Julie

by Catherine Marshall

  One viewer described these streams at 9:00 a.m. as “going berserk.” Smather’s Run, seldom more than 10 feet wide and 2 feet deep, was nearly 50 feet wide and stripping branches off trees 5 feet off the ground.

  At 10:00 a.m. a resident of the Hunting and Fishing Club climbed into his small outboard and chugged around the side of the lake. “The meadowland was under water in spots almost 300 feet from the edge of the lake,” he reported. “Debris everywhere, mostly logs washed down from a sawmill miles away. The lake was a mass of junk.”

  All available heavy-duty manpower had been gathered by 11:00 that morning as the lake rose quickly and threatened to spill over the dam. The sluice guards and spillways were opened wide. Then one group of men began to pry away the drift guards and tear up the road to get at the heavy iron gratings in the spillway which kept fish from escaping down Brady Creek.

  To ease the growing pressure on the earthen dam, several men grabbed pickaxes and shovels and began digging a ditch about 25 feet from the dam’s breast to act as a makeshift spillway. Another group had gone to the far end of the dam to dig a new waste-weir. After twenty minutes of work they hit hard rock and had to give up.

  By 12:00 the water had reached the top of the dam and began to spill over into the creek below. The earthen channels and cement buttresses directed the overflow to Laurel Run, which had changed in a few hours from a gentle stream to a small river of surging brown water overflowing its banks as it coursed down into Somerset Valley.

  The panting, gasping workers tearing up the road to dislodge the gratings encountered iron grids rusted and wedged in by years of overgrowth. The heaviest crowbars wielded by the strongest men could not budge them.

  By 1:00 p.m. logs, tree branches, and other flotsam flowing into the lake from the two feeder streams had reached the dam, adding to the pressure on it. Suddenly workers were horrified to see several large concrete blocks loosen, then tumble thunderously into the stream below. A geyser of water shot 30 feet into the air.

  At this point the workers made a final effort to slow the overflow by pouring wheelbarrows full of rocks across the road atop the dam. The heavy rocks were washed off like pebbles.

  At 1:30 dam erosion had created a V-shaped notch about 6 feet wide and 2 feet deep in the breast of the dam. As it continued to widen and deepen, the workers knew the dam was lost and began a retreat toward the Club. Suddenly a big chunk of the roadway over the dam collapsed and was washed away.

  Within minutes the opening was so large a yacht could have cruised through it. A sheet of water nearly 60 feet wide was now pouring over and through the opening. So far the concrete buttresses had easily diverted the heavy overflow away from the Sequanoto River into Laurel Run. Onlookers then witnessed an awesome sight. The main part of the earthen dam and the road above it did not burst or crumble, it just moved away. The water, treetop high, exploded over the dam like a living force, sweeping everything before it: trees, other vegetation, rocks, concrete, and all man-made objects.

  The onslaught of water hit the new waterway area with the roar of an express train. Twenty-foot-high mounds of earth supported by cement retaining walls crumbled, then dissolved into hundreds of missile-like objects and became a part of the roaring torrent that joined the Sequanoto River as it thundered toward Yancyville.

  It was 2:10 p.m.

  It took only 27 minutes for Lake Kissawha to empty over 500 million tons of water into the valleys below. Engineers later estimated that 118 tons of water per second pounding away at the dam wall had pushed away 90,000 cubic yards of earth and stone, which went tumbling downstream.

  The workers watched, incredulous at the sheer velocity and brute force roaring into the valley. The water snapped century-old four-foot-thick trees as if they were twigs, sometimes uprooting them altogether, and propelled them forward like matchsticks in the debris-filled, swirling torrent. The growing mass of water tore huge boulders from the stream banks and rolled them over and over as if they were marbles.

  What remained of the lake bottom was now 800 acres of brown ooze, separated here and there by a few small streams flowing quietly in the direction of the dam. Black bass, pike, and trout were flopping about in the mud at the bottom of the reservoir basin.

  The course of the floodwaters was strangely selective, though it mostly followed the Sequanoto River bed, which flowed through Yancyville, Mills Ford and then into Alderton. Yancyville was the first hit.

  Anne-Marie, who had stayed through lunch and was to be picked up later by Margo, was in the kitchen of the farmhouse with Hazel Fleming when she observed Queenie behaving strangely. The usually placid dog, now pregnant, was dashing about the yard whining and whimpering. Suddenly the collie sped toward the small cabin as if in great pain. Anne-Marie, who could not stand to see any animal hurting, hurried after Queenie to see what was wrong.

  From her position on the hillside beside the cabin, Anne-Marie heard the flood coming before she saw it. “It was like the roar of a fast freight train,” she said later. The noise was obviously painful to Queenie’s sensitive ears. Whimpering even more, the dog crept close to Anne-­Marie’s legs for protection.

  Now the booming freight-train sound was closer, just around the bend in the river. Anne-Marie stood rooted by the cabin, craning her neck to see. Her first impression was that a dark mist was rolling in. Then she saw a 50-foot-high wave of debris hurtling forward. She watched in horror as the wall of junk slammed into the right side of the farmhouse. Above the sound of splintering wood and crashing glass, her own screams seemed disembodied.

  The roof of the farmhouse tilted sideways. The trunk of a large tree then tore through the second-story window above the porch, leaving half of the tree hanging grotesquely outside, swaying in the air. The whole building dissolved and was sucked up into the dark mass.

  Behind the mountain of trash came the water: huge, churning waves over 75 feet high, carrying along on their swirling surface cows, horses, pigs, trees, sections of fences, boulders.

  And yes, human bodies. A woman’s long hair floated on the water. Could that be Hazel? Then the heaving waves thrust a man’s body halfway out of the water, only to suck him under again.

  Sobbing, Anne-Marie turned her head away. A thunderous crash drew her gaze back. A second wave of water, equally high and spread over a wider front, had crushed the two walls of the big red Fleming barn. The ripping, tearing sound of wood, plus the terrified squeals of the animals, sickened her. Just a half-hour before, she and Hazel had gone to feed the two Guernsey cows, the riding horses, and the beloved old swayback, Shorty. All were now a part of the rushing, tumbling torrent.

  The flow of water continued for about 20 minutes, then stopped. Because the log cabin had been built on higher ground, the raging water had just missed it. In fact, the cabin was standing there serenely intact, as though viewing with equanimity the total annihilation of the farmhouse, its mistress and the barn.

  Dazed, blinded by her tears, Anne-Marie made her way back down the hill. What had been a gracious dwelling minutes before was ­litter-strewn ground: a piece of brass, fragments of glass, a kitchen knife, a dented pot, several broken springs, fragments of wood and metal. That mighty body of water had swept away everything else.

  Half of Yancyville was demolished by the flood, half was spared. Those farms, houses, and stores on the west side of Seven Mile Mountain Road were swept away. Buildings on the east side were on higher ground and suffered only minor damage.

  Just below Yancyville the steel bridge over the Sequanoto River took the full brunt of the waters. Said one observer: “The bridge squirted into the air in a crazy L-shape, then exploded into pieces and was gone.”

  Mills Ford was the next target.

  At 2:11 the Allegheny Local, an eight-car passenger train which serviced some twenty stops between Altoona and Pittsburgh, stopped at Mills Ford to discharge and take on passengers, mail, and freight. The exchange usually took 5 minutes.

  At 2:13 the railroad clerk received a fran
tic call from the Yancyville station. He listened for less than 10 seconds, then raced outside, shouting at the conductor. “Get the train out of here! The dam broke and the water is heading this way!”

  A whistle blew, the loading of freight was stopped, and the train pulled out of the station, one minute ahead of the water, slowly building up momentum. A mile south of Mills Ford the tracks turned from the riverbed and climbed to higher ground. Would the train reach this spot in time?

  With a grade crossing 300 yards ahead, the engineer pulled the cord of his locomotive whistle. He never let it go for the next two and a half minutes.

  The first wall of water hit Mills Ford at 2:16. Warned by the train whistle and shouting word-of-mouth, over half the population had scampered to higher ground. The station clerk, who fled with the others, later described the approaching mass as “a brown hill a hundred feet high rolling over and over.” A flour mill, five stores, eight houses, and the railroad station were obliterated by the first onslaught of water. Pieces of railroad track were spinning and flying about “like someone had rained down a shower of steel spikes from above.”

  The second wave of water collected three more houses, a wooden church, and a warehouse. As the roof of one of the houses disappeared down the valley, a naked man was seen on top of it, holding frantically to what remained of the chimney.

  Ahead of the water the engineer of the Allegheny Local had pushed his throttle as wide open as he could. But before the lifesaving high ground could be reached, the track bed ahead made a sharp turn around a bend in the river.

  A truck driver on Seven Mile Mountain Road several hundred feet above the railroad tracks saw the train’s race against death. The water, a tumbling, foaming, debris-clogged mass, closed the gap quickly as the train made its circuitous turn around the bend in the river.

  A hundred yards was the difference. The engine had reached high ground, but the roiling water thundered into the last five cars and sucked them up like pieces of kindling, sending them tumbling and bouncing about until they broke apart. The engine and three other cars were yanked sideways and flipped over.

  In the seconds that passed before the second wave of water struck, seven people scrambled from the first three cars of the train and reached high ground. Then the second force surged into the helpless and prostrate train and lifted up its parts as an ocean wave picks up flotsam along a beach.

  The last view the truck driver had was of engine and cars cartwheeling down the floor of the riverbed like a toy train bouncing down a flight of stairs. Death had won the race.

  As the first body of water approached Alderton the weight of its accumulated debris—trees, buildings, automobiles, trucks, railroad cars—slowed it down. At times it appeared to be an almost gelatinous mass, giving out logs, hunks of metal, bodies and boulders along the way. The second body of water caught up to the first about a quarter of a mile north of the turnoff road to McKeever’s Bluff.

  When the second mound of water hit the first, there was a thunderous roar, as though a bomb had gone off. The whole mass seemed to explode into a thousand multicolored pieces. The rays of the afternoon sun revealed one section of the mass as emerald green, another jet black, still another an oily brown, while pieces of metal caught the sunlight in a weird pinwheel effect. Then for no discernable reason, the watery ball veered to the right and ripped a gaping swath through the wooded area behind McKeever’s Bluff.

  Several viewers lived to describe what then happened. “Like a scene in a movie spectacular,” said one. “As though the god of water picked up the Vulcania like a small toy and threw it over the cliff.”

  Another said, “It looked from a distance as though the water just nudged the Vulcania over the cliff. The Vulcania seemed to struggle for a moment as if clawing for its life, then it fell.”

  The car twisted completely around before tumbling the first hundred feet, where it hit a clump of trees. For a few seconds the Vulcania hesitated, then spun, pirouetted, and plunged forward end over end.

  “It crashed, bounced, slammed into the ground, bounced again as if it had been a pogo stick,” reported one witness. “I think it did that four or five times.”

  At the last crashing impact, a burst of flame shot out one end of the car. Then the Vulcania began a slow, rolling, bouncing fall the last few hundred yards up to the outskirts of Alderton. It was a flaming torch when it finally came to rest at the bottom of the hill. A wall of water rolled over the Vulcania, dissolving it and the two human beings inside into a thousand fragments.

  When the dam waters hit Alderton, they were about 30 feet high, 500 feet wide and 2 miles long.

  The time was 2:19.

  It takes a moment to react to crisis. When the cry came, “To the top floor,” I darted about looking for my sweater. Rand’s shout brought me to my senses. He grabbed my hand and fairly propelled me up the stairs.

  Emily Cruley had been reluctant to leave her desk. The panic in the faces of the two women pushing through the front door ignited her. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Emily scrambling toward the stairs, subscription case held tightly to her bosom.

  At the top of the stairs I heard a shout, turned, and observed Dean Fleming coming through the front door. He gave a quick look about the office and scurried jerkily after us up the stairs, the bad leg hardly slowing him down at all. In addition to the six of us who raced upstairs from the Sentinel office, five others had scampered up the staircase from the side entrance.

  The view out of the north window of the second floor was frightening. Panicky people were running and scurrying about on the sidewalk in a state of confusion, some heading one direction, some another. The din was growing: dogs barking, women screaming, men shouting, whistles blowing, church bells ringing.

  Two comparable scenes flashed through my mind. The first was a picture I remembered in an old religious book of confused people running about on the Day of Judgment. The second was a sight that had turned my stomach as a little girl in Timmeton: a hen flopping around, this way and that, after Dad had chopped her head off.

  Suddenly we saw the reason for the pandemonium below. A dark, misty wall of water was bearing down upon us, one block away. The sound that preceded it was like rolling thunder. “Upstairs!” The order came from Dean Fleming.

  My last glance at the dark mass revealed all sorts of objects swirling in it: an automobile, a bicycle, a pushcart, street signs, the bodies of several men plus a woman holding her child.

  Rand held my hand as we rushed up the twisting stairs to the top floor; behind us came Dean and Emily, who still clutched her black case. The third floor contained trunks and boxes scattered about, old-fashioned clothes trees standing upright, sporting costumes and uniforms; clothes on hangers dangling from hooks in the rafters; still more elaborate costumes on department store dummies. One corner contained boxes of Christmas decorations.

  Rand pulled me aside, placed his mouth close to my ear. “Whatever happens, Julie, I love you.”

  Grinding, buckling noises shook the floor; the entire building groaned. Rand and I fell onto the floor as a huge tree crashed through one window. The bodies of a brown dog and a half-clothed man burst through the opening. Our screams were drowned by awesome noises all around us.

  How can I find the words to describe the sounds and sensations of a building breaking up? Swirling waters were hurling assault after assault at the foundation. Timbers cracked, then splintered; mortar crumbled; entire walls heaved and buckled.

  A rain of dirt and small particles showered us from the ceiling. When the building suddenly tilted, costumes and decorations flew in every direction. Rand and I were back on our feet, arms around each other. Dean was next to us, protecting Emily with his body. I heard these words:

  God is our refuge and strength . . . Therefore we will not fear . . . Though the waters roar, though the mountains shake . . .

  Abruptly the floor under us split in two. Next, the seams at the top of the gabled roof ruptured and we could see daylight
just above us. Water began pouring in through the openings and the floor began to sink under us.

  Numbly, I saw the opening above us as the only escape. Then I found myself thinking that clambering through that space would take no more agility than climbing the cherry tree in our back yard, as I had done dozens of times. I jumped on top of a nearby trunk, pointing to the daylight above. Rand leaped up beside me, grabbed me with his sinewy arms, strengthened by years of rowing, and propelled me toward the light above.

  Desperately, I clutched the broken edge of the roof and pulled myself on top. Then I turned to give Rand a hand. He was gone.

  The building seemed to explode underneath, throwing me halfway off my platform of safety. Pieces of timber fell about me. The mass of water catapulted my perch forward as I clawed to keep my handhold. I was tipped at a crazy angle and spun around several times, banging into logs, bales of wire, and metal junk. Dazed, I coughed up brown fluid and clung to my section of roofing.

  Twice my raft almost spun over as I found myself on the crest of a river of debris, cruising through downtown Alderton, watching building after building crumble, then disintegrate. The rushing floodwaters had been slowed by Alderton’s stone, brick, and wooden structures. I guessed we were moving no faster now than 15 miles per hour.

  I sensed I would not survive if I remained on such a wobbly raft. The roof of a small house swirled by. In desperation, I leaped toward it. My feet went into the water, but miraculously I was able to pull myself on top of it. Then that rooftop was struck by another wall of water and began to buck and lurch like a wild bronco. On hands and knees, scrambling and clawing, frantically I clung to it.

  I had just a moment to wonder about Rand, Dean, and Emily when the branches of a tree swung by and knocked me off my rocking rooftop. Down I plunged into the murky depths. This is death, I told myself with surprising calm as blackness settled over me.