Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 19, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 September 1897 — PRAYING FOR RAIN. [ARTICLE]

PRAYING FOR RAIN.

FARMERS AND PREACHERS ASK HEAVEN’S HELP. Conditions Prevailing Are Worse than Have Been Experienced for Many Septembers—Schools Forced to Close Because of the Deadly Heat. Many States Stricken. Wells are drying, corn is scorching, pastures are bare, dust is inches deep and the pastors are calling special meetings and joining their flocks in earnest prayers for rain. Illinois, Indiana and lowa are parched. Until Tuesday evening Kansas was in the same condition, but rain came. In Southern Illinois the temperature averaged 90 degrees for fourteen'days. Northern Illinois and Chicago are having an unusually hot period for so late in the season. Corn is being destroyed in all the Egyptian country, and no such record has been made in heat and drouth since the September of, 1879. The Sangamon, Mackinaw and Vermilion Rivers are nearly dry, and the cattle on a thousand hills are bellowing in vain and dying for want of water. In Indiana no drop of moisture has fallen for two months, the corn is being burned to death, the pastures are as inflammable as powder and fires are raging. All over Northern and Eastern Indiana prayers for rain are being offered in all the churches. lowa has had an average of nearly 90 for ten days and never in the State’s history has there been so much suffering in September. Public schools are closed in many towns, workmen are forced to quit toil and prayers for rain are going up on every hand. In Ohio also public schools were forced to close on account of the extremely hot weather. Children fainted at Bellaire during the morning and there was no school in the afternoon. Michigan, too, is scanning the skies and watching every newspaper and weather bulletin for the promise of a downpour. Farmers are anxious, fruit raisers are downcast and the people of the cities are discouraged. Following is a table of temperatures in the principal cities Tuesday: -St. Louis ........96 Kansas City. 90 Indianapolis 94 Des Moines 90 ■Cincinnati 94 St. Paul 86 Philadelphia 92 Omaha S 6 Memphis 92 New York 76 Chicago 91 Detroit 76