The story of Johnstown : its early settlement, rise ... - JohnstownCafe

I20 THE S n 'A' ] ' ( '/-^ /I '/A\>" /v / f s.
sdurt available would admit. Whole families were saved— a vagary of
the flood ; whole
families w.re l,,st-the moekeiv of fate. The survivors,
stunned l.v the wei-ht of the calamity, were mo\ in- they kne^v not whither.
Over and under the wreck some clambered and crawled, peerm- into the
smallest openin- or prvm.u up b..ards or sticks, all the uliile dreading what
mi-ht be revealed. Others trod miles of ruins to discover that bare earth, or
fragments of buildin-s which had traveled far. occupied the sites of their stores
antldwellin-s. Merchants wandered aimlessly, tramps with the r.'st. Heedless
of the direful conseipiences, not regarding the sorrow and sullering that must
ensue, respecting neither a-e nor sex nor condition, intent only to pour forth
their vials of hateful resentment, the waters had shunned no nook or cranny
or crevice in their blind excesses.
Let the reader accompanv me on my Saturday exploration through and
around Johnstown. Where is the heart of the town Cast your eye westward
and southward from Green Hill, on the turnpike leading to South Fork.
over the wastes f^ve to twentx h et under dirt\- water an.i the burnim; volcano
at the railroad bridge, and you have the answer. .\ strip of tlnckl>- populated
territorv. two miles long bv three to seven sipiares wide, with six dismantled
buildin-s remainins. gives a faint idea of the havoc from the upper end of
Woodvale to the blistered stone arches. Add to this two hundred houses m
Cambria and a great gap alon- Stony Creek from end to end of Kernville,
making a total of at least two thousand buildings, to complete the fearful
survey .-\ bruised and battered grocerv— a railroad station minus a corner
and the tracks about it gone— the Cambria Inm Company's store, one-third
of it beaten down and the offices safe under its guardian wing— the brick
school-house on Iron street, into which hundreds crept or were dra-^ed trom
the drift, and other hundreds are to be prepared for burial— are the remnants
of the busiest sections of Conemaugh Borough. Johnstown and MiUville.
None of them can be approached for hours. b>o"ls of water soak and suim
whatever ventures to fathom their depths. Millville has followed Woodvale
and Mineral Point, the school-buikling alone staying to see what the harvest
will be. We cannot cross Coneinau-h Creek, but the (iautier mills are missin-,
and it is evident that the iron-works and Cambria Borough have been
struck hard blows. Railroad trains are not runnini;. Frei^^ht cars are m the
litter of the streets or the wreckage above the bridge. .\ locomotive, which
rode the wave like a cork from East Conemaugh. is lod-ed near the company's
store— the store upon whose roof or throu-h whose windows scores of people
leaped and were saved. Xo tracks are within sight, steair. whistles are
hushed, and the cheerv hum of machinery is not heard. E.xceptmg the farmers
back of the hill that' borders Concmau-h Borough, Jolmst.nvn can receive
no visitors until some way is provided to cross the creeks or >et the car-wheels
in motion. Until then an .Mpme tourist on a -lacier is as approachable.