska surrounding Omaha were
hard hit and many farming communities were destroyed.

CHAPTER XXI

THE TORNADO IN IOWA AND ILLINOIS

MONSTER TORNADO SWEEPS ACROSS RIVER--DESTRUCTION IN IOWA--THE
STORM-CLOUD OVER ILLINOIS--GALE AND FIRE IN CHICAGO.

The monster tornado that wrought such havoc in Omaha leaped across the
Missouri River and swished its wicked tail through Council Bluffs. Then
it sped northeasterly, wrecking several villages before it finally
disappeared.

DESTRUCTION IN IOWA

Reports from Mills County stated that it caused loss of life in every
town in the county reached by telephone. Many deaths occurred at
Glenwood and at Council Bluffs. Scattering towns all through the
district reported one to two deaths.

Eastern Council Bluffs suffered heavily, the storm breaking in the
valley just east of the town proper and following the lines of the
Milwaukee, Rock Island and Great Western railroads for a distance of a
mile.

The storm, which was accompanied by hail, rain, sleet, lightning and a
gale which blew seventy miles an hour for a time, was felt most
severely in the northwestern section of the city, where houses were
overturned, windows broken, trees uprooted and electric light and
trolley poles blown to the ground. Nearly fifty small fires resulted and
hundreds of men, women and children fled from their homes in terror.

Considerable damage was done to Des Plaines, Park Ridge and other
suburbs. The property damage in the city and suburbs was estimated at
more than $500,000.

THE STORM-CLOUD OVER ILLINOIS

Illinois also suffered severely from a tornado on the night of Easter,
March 23d, and the following morning. The storm was less severe than
that which struck Omaha, but the wind was blowing at a rate of seventy
miles an hour for a time, and in Chicago alone thirty-two structures
were damaged and a number of persons killed. Out in the state the
heaviest suffering was at Rockford, Elgin, Wheaton, Bloomington,
Galesburg, Peoria, Erie and Des Plaines. The aggregate loss in other
communities was great.

The storm covered all of Illinois north of Peoria. In Galesburg many
buildings were moved from their foundations. Half a dozen residences in
Peoria were demolished. All streams rose high and costly floods occurred
along the Kankakee, Illinois and other rivers.

GALE AND FIRE IN CHICAGO

In Chicago all the elements seemed to meet Sunday night. The wind blew a
violent gale; snow flew before it in some places; hail crashed windows
in other parts of the city. Every available fire apparatus in the north
and west sides of the city was called out to extinguish fires which
broke out in business blocks and dwellings partly wrecked by the storm.

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