McLEAN COUNTY HISTORY & GENEALOGY NEWS
By Euleen Rickard
The poor living conditions of the Great Depression were beginning to improve when the big flood of 1937came bringing horrendous devastation to our area. One news reporter wrote “in the latter part of 1936 a cold high-pressure system built over the southern states and a high pressure system centered over the upper Mississippi Valley, with a current of warm, moist air funneled between them, right up the Mississippi and Ohio rivers for days on end. By the end of December 1936 the ground across the Ohio Valley was saturated and still the rains came. It rained twenty-one days dropping 165 billion tons of water. On January 21st it rained 4.04 inches.”
The rivers rose, overflowed and emptied out into the fields, towns and cities as never before. Day after day the rivers rose covering more and more land, causing houses and livestock to be carried away by force. Nearly a million people were made homeless and hundreds died. It was the worst flood in the history of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers.
Property damage was estimated at three hundred million in depression dollars. A total of 7,272 rescue boats were used to evacuate 1.5 million people who were driven from their homes.
In McLean County 5,500 people were evacuated as the Green River climbed to a record 45.5 feet at Calhoun and continued to rise until it reached an all-time record crest of 54.4 feet. Many residents of Rumsey and the lowlands of the county took shelter in the Calhoun school and the courthouse. An 88-year old man died in the courthouse and a baby was born there and when a fire broke out in the Calhoun jail near the courthouse, rescuers rowed boats down the street to save the prisoners.
Houses were tied to trees to keep them from floating away, still some left their foundations and settled far from their original locations. Mary Ann (Smith) Stevenson recalls that the Smith house had water in the first floor and they lived in the upstairs for days.
My mother kept the radio tuned to a Louisville station, listening to calls for help. The phrase “send a boat to” various locations urgently needing help, was heard day and night. Pete Monore of WHAS accepted calls from residents in Louisville and the surrounding area when they became stranded and he directed boats to rescue them. There was no radio station in our area so the Ken-Rad Tube and Lamp Corporation on 9th Street in Owensboro set up an emergency station to broadcast messages for the Red Cross.
Island has been described as “an island with no water in sight” but during the devastating flood of 1937 from our school on the hill we could see the overflow waters of Green River. We watched as the Coast Guard operated barges in that water, carrying necessary items to those in need. Trucks from coal mines could be seen putting coal on the barges for delivery to Livermore, Calhoun and other places where it was needed. Island, an eight square mile tract of land, became an “island” when the water from Green River, the Thoroughfare, Black Lake and Cypress Creek cut off roads to adjoining towns and cities. A levy had been built on the lowland just south of Island. Engineers thought that water would never cover it but water spilled over and almost washed out the road. Several areas of railroad track, both north and south of Island were washed away.
All ferries, trains, buses, mail and other deliveries and telegraph service stopped. Only emergency needs were addressed.
The river crested on January 29th and receded into its banks by February 10th. February was one of the warmest on record. Fruit bearing trees, flowers and shrubbery blossomed. Trees and rose bushes turned green a month early. Some plowed and planted gardens. Then rains came again, accompanied by wind so severe it downed telephone poles. Fortunately it did not affect the falling of the river.
In March winter returned with vengeance. The extreme cold damaged many plants and destroyed most of the fruit crops. Heavy rains came again in March and the first of April the river passed flood stage but no one had to move.
Since 1937 new dams along the Ohio and Green rivers had aided in the control of flooding and the US Army Corps of Engineers has built seventy-seven lakes to hold back the water on the tributaries of the Ohio. Water can be held in those lakes and released into the Ohio, instead of rushing there immediately as it did in the “big one of ’37.”