The Flint, Michigan tornado of June, 8 1953........

Wow. I've been following all of this coverage of the horrible start to the tornado season that we Americans are experiencing this Spring. It doesn't seem to stop....every day keeps bringing more dreadful weather to the Midwest and South of the country. I take more than a passing interest in tornadoes, I've lived through a few, relatively minor ones....minor in that there was no loss of life, and minimal property damage. In hindsight they were minor, but they certainly didn't seem minor as I was waiting them out with a battery operated radio, in the basement.  

I grew up in Flint, Michigan. Home of what was one of the worst tornadoes in American history. Well, I guess it was the worst in terms of loss of life and damage until this storm that struck Joplin, MO., this past Sunday. Strange that I think of Joplin as having broken our record for death. Strange. 

I don't really know any family that grew up with me that wasn't touched at some level by the tornado of June, 1953. Lost loved ones, friends, classmates, property....every friend I grew up with had a family story, a photo album, saved newspapers. If our parents, grandparents, or older siblings and cousins hadn't been in it's direct path, they had some involvement  in it's aftermath, rescue, or cleanup. It was a running joke among us kids that you knew that your mom had lived through it, if she screamed at you to get in the basement at the first sign of thunder.....not funny, I know, but hey, we were kids. I grew up with stories, remembrances, arcane trivia......and a massive, morbid fascination with twisters.

I posted the cover art from the Flint Journal issue by artist Ken Dolan, because this image has been seared into my brain since childhood.....my parents had a copy of it (who's didn't?). It terrified me as a small child, it still has a visceral effect on me. I still think that it is one of the most intense images in the history of American print journalism.

My prayers are with the people of Joplin, MO., and with he people in the other cities effected by recent storms.

A little background on the Flint-Worcester tornado outbreak sequence of June 1953:

The Flint–Worcester Tornadoes were two tornadoes, one occurring in Flint, Michigan on June 8, 1953, the other in Worcester, Massachusetts on June 9, 1953. These tornadoes are among the deadliest in United States history and were caused by the same storm system that moved eastward across the nation. The tornadoes are also related together in the public mind because, for a brief period following the Worcester tornado, it was debated in the U.S. Congress whether recent atomic bomb testing in the upper atmosphere had caused the tornadoes. Congressman James E. Van Zandt (R-Penn.) was among several members of Congress who expressed their belief that the June 4th bomb testing created the tornadoes, which occurred far outside the traditional tornado alley. They demanded a response from the government. Meteorologists quickly dispelled such an assertion, and Congressman Van Zandt later retracted his statement.

The Flint-Worcester Tornadoes were the most infamous storms produced by a larger outbreak of severe weather that began in Nebraska, Iowa and Wisconsin, before moving across the Great Lakes states, and then into New York and New England. Other F3 and F4 tornadoes struck other locations in Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire and Ohio.

An F5 tornado hit Flint, Michigan on June 8, 1953. The tornado moved east-northeast 2 miles (3.2 km) north of Flushing and devastated the north side of Flint and Beecher. The tornado first descended about 8:30 p.m. on a humid evening near a drive-in movie theater that was flickering to life at twilight time. Motorists in the drive-in began to flee in panic, creating many auto accidents on nearby roads. The tornado dissipated near Lapeer, Michigan. Nearly every home was destroyed on both sides of Coldwater Road. Multiple deaths were reported in 20 families, and it was reported that papers from Flint were deposited in Sarnia, Ontario, Canada, some sixty miles east of Flint. One hundred and sixteen were killed, making it the tenth deadliest tornado in U.S. history. The death toll was surpassed by the 2011 Joplin tornado. It is also one of only three F5 tornadoes ever to hit in Michigan. Another F5 would hit in Hudsonville on April 3, 1956.

The storm system that created the Flint tornado moved eastward over southern Ontario and Lake Erie during the early morning hours of June 9. As radar was still primitive (or nonexistent) in 1953, inadequate severe weather predictions resulted: the Weather Bureau in Buffalo, New York merely predicted thunderstorms and said that "a tornado may occur." As early as 10 A.M., however, the Weather Bureau in Boston anticipated the likelihood of tornadic conditions that afternoon but feared the word "tornado" would strike panic in the public, and refrained from using it. Instead, as a compromise, they issued New England's first-ever severe thunderstorm watch. Several hours later and virtually without warning (to the public at least), a strong F4 tornado struck central Massachusetts in the late afternoon hours on June 9, 1953. The tornado descended over the Quabbin Reservoir in Petersham, Massachusetts at 4:25 P.M., and was witnessed by boaters on the reservoir. After brushing Petersham, it tracked southeastwards and slammed into the rural towns of Barre and Rutland, followed by suburban Holden, before killing 60 in heavily populated northern Worcester. The towns of Shrewsbury and Westborough each suffered numerous fatalities. The tornado did its final destruction at the Fayville post office on Route 9 in Southborough, and dissipated nearby over the Sudbury Reservoir in the Framingham area, 84 minutes after it formed.

Ninety-four people were killed.

Coincidentally, residents of central Massachusetts were coming home from work in the minutes before impact and picked up their evening newspapers to read the front-page headlines of the tornado that had just struck Flint, Michigan the previous evening. Some wondered if it was exactly the same tornado that was now bearing down on them.

Outbreak death toll

State	Total	County	County total
Massachusetts	94	Worcester	94
Michigan	125	Genesee	116
		Iosco	4
		Monroe	4
		Washtenaw	1
Nebraska	11	Valley	11
Ohio	17	Cuyahoga	6
		Erie	2
		Henry	5
		Lorain	1
		Wood	3
Totals	247
All deaths were tornado-related

The massive Worcester tornado was on the ground for nearly an hour and a half. In that period it traveled 46 miles (74 km), reached 1-mile (1.6 km) in width and injured 1,300 people. Barre suffered the first 2 fatalities. The tornado then renewed its vigor in Rutland center with 2 more deaths, and widened to 1/2 mile in Holden, where 9 were killed outright (a 10th succumbed 2 days later), the worst-hit areas being Winthrop Oaks and Brentwood.

At 5:08 P.M., the tornado entered Worcester and grew to an unprecedented width of 1-mile (1.6 km). Damage was phenomenal in Worcester (the second-largest city in Massachusetts) and in some areas equaled the worst damage in any U.S. tornado. Hardest-hit areas included Assumption College (now Quinsigamond Community College), where a priest and 2 nuns were killed. The main building's 3-foot (0.91 m)-thick brick walls were reduced by 3 floors, and the landmark tower lost 3 stories. The nearby Burncoat Hill neighborhood saw heavy devastation (especially on its western slope), but it was the Uncatena-Great Brook Valley neighborhoods to the east of Burncoat Hill that were utterly leveled, houses simply vanishing and debris swept clean from the sites. Forty people died in the Uncatena-Great Brook Valley areas alone. A 12-ton bus was picked up, rolled over several times and was thrown against the newly-constructed Curtis Apartments in Great Brook Valley, resulting in the deaths of 2 passengers. The Curtis Apartments blueprints were blown all the way to Duxbury (near Plymouth), 75 miles (121 km) away. Across Boylston St. from the Curtis Apartments, the Brookside Home Farm (a city-operated dairy facility and laundry) sustained total damage, with 6 men killed and the loss of its herd of 80 Holsteins. Wrecked houses and bodies were blown into Lake Quinsigamond. The 6 fatalities at Brookside were the most in any 1 particular building in the tornado.

The funnel maintained a 1-mile (1.6 km) width throughout much of Shrewsbury (12 killed), and was still doing maximum damage when it moved through downtown Westborough (5 deaths), where it began curving towards the northeast in its final leg. In the storm's final moments, 3 perished in the collapse of the Fayville Post Office in Southborough. Coincidentally, around the time it ended 5:45 P.M., a tornado warning was issued, although by then it was too late. A separate F2/3 tornado also struck about the same time the warning was issued, in the nearby communities of Sutton, Northbridge, Mendon, Bellingham, Franklin, Wrentham and Mansfield in Massachusetts, injuring 17 persons. Another tornado did minor damage and caused several injuries in Fremont and Exeter in Rockingham County, New Hampshire; other smaller tornadoes occurred in Colrain, Massachusetts and Rollinsford, New Hampshire.

Baseball-size hail was reported in a score of communities affected by the Worcester supercell. Airborne debris was strewn eastward, reaching the Blue Hill Meteorological Observatory 35 mi (56 km) away, and even out over Massachusetts Bay and the Atlantic Ocean. The farthest documented distance of tornado debris was an item that blew from Holden to Eastham on Cape Cod, a distance of 110 miles (180 km). This is one of the greatest such instances in a U.S. tornado.

The Worcester Tornado was a milestone in many regards, and not only because of its enormous size or unusual geographic location. At the time, it was the nation's costliest tornado in raw dollars, and its 1,300 injuries were the 3rd worst in U.S. history (until the 1979 Wichita Falls tornado bumped it to number 4, where it still stands). The tally of 10,000 homeless stood unchallenged for 26 years until the '79 Wichita Falls storm.

However, the Worcester Tornado's greatest effect on the nation was its being the catalyst for the Storm Prediction Center's reorganization on June 17, 1953, and subsequent implementation of a nationwide radar/storm spotter system. The results were proven successful: since June 9, 1953, no single U.S. tornado had killed over 100 people until the Joplin, Missouri tornado of May 22, 2011.

The severity of this epic storm remained in dispute for a long period within the meteorological community. Official observations classified this tornado as F4, but damage was consistent with an F5 tornado in 5 of the affected towns (Rutland, Holden, Worcester, Shrewsbury and Westborough). As a result of this debate, the National Weather Service took an unprecedented step and convened a panel of weather experts during the spring of 2005 to study the latest evidence on the wind strength of the Worcester Tornado. The panel considered whether to raise the designation of the storm to F5, but finally decided during the summer of 2005 to keep the official rating as a strong F4. The reasoning for this was that the anchoring techniques used in many of the destroyed or vanished homes could never now be ascertained with certainty, and some of these structures (many of recent postwar construction) were possibly more vulnerable to high winds than older homes. Without a proper engineering qualification, it would be nearly impossible to determine with 100% accuracy which damage was F5 and which was F4, as appearances would be similar.

A perspective:

Even though the 1953 tornado season only saw 422 tornadoes (which is half the nationwide average), the year saw some of the deadliest tornadoes in U.S. history, including the Waco Tornado that hit on May 11, the Flint tornado of June 8, and the Worcester tornado on June 9. These 3 storms were also unique in occurring within a 30-day period.

Other severe tornadoes of 1953 hit Warner Robins, Georgia in April, San Angelo, Texas in May (same day as Waco), Port Huron, Michigan also in May, Cleveland in June (same day as Flint), and Vicksburg, Mississippi in December.

Here is a story from The Flint Journal about memories of the storm:

http://www.flintjournal.com/20thcentury/1950/1950tornado.html



The Flint Journal presents:

Journal File Photo A nurse treats an injured child in the ambulance drive at Hurley Hospital amid the pandemonium that followed the Beecher tornado of 1953.

Comeback from disaster can’t blot out memories of tornado

By Betty Brenner
Flint Journal Staff Writer

---

Maria Gatica says she will never forget that June 8 evening in 1953.

She had just returned to her house on W. Coldwater Road in Mt. Morris Township after visiting her hospitalized husband when she looked out a window to the west.

"I never (saw) a cloud like that in my whole life,'' she said. "It was a big, black cloud like a top you play with, that goes around and around, and a little tail.''

What Gatica saw would become known as the Beecher tornado, a vicious storm that struck the modest residential area along Coldwater Road between Clio Road and N. Dort Highway, destroying almost everything in its path and ripping into the area's psyche.

The storm killed 116 people in Mt. Morris Township, injured more than 900, destroyed at least 300 homes and seriously damaged 250 more. The newly completed Beecher High School was seriously damaged. Property damage was estimated at $10 million.

It was the worst tragedy Genesee County had ever seen - in fact, it was Michigan's deadliest tornado ever and the ninth worst in the country.

The tornado so shook up the area that for years downtown Flint merchants would close if there was any threatening weather, a former Flint Journal staffer recalled.

Gatica remembers picking up her 7-month-old son, the youngest of her eight children, and yelling to the older ones to get under the bed.

Then she blacked out.

Journal Photo / Steve Kleeman Maria Gatica, Beecher tornado survivor, holds a cross she hopes will protect her home.

When she came to, she was still holding her baby. Somehow, he had on the hat that his grandfather, who also had been in the house, had been wearing. But only the foundation of her house and the tank for her gas stove remained.

A big stick was jutting out about 3 inches from her right leg. Her mother, who also was in the house, had a similar injury, and her grandfather received only a bruise on a leg.

One by one, Gatica called the names of the children who had been in the house and they answered. How they survived, just scratched and dirty, she doesn't know.

But her 3-year-old had gone next door to Gatica's sister's house. The little girl, Maria Anita, died along with Gatica's sister and the sister's four children.

The girl's body was found later under a cover of wood by people operating a bulldozer, she said.

Gatica and her mother spent a month recovering at Hurley Hospital.

The tornado traveled 28 miles through Genesee and Lapeer counties. East of N. Dort Highway, it inflicted less damage than on the rest of its path. It traveled east along Coldwater Road until it swerved slightly north into Richfield Park and north of E. Stanley Road. It continued into Lapeer County, skipped a few miles, then continued east to Lake Huron.

Described as a dancing funnel or an ugly black cloud with a ball of fire in it, the tornado arrived with little or no warning. Some said they didn't see it coming, but heard it.

One woman said she looked out the door because her kids were so curious about the roaring noise they heard.

"I saw a big ball of fire, real bright, about the size of a big washtub, coming down the middle of the road,'' Nora Cook said later. "It was surrounded by the most awful black cloud — it looked like black smoke.''

Richard Childs, at the time a member of The Journal's regional reporting staff, remembers being called by The Journal a few minutes after the tornado hit and being told to take his camera to Hurley Hospital.

There, he said, he found rescuers trying to organize the chaotic scene.

There were not enough ambulances, so the injured and dead arrived in the beds of pickup trucks or carried on doors, mattresses and even a wooden bench. Some were brought in by the state police.

Workers searched scores of debris-filled basements for victims. Some bodies were battered beyond recognition, strewn among twisted heaps of wreckage and debris. The last of the victims was not identified for three days. It took five days to account for the missing.

As the enormity of the tragedy became clear, a morgue was opened at the National Guard Armory.

For five days, funeral processions filled area streets. Last rites for 16 were said at St. Agnes Catholic Church, in the largest mass funeral in the city's history. Bishop Joseph Albers celebrated Mass.

There also were accounts of escapes.

Hattie Sage was in her car with her six children when she saw the tornado coming. She floored the gas pedal until the speedometer read about 100 miles an hour, and barely kept ahead of the tornado.

"Two or three times it felt like someone had picked up the rear wheels of the car and bounced it,'' she said later.

Inside the tornado, she said, she saw a rocking chair and body. An outhouse was blown over the top of her car.

The family survived.

C.W. Lackey, a partner in Lackey's Market at N. Saginaw Street north of E. Coldwater Road, saw it coming, headed for the basement of the store and made it. But a customer who had just climbed out of his car disappeared. The store and $1,500 in cash also were blown away.

Later, Lackey found one can of beans and one can of fruit cocktail. He also found the motor and front grille of the truck that had been parked by the store. One man said he saw the tornado coming, with boxes being swept along in front of the big, black cloud. Then he realized the boxes were houses high in the sky.

One woman sick in bed saw the roof of her house collapse and threw her hands over her eyes. The next thing she knew she was in a field 100 yards away, still in bed. A purse lay on the bed beside her.

A house trailer was blown eight miles, but the roses in bloom next to it remained. After the tragedy, the community pulled together.

Sightseers stopped to give money to the victims. A hardware store opened doors to help rescue workers get necessary tools. A restaurant opened its doors to feed workers and victims.

General Motors started the Red Feather Disaster Fund with a $100,000 gift, the UAW-CIO and its locals added $150,000 and more than $200,000 was contributed in volunteer payroll deductions.

Contributions came from all over the country.

In all, nearly $1 million was given to the fund.

The Salvation Army opened a hot meal center in a tent and served a peak of 700 meals.

At the end of August, 7,823 people worked in 90-degree heat to rebuild 193 homes. The Rev. Henry W. Berkemeier, pastor of St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church, organized the building bee and worked on the rebuilding.

Gatica's house was the first rebuilt.

For the community's efforts, Flint was named All-America City by the National Municipal League. Berkemeier received the Freedom Award of the Freedom Foundation of Valley Forge, Pa., and the Flint City Council named Berkemeier as the Year's Outstanding Citizen.

The area's strong comeback from the disaster, however, could not blot out survivors' awful memories.

"It was terrible,'' Gatica said. "For a long time, when I see rain, thunder and lightning, I get real nervous, put the kids in a closet, and say, 'Stay there.''' 

Another excellent site devoted to the Flint tornado with pictures and links to other sites:

http://www.fpl.info/gallery/beechertornado/index.shtml