Rensselaer Republican, Volume 27, Number 50, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 August 1896 — HOT SPELL BROKEN. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

HOT SPELL BROKEN.

RAIN A LIFE SAVER TO SUFFER. ING HUMANITY. , ' a ■« , I ; Long Season of Terribljif Tlcat Departs In a Thunder Storm—Victims in Many Cities—Men nnd Women Die in Their Tracks on the Streets. Awfni.Denth Roll. The backbone of the hot wove,has bopn brokefi. The breaking pf this opst-iron backbone was accompanied by severe thunder storms, but it Is broken. An urea of high pressure developed on the Oregon coast on Sunday night and crossed the Rocky Mountains in, Montana with fair velocity. Monday night this high area was at Helena. The temperature there was 02 and the Telocity of the wind thirty miles an hour. At Qu’nppelle, in the Dominion, the temperature was 50, and at Havre, Mont., 56. There was rain in the Dakotas and Minnesota Tuesday,

nnd it reached northern Illinois and Chicago late Tuesday night. Out of the west there came a wind and rain. In an hour the rainfall was more than an inch. In half an hour the fall in temperature was 20 degrees. In' that manner Chicago dismissed her hot wave and welcomed the coolness from Montana and Wyoming. " r . . When the rain came down upon the baking town 'it was after 0 o’clock. All day men at work had sweltered. Little

people and the old Were faint. Some itere dead, because the battle with them had been too harsh. Then the rain came. Winds View it out of the west and out of the north—kind winds—and it fell as un{‘'stfained mercy out of heaven. Sick nnu prostrate ones found in its halms reprieve and pardon. Millions thanked God out of their hearts. The day nad been oppressive. Man and beast had fallen helpless as the mercury rase_steaUily, and, many, feared in midafternoon that the awfulness of Monday night might have succession not less terrible. At 3 o'clock In the afternoon the mercury was hut 1 degree below the maximum registration of twenty-four hours before. At 4 6 it had peevishly fallen to 89 degrees. There seemed small Voice for thanksgiving. Every hour had brought to the health department fresh lists of stricken

people, new tales of the dead, added notifications that poof beasts had dropped in harness and demanded burial. Then Jhe bounty of the sky and the west wind pulled its purse strings wide and men and women breathed again. The slaughter was given pause. This is the record qf the conqueror for the hottest three days: SUNDAY. New York anil Brooklyn j.. 72 Philadelphia ; 23 Baltimore 19 Chicago 18 Small Illinois towns., 9 Cincinnati 3 Small towns in Indiana 3 Small towns In Ohio 3 Boston 2 St. Louis , 2 Pittsburg 1 Cleveland 2 Louisville 1 Memphis 1 Han Antonio . 1 Sioux City 1 MONDAY. ProsDenths. tratlons. New York... fill 205 Brooklyn .. 21 00 New York suburbs 73 201 Chicago 20 01 St. Louis... .• —.. 11 . littsburg 3 t 100 Hartford 8 New Haven........ 3 Boston -. 1 0 Cleveland 2 60 Toledo 2 ..: Providence 4 Washington 0 Buffalo 2 Philadelphia 67 128 TUESDAY. ProsDeaths. tratlons. Greater New Y0rk...... 182 500 Boston 12 18 Philadelphia 18 „ «fl Washington 44 15 Baltimore 2 12 St. Louis.. 12 30 Indianapolis 1 3 Cincinnati 10 Cleveland 1 5 Louisville 3 17 Sullivan, Ind 7 15 Terre Haute, Ind. 10 80 Chicago 8 34 Total 205 794 The baking to which this continent has been subjected is almost unprecedented

Id the leather history of America. JSvery summer there are periods of six or seven days in which the temperature remains abnormally high over small areas. But rarely if ever baa the. Whole country borne continuous-heat for so long ji time. St, Paul and Jacksonville, Fla., HI Paso and Abilene, Pueblo .and Green Bay suffered about equally, and the hot wave rolled mercilessly from the Rocky Mountains to the Atlantic ocean. The cumulative effects of the excessive temperature on the public . health are marked in the returns of sunstrokes turned in by the police and the observations of general mortality .made by the health department of large cities. Although the temperature In Chicago Tuesday a week ago was 94, the number Of .prostrations was BipalH .it grew on Wednesday with the mercury at 90; it’Vas still larger on Thursday when a maximum temperature of 'only 85 was recorded? Thence : t mounted steadily to the extraordinary and appalling record for Sunday and Monday. New Yorkers Suffer. With the beginning of the seventh day of torrid heat New York city gave one great, ’ gasping sigh and then submitted to :i» scorching that struck down men and women on the streets and in their homes, babies-in their mothers’ arms, and children in their beds. Though the humidity was’not so great as it has been, the mortality list and the roll of those who fell prostrate were longer tbag ever. Men and women who had lived through six days of such awful heat could not withstand its cumulative effects. It is fair to say that hardly more than SO percent of those overcome had their cases reported to the police. Many were stricken down and went to their homes or were taken care of by friends, and of these the authorities know nothing. RUIIJ LEFT BY WIND. Michigan, Illinois, Ohio, Indiana and “lowa Swept by Storms. Michigan had a severe tussle with a storm Sunday night and Monday. A veritable cloudburst visited lonia. One storm struck the city at 11 o’clock and a second came two hours later. Complete prostration of telegraph and telephone wires resulted. No human victims

were claimed in the city, but the property damage will reach fully 5,0007 Th the agricultural districts the storm seems to have been equally disastrous. From nearly eve.j’y direction come reports of buildings blown dawn or unroofed. while hundreds of acres of fruit- trees are torn ,up or broken down and the fruit destroyed. Corn is Hat on the ground from the effect? of the rain, hail and wind, while miles of fence will have to be rebuilt. The damage to the rural districts W ill aggregate many thousands of dollarsT"“XossT of live stock especially promises to reafeh an astonishingly high figure. A loss of 8100,000 was occasioned bv a terrific wind whiefi sWept over Saginaw early Monday morning, but no human victims were claimed. The storm was accompanied by terrific lightning and a deluge of water. In some sections of lowa the wind almost amounted to a tornado. Immense trees were blown down, houses moved off their foundations and barns and outbuildings dismantled. Panic-stricken people rushed for caves, cellars and other places of refuge. At Sandusky, <)., .lay Leonard and John Thomas, of Cheboygan, employed in building a dock, were struck by lightning while_ operating a saw and instantly killed.

HEAT PATIENT IN THE HOSPITAL.

A STRICKEN HORSE.