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

g8
THE S TOR y OF JOffXSTOWX.
the Egyptian darkness in Pharaoli's roign. Several boroughs were cut off
from comnumication \\\i\\ each otht-r and tlie world outsitlL'. A message from
tlie Central Telephone office at 3:15 staled that the South Fork reser\'oir was
flowin;,' o\ er the dam, which might gise way. The dam liad broken by that
time, bjit the citizens of Johnstown knew nothing of it imtil the llood was at
their doors to absorb tlu.-ir liabitations and thenibelves.
The eventful minutes \\'ore on. full of fatiguing toil for the few, of increasing
distress for the man\'. and Lif ajiprehensne excitement for all. From windows
and roofs were shouted rumors of rescuers and ad\ enturcrs meeting with hazardous
mishaps. The telephone wires grew h(.)t with the impatient jangle of
ceaseless inquiries from worried (luestioners up to their knees or waists in
water. Dumb were the telegraph instruments, the operators having to seek
an upper room. Then a roar and a crash— a sudden note of alarm— dj'ing
groans and falling buildings—and the waters of Lake Coneniaugh had penetrated
johnstov.n, unherahled and unannounced. Pestilence may be checked
and a conflagration subdued, but this bold enemy was not to be repulsed. The
inhabitants of Herculaneum and Pompeii, when the showers of burning la\a
descended, had a chance to run. Not so the denizens of the Cambrian towns
in 18S9. Fastened in their liouses, rats in a trap were not nuire defenceless.
Crick structures melted at the destroying touch and fr.inies tumbled to atoms
with the celerit\' of lightning. On sped the wreck from Conemaugh Borough
and further up the pathway of an invader rapacious as the barbarian
hordes of fierce Attila. liouses at one end of Johnstown nodded to houses
in the other, meeting in an embrace that meant irretrie\able ruin. The main
body of the great wave wiped out tlie district from tin' Conemaugh back three
solid squares. Thousands of fellow-l)eings, drawn int'.i the lashing current before
they realized what hat! ha]ipened, battled for life against terrific odds.
Scores were mangled b}' the timbers tliey seized desperatel}'. Hundreds
slipped out of sight as the tloors or roofs that tloateii them split asunder,
crunchetl l)y the palpitating mass.
Traces convulsed with anguish were visible
an instant and then vanished beneath the resentful \\-aters.
Eyes upturned to
lieaveii in speechless terror as the\' looked their last on the clouded firmament.
Husbands and wives, parents an