<em>Is Anybody There?</em>: It was 40 Yrs Ago Today . . . .

15 May 1968 at 4:57 pm when it hit Oelwein. A tornado that is. I was 1

2 yrs old at the time. We were watching the Dr. Max show on WMT-TV, channel 2 (now KGAN). The fire siren went off & almost immediately it ceased as the power went out. When we knew what was going on my Mom & my sister headed towards the basement. Not me & my Grandpa Stasi. We stayed upstairs in the dining room & watched it go by through the window. (This is definitely not recommended behavior.)

My dad was at work, bartending at my cousin place, Luigi's Restaurant, at the South end of town. The bar was in the basement & fortunately he wasn't hurt. But, the giant chicken that was on the sign in front of the place ended up flying the coup.

Sadly 1 person was killed as a result of the tornado. Grace Damon died from injuries when the roof of the building (Ben Franklin Dime Store) she was in downtown collapsed on her. (The Oelwein Daily Register put a picture of it on the front page of the paper that raised a lot of controversy as to its appropriateness.) 2 others died during the clean-up (heart attacks).

The tornado basically followed the old Rock Island RR tracks through town & eventually headed North towards Maynard & Randalia. The tornado was later classified as a F5. As I said at the start the sirens barely went off before they stopped due to the power going out. That was because the lines from Interstate Power came into town at the South end near where the tornado began. It quickly knocked them out. Like many a tornado the damage it did was horrific, but also some what bizzare in what it did & didn't destroy. Sacred Heart Catholic Church had a part of its South Wall & the huge stain glassed window knocked out. Many years later tha pastor at the time, Fr. Fidelis Kaufman, told me that it was a blessing from God that he had raised the covered value on the damaged windows earlier that year.

Another church didn't fair so well. & it was actually further away from the funnel cloud. The 1st Christian Church was so badly damaged that it became a parking lot instead. The Episcopal Church was by the tracks & also got wiped out. It also destroyed Central Grade School & the Junior High. Thanks to DST everyone was out of the buildings.

Our house was 8 blocks West of the tornado & lost a bunch of shingles. Half a block North of us a old huge tree was blown over so badly it had to be cut down. I should say that it was pulled towards the tornado as it was leaning East over the street. The damage to my house taught me a lesson in dealing with insurance companies. Grandpa had replaced the shingles on the addition. The insurance would only pay for the new shingles there. But on the main part of the house it paid for a new roof, even though there was no need to do so. The lesson, don't do any repairs until the agent has looked at the damage.

For the next few days we had the National Guard roaming arround controlling travel in & out of town. Relatives could call in but couldn't call out. Some of the pictures showed areas I was familiar but they had so much damage they were unrecognizable.

The old City Hall/Fire Station was completely destroyed. The current City Hall is the Old Chicago Great Western RR station. (More on that later this year.The tornado was the 1 & the loss of the CGW to a merger was the 2 of a 1-2 punch Oelwein suffered that year.) A new firestation was build nearby. Other businesses including City Laundry suffered major damage also. Initial estimates put te damage at over $14 million dollars.

Than evening being without power & only candlelight, the house took on a strange feeling. Part of that was the lack of electric light, but a lot of it was because of the shock of the events of that day. We had some neighbors over for a while. 1 article accurately describes that night as having an eerie silence. It was.

Life eventually got back to normal. The High Schools had their graduations & rebuilding began. In 1969 Oelwein held a community wide "Thanksgiving service" on 15 May. There are many, many unknown, unsung heroes that helped with the recovery.

As I pointed out, I watched the tornado go by. 40 yrs later it is still vivid in my memory. For years I had trouble watching any film of a tornado. But as time went on, God healed me of that fear. Those few days still feel a little unreal. That is understandable. A tornado is something that I would never want anyone to go through. Reviewing some of the pictures from the Register (see below for links) still saddens me & the memories still seems as fresh as they were back then.

I thank God that none of my family was harmed. It is a miracle to me that with all the damage, short warning time etc, that there was as little loss of life as there was. Like I said earlier, if we weren't on DST there would have still been a lot of people in the grade school & junior high that were destroyed. & with as close as it was to Sacred Heart, students at their grade & HS would also have been injured or killed.

Even now, it is hard to put all my thoughts & feelings into words. & more than 1 day to write this. That is why it is actually posted 2 days after the official date shown. I've tried to do the best I can to share about it, so I won't apologize if it is a bit disjointed & jumps about.

Note: Elma & Charles City, IA were also hit by tornadoes at about the same time as Oelwein. Charles City's was also an F5. Normally there is 1 F5 every 3 yrs. 2 at 1 time is very rare.

(Pictures: Upper right from Oelwein Daily Register, it shows the damage done to Barney's Texaco

Middle Left from KCGR, it shows Dowtown Oelwein on 16 May 2008. East is left side of picture.)