Sunday, May 5, 2024

Bit of History - August 9, 2023

A very destructive storm, bordering on a tornado, hit Harrison County in the first week of August, 1940, causing damage at nearly every farm in the county.  After a day of close to 100 degree temperatures, the clouds in the sky must have seemed like a welcome relief from the heat.  It first started to drizzle but around 8 pm, a wind from the north picked up and blew steadily with velocity from 50 to 75 miles per hour.  The wind was followed by intense electrical storm lasting over an hour, producing 1.61 inches of rain.

The damage was overwhelming.  The power went out all over the county due to snapped electric poles.  The greatest damage was to the Ridgeway School, where the big chimney on the south side toppled through the roof into a classroom below.  The hole in the roof was 18 feet by 22 feet and only the fact that the classroom the chimney fell into had a brick wall beneath it prevented the chimney from going all the way to the first floor of the school. The damage was estimated to cost $2,500 to $5,000 to repair (about $54,000 to $108,000 today).

“To report all the damage done in the rural areas would be almost equal to public a census of the occupants of the Harrison County farms.  Hardly a place escaped being damaged in some way or other by the wind.”  (Ridgeway Journal, August 1, 1940.)