Rensselaer Republican, Volume 24, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 April 1892 — TORNADO’S WORK. [ARTICLE]

TORNADO’S WORK.

Death Rode in the Storm, and - Scores of Dying Mark Its Path. The Town of Towanda Literally Wiped From the Earth— Nota House Left Standing—Augusta, Also, Greatly Damaged— Havoc Wrought at Many Other Points—- • Chicago to the Front—Details of a Fright- . ~ tnl-CgiaenHy, , ■ —l-

News was not received until the 2d of a frightful tornado that swept off parts of Kansas and other adjoining States. We quote from dispatches: A storm of mad destructiveness swept over Kansas last night. Butler county seems to have been the scene of the greatest havoc, The town of Towanda was wiped off the face of the earth and Augusta, a few miles distant, wa 3 buffeted out of all semblance to its former self. Not a house or building was left Standing in Towanda. The town wa s asleep when the storm swept down, razed everything in its path and leftdead bodies lying in its wake. Towanda is a small village of 1/0) inhabitants, situated ten miles west of El" dorado. The storm laid the whole town . flat with the earth and left not a single house standing. Of the eighty families comprising the population there is not one to-night that is not either mourning for a dead or dying member, or sorrowing with the suffering. Six persons were killed outright, seven fatally injured, nineteen badly hurt and others injured. Joseph Glassen and family were killed at Strong City and others injured. The wind reached a velocity of 61 miles an hour at Kansas and considerable damage was done to property, but no lives were lost. At Augusta the storm wrought great havoc and caused a considerable loss of life. Houses were leveled to the ground and the inmates were cr u shed and man - gled and some of them killed-. The dead number four, fatally injured eight. The people of the town and vicinity lost nearly everything. At South Haven eight persons were killed and a score injured. Near Wellington thirteen person a were injured. The family of Wm. Little near that place were frightfully mangled and crushed, himself and four of his children being killed outright and Mrs. Little dying soon afterward. At another farm home in the neighborhood four persons were in jured. The storm, so far as can be ascertained, swept across the country from the Indian Territory in the southwest part of Barber county, Kansas, taking the little town of Kiowa in its path. In a northeasterly direction it passed through Frazier county and through the center of Sumner county. Bending as a bow it passed almost directly north through the center of Sumner county and along the western part of Butler county. Villages and farmhouses were carried away as it swept along. The tornado continued in Kansas and the northwestern part of Missouri Friday, but was less destructive.

Reports of injuries to persons been received, though many count-y barns and their outbuildings and haystacks, and occasionally a weakly constructed residence were wrecked. At Atchison no damage was done to speak of till nearly noon Friday, when a tornado struck the city and unroofed and large buildings and scattered signs and awnings in every direction. Hundreds of chimneys have been blown down and a great deal of light damage done. Heavy damages in the country to fruit trees. No one was injured. At Olathe, Kan., the general store of Mariner & Mauvel was wrecked by the -£torm. Farm houses and stables in the city were unroofed, but no one was injured. At Marshall, Mo., considerable damage was done, The cupola of the Methodist church was blown down, plate-glass windows were blown in and roofs carried away. . At Salina, Kan., the house of M. A. Brather was carried from its foundation and wrecked. The family was at supper at the time and all were more or less injured. One daughter had a leg broken and was internally injured. Another was hurt about the back and also sustained internal injuries. Neither are likely to recover. A young son was badly injured and bruised about the head, but not fatally. The house of Samuel Buckhalder was demolished, but the family escaped injury. Mrs. Zimmerman took; refuge in the cellar of the house. Th 6 house was demolished and she was fatally injured.

At Ottawa, Kas., the tower of the water company’s building was toppled over, roofs carried away and sidewalks turned oyer. Trees were uprooted and much damage was done to orchards. At Warrenburg, Mo., the Methodist church was unroofed and the cupola blown down. At Chillcothe, Mo., also, the cupola of the Methodist church was blown down an<j the building unroofed. No one was hurt. At Kansas City, Kas., Arn Connors, aged 5 years, was thrown violently to the ground by the ijind and had his hip crushed.' Del March, a girl aged 17, was struck by a piece of flying sidewalk and sustained injuries that may prove fatal. The great P*avy elevator was badly wrecked, being uproofed and severely strained at its angles. At Chllicothe many houses were unroofed and the Louse of James Pothe at the'edgeof the town was demolished, but the occupants escaped Injury. Special from Hiawatha, Seneca, Oneida. Horton, Lawrence, Bolckow and Mary -0 ville, Mo., report great loss. CHICAGO. A Chicago special says: At 0:30 o’clock Frtdav evening the sky, which had been threatening ail day, became black as night and in another miuute a terrible cloudburst occurred. The wind blew at a hurricane rate and drove the raln t in sheets along the streets, sweeping every movable object before it. The wind was of cyclonic

force and at the corner of Halstead and "Pearce streets tore down a house. The building was a seven story brick structure. It was surrounded by one and two story frame and brick buildings, the homes of humble laborers, and crashing upon them instantly crushed out the lives of nine inmates and fatally or seriously injuried nineteen others. 1Thomas Hulett lived immediately in the rear of the ruined seven story brick building. He and his family, together with two guests, Mrs. Emma Hope and Mrs. Ada Keown were at supper. When the immense mass of brick, iron, wood and plaster comprising the larger bulding fell its force seemed to be directed to. the rear upon Hulett’s residence. A passer-by, as soon as the ac. cident occurred, turned in a fire alarm and a police and ambulance call. Citizens who heard the crash and the cries of the injured also rushed to the scone and the work of rescue was at once begun. The dead and injured were at once removed to residences near by. The Hulett family occupied only one side of this dwelling and on this the ruined building descended like an avalanche. The six-month-old baby of David Hulett was instantly crushed into a shapeless mass. Of the thirteen people sitting at the table the infant was the only one-instantly killed. The others, who were pinioned under broken timbers and bricks, were soon released by the hundreds of firemen, police and citizens who rushed to the rescue, A number physicians were soon at the sceneof the disaster to care for the wounded as fast as they were removed. James McGowan, his invtllie wife and Mary Walsh, Mrs. McGowan’s nurse are believed to be buried in the ruins of the brick building. Up to this hour, 11 p. m., no trace of them has been discovered by the diligent searchers and it is feared all are dead. /' x ■ -

An unknown man employed as a watchman in the runied building is missing and is supposed to be buried in the ruins. The loss from the destruction of the building is about 835,000.— ZZ At the signal service office it was stated that during the storm the wind attained a velocity of fifty-six miles an hour. At Des Moines the velocity was sixty and at Sioux City, la., sixty-four miles an hour. The same source reports that the storm which centered at North Platte, Neb., is now central in northwestern lowa southeastern Dakota, haying originated in the Northwest territory. Ft. Buford reports a fall of the thermometer of thirty degrees and at 10 o’clock Friday night a heavy snow was falling in northeastern Nebraska. The total loss from this seemingly wholesale destruction can not be estimated at once but will aggregate hundreds of thousands of dollars. Nebraska reports its tornado to have swept through the entire State, damaging property to a very great value and killing or injuring many people. At Des Moines, lowa, the wind blew one hundred miles an hour. The daughter of Gen. James B. Weaver was among the injured at Bloomfield, lowa. Many of the towns in the State suffered. Even sleepy, old St. Louis suffered from the storm. A passenger train was blown from the track near Burlington, lowa, and some of the passengers injured.

REVIEWED. This storm has been one of the most farreaching and destructive on record is borne out, as fragmentary scraps of information straggle in from the Northwest, the far West and the Southwest over the badly crippled, almost unworkable wires which escaped the fury of the warring elementsThe justly famous, though not popular, “Kansas cyclone” seems in this instance to have comprehended a vast expanse of territory upon which to wreak its fury and any estimate approximating the amount of damage done to property, or the number of lives lost, is out of the question. In the onward march northward in swirling shrieking eddies “bleeding Kansas” first fell under its mighty power Death and destruction marked its baleful progress from the moment it left the rollng prairies of the Indian territory. Grasping in its pitiless clutch the pretty little city of Tawanda, Kas., it bounded on with ever increasing volume, leaving in its wake a maze of shattered score of mangled corpses and a hundred torn and bleeding victims. „ * Wellington, Caldwell. Augusta and Kiowa, Kas., then furnished the quota to the death harvest. Passing northward through Kansas, Nebraska, the Dakotas and Minnesota, a track of desolation miles in width marks its passage, and feeble wails straggle through the fag ends of prostrate wires from interior towns to tell their tale of woe. From Omaha and Council Bluffs the tale is but a repetition of that from the Southwest—crippled wires, buildings unroofed, fences and trees laid waste, chimneys. signs and plate-glass front? smashed and scattered. Minneapolis and St. Paul have no outlet and their story is yet untold, and only a cessation of the awful visitation will admit of a summary of its results. When the result has been Summed u p it is probably that the country has not been visited by such a storm 'or years.