NINETEENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK— PART X 539 



Mr. Albert Smith, five miles southwest of New Hampton: Struck on the 

 head by a block from the chimney when the house was demolished. Wife 

 and child with him escaped with bruises. 



Theo. Krueger, Jr., one mile south of Xew Hampton: Killed by fallinj? 

 barn in which he had just placed horses. He and his father were bringing 

 school children home in a wagon. When they saw the storm approaching 

 they drove into a farmyard and sent the children into the cellar under the 

 house. They then drove the team into the barn. The father remained out- 

 side; when the storm struck him he clung to an apple tree and escaped 

 with bruises. 



Mr. and Mrs. Peter Anderson, Calmar: Killed when their house fell to 

 pieces and the wreckage of other buildings was piled on its ruins. 



That more lives were not lost is partly because the storm did not cross 

 the crowded parts of the few towns that it touched; and partly because 

 its slow forward movement gave people time to seek cellars and other 

 relatively safe places after they saw it approaching. Some such reported 

 instances in illustration, follow: 



Miss Vera Deisler, teacher at the Pearl Rock school, formed her pui)ils in 

 a chain of clasped hands and led them to a hedge to which they all clung 

 AX'ith the strength of desperation until the storm passed. The school build- 

 ing was scattered far and wide. 



At one schoolhouse, totally wrecked, it is claimed that the change in 

 time, daylight saving, probably saved many little children from death or 

 injury. School had been dismissed for the day long enough for the children 

 to have reached their homes. Under normal time they would have been in 

 the building. 



At another schoolhouse they were having a picnic in celebration of the 

 end of the term. It was filled with women and children. When the storm 

 was seen approaching they fled to a nearby farmhouse cellar. The house 

 over the cellar was completely blown away, but not one of the thirty occu- 

 pants of the cellar was injured. 



East of Nashua there is a group of Piersons, father and sons, on adjoin- 

 ing farms. All took to cellars, and while some of the houses went away 

 no one was hurt. Mr. E. D. Pierson, his wife and five children went into 

 the cellar. Before they realized that their house had been hit they were 

 looking up into the VQry heart of the tornado, which was trying to lift them 

 out of their refuge. By clinging to each other and to the wall of the cellar 

 they managed to stay on the floor till the storm passed. 



Some children alone at their home remained in the yard until they saw a 

 neighboring place going, then took to their cellar. The house and outbuild- 

 ings were wrecked, but when the parents returned they found the children 

 safe. 



But the cellar under a building is not always a safe refuge. In the 

 above accounts, it is related that one man was killed and others injured by 

 falling debris while in such a cellar. Some of the reported instances 

 where the cellar was unsafe were: 



Mr. Cecil Gray, near New Hampton, woulcj not risk the cellar because it 

 was shallow. He, his wife and child clung to some lilac bushes and escaped. 

 The house tumbled into the cellar and the wreckage caught fire. 



Mrs. McGrath, near Nashua, led her children into a plowed field where 

 all lay in' furrows with safety. Had they gone into their cellar they would 

 probably have been killed, as the house collapsed and fell into the cellar. 



Mr. Strawson, near Nashua, had a new modernly constructed home, one 

 of the best farm buildings in this section of rich farms. Before going into 

 the basement he took the precaution to throw water on the furnace fire to 

 guard against that possible danger, thinking the basement otherwise safe. 

 When the storm began tearing tine house to pieces he and his family huddled 



