Tornado

On the afternoon of April 21, 1967, an F4 tornado swept through Lake Zurich, Illinois, passing close to our house and destroying my school. It was one of three separate tornadoes in a 20-mile radius, leaving a 9-mile path of destruction. The outbreak included 19 tornadoes in Illinois alone.

Here is a NOAA report of that afternoon.  Following a bunch of weather maps, a little past halfway down is a section describing the "Three Big Tornadoes", and Lake Zurich is the second one.  There's a map of the tornado's path, and a link to an even MORE detailed description. 


The LZ house - tornado spotted through window on right House location and tornado's path




Here are bits and pieces of what I remember:

Around dinner time, Mindy was looking out the front window, and hollered something about a "big fire" outside. Dad and I both ran up to look, and what we saw wasn't the billowing smoke of a fire, but a huge tornado a block or two away . I can't remember if I actually made sense of what I was seeing, but Dad did. He called for Mom to come down NOW, and we all went to the lower floor. Greg and I got into the crawl space, but Mom and Dad didn't, so we got back out. They each laid on top of one of the girls, and Greg and I "ducked and covered" the best we could. We couldn't hear anything because the girls were screaming with panic (not that we weren't a bit concerned ourselves).

Dad and Greg and I went out in the car soon afterward, to offer candles to power-less people (he was active in local politics and entertained a lot). It began to rain - the heaviest rain I'd ever seen, and the windshield was basically opaque. It was so loud in the car that we had to yell to hear each other. I remember someone yelling, "They're touching down all over!" The damage path ran right through the Zurich Manor development, through the school, and off to the northeast. Fifty homes were destroyed, and another 150 damaged.

One split-level house had its upper roof totally gone. In one of the exposed bedrooms, the sheets had been sucked off the bed, but perfume bottles were still upright on the dresser. The lady was in the kitchen, on the phone, when we knocked (no cell back then - the wires were still up). Her horse, Toby, was last seen running (flying?) down the road, but I think they found him a few days later.

Somewhere else there was a horse that always ran free because it would never cross the road, and it somehow ended up across the road and wouldn't go back. I guess they had to put it in a trailer for the 20-foot ride.

At least one house had curtains hanging out from under the eaves. The roof had been lifted enough to pull the curtains out, still on their rods, then dropped again.

Bricks from Seth Paine Elementary School (where I was in 6th grade) were found in Acorn Acres, a development a half mile or so away. The gym was totally open, with no roof and one or two complete walls missing, and the clock was stopped at 5:05. There were two huge rectangular sections of floor missing, diagonally opposite each other. But the intact center section was wide enough to ride our bikes across, above the "abyss" of the basement. Boy, we were invincible back then...

Over the next few days, they had established a Martial Law control and required residents to get permits to get back into the area. For one reason or other, we couldn't get one the first night, so Greg and I suggested the "Boy Scout Trail" (as we called it - it ran directly to town from next to our house). We drove in as far as we could from the Lake Zurich end, then walked the rest of the way. We had no power, but at least we didn't have to find a motel or stay wherever they'd set up. We got our permit after that, and had access to the neighborhood.

Several houses had messages spray painted on their fronts: "Thank God no one hurt", and "Milkman - no milk today"

As for continuing school, I remember having to share a locker (and a desk) with kids I didn't know in the Junior High. I think they put up temporary trailers eventually, but I don't remember them.



Here is the letter Dad sent to Grandma and Grandpa (his parents) a few days afterwards:

Monday - April 24, 1967

Dear Folks:

Much of the news of the tornado we have already given to you by phone but I'll start at the beginning and tell you some of the events as they happened.

I got home from a trip into Chicago about two Friday afternoon and began working on office paperwork and correspondence.   The radio had reported earlier in the day that there was a tornado watch in effect from two to eight PM that day so I kept one ear tuned to the TV in the family room as I worked.   Also, it looked like it could start raining hard any minute so planned to pick up the children at school when they got out if it was raining.  At 2:30, though, it was bright and shining, so I didn't make the trip to school.

About 4:30, Greg was watching TV in the family room and I was working here in my office when we both heard the announcement that residents of Lake County should be on the alert for a tornado for the next thirty minutes as one had been sighted in Woodstock, Illinois.  Since we live right on the Lake - Cook County line, I wasn't too concerned (since they didn't mention Cook County also) but Greg came in and asked where Woodstock is so we got out the map and looked.  Since it is east and slightly north of here and tornadoes usually go northeast, we weren't concerned.  About five o'clock, though, I was in the kitchen when Melinda yelled excitedly that there was a big fire outside.  She was looking out the front room window so I rushed in to see.  My first reaction, too, was that there was a fire for I saw a huge towering column of what appeared to be smoke about a block or two away but then I realized that I didn't see any fire and then noticed that it wasn't smoke at all.  At that close range, you could see the swirling action and see the debris being swirled around above the trees and houses.  I didn't pause long enough to see what direction it was heading but yelled at Dit who was upstairs under the hair dryer and together we rushed the children down to the family room.  The boys climbed into the crawl space; Dit layed on the floor on top of Melinda and I layed on top of Melissa.  The wind blew pretty hard for two or three minutes and then everything became still so we got up and began trying to quiet the girls who were pretty panicky.

I went outside and quickly saw that there apparently was no damage and then walked across the street to our neighbors who had come outside.  A few minutes later one of our other neighbors reported that he had heard that the school was gone.  It's about 1 1/2 blocks (as the crow flies) from here.  Since I could see no damage in our neighborhood, I practically dismissed his comments in my mind as just a good example of how rumors get started.  A few minutes later, though, the boys and I got in the car and drove down that way to have a look and it was true!  The area looked like I'd imagine a village would look after an effective bombing attack and the people were just beginning to come out on the street.  It was raining very hard by this time and, I guess, the other side of the "eye" of the storm came along and the three of us in the car were darn scared.  For a minute or two I thought the second tornado was on top of us and even the boys came near to crying.  As soon as we could, we got back to the house for I imagined the girls would be wondering what had happened to us.

In a few minutes the weather calmed down and all of us got into the car; took a quick look at their school and the houses nearby; drove over to Acorn Acres so see how our friends there fared since the path of the tornado was in that direction; couldn't get into the area there for the police already had that blocked off; and then drove up to the high school where we had heard we could sign up to house victims of the storm.  Although it had only been about thirty minutes after the tornado when we arrived at the high school, already there were a half dozen or more Catholic nuns there getting things in order to handle the emergency.  We signed up to take in two families and were the second ones on the list.  On the way home we decided to stop at the grocery store and get extra groceries to feed the people who would be staying with us.  By the time we finished that and headed towards home, we suddenly found that the entire area had been sealed off by the police and state troopers and we couldn't get back home without a pass.  As of yet they hadn't set up the procedure to issue the passes so we were in a fix.  We tried the back road into the area but it was blocked too so finally went back into town and drove as far down the path from our house to town as the car would go, parked the car in the woods, and the six of us hiked down the path through the woods to our house - carrying the groceries and trying our best to stay out of the mud.

When we got home, for the first time we realized that we had no electricity and water and, with no electricity, the furnace blower wouldn't work so we had no heat.  Since we cook with electricity, we had no way to cook so we realized that we were in no position to take in storm victims.  We had plenty of candles and two kerosene lamps so we spent the evening sitting around playing games and Dit read to the children.  With the house getting colder and nothing to do, we all went to bed early Friday night.  The cold front moving in that spawned the tornado took the temperature down to about 26 degrees Friday night but our house wasn't too bad by morning.

Saturday morning we went into town for breakfast; waited in line quite some time for a pass to get back into our area; drove over to the Lotz' house for coffee; ate lunch in Barrington; came back home and sat around a while; and then decided we had better get a motel room for the night.  We had been invited by several of our friends to stay with them but decided it would be easier on them and us both if we just went to a motel.  We found a nice two-room apartment in a nearby motel and checked in about 4:30 Saturday afternoon.  After watching TV for awhile and cleaning up, we went out for dinner and then back to the motel for the evening.

Since our pass was good for only the one day and the line to get it was long, I got up at six Sunday morning and went to the high school and got a new pass for the day.  I drove out to our house and found it OK except none of the utilities were on yet.  That was 6:40 AM so went back to the motel.  We ate breakfast in the room, read the papers, and just loafed around until about ten.  We had been invited to the Lotz' for noon dinner so checked out of the motel at ten to come back by home before going to the Lotz'.  We were quite thrilled to see our outside porch light on when we drove up and came into the house to find it warm, the electricity on and the water running!  In fact, we later figured out from the clock that had stopped at 5:05 Friday afternoon that the electricity came back on five to ten minutes after I was here at 6:40 that morning.  Boy did it feel nice to have heat, lights and water again!

Saturday afternoon they flew over the area announcing by loudspeaker that a curfew would be in effect each night from 7 PM to 6 AM and no one (including residents) could enter or leave the area or be on the streets during that period.  Today (Monday), they issued permanent passes so we don't have to get one each day and the curfew is expected to remain in effect for a few more days.

Needles to say, we are extremely thankful for not having suffered any damage or harm to the family.  Today's newspaper comments on the tornado at Lake Zurich and makes the statement that nearly all of the children in the school would have been killed had it come two hours earlier.  That probably is an exaggeration but certainly few would have escaped uninjured and many would have been killed.  We are very very lucky!  This is the first actual tornado that I've ever seen and I hope it will be my last!  Quite a frightening sight when it is that close and you can only figure that it is heading your way.  When they are that close, there's no time to stop and figure which way it's going!

Now that it has happened and the terrible results cannot be prevented, I can say that it has been an interesting (not enjoyable) and educational experience.  It has been our first experience at living under something like martial law and that is an experience in itself.  It certainly makes you better understand and appreciate freedom!  It's a strange experience to have to line up, show identification, and give the authorities facts on your car and family in order to get a pas to go to your own home and have to stop two or three places along the way to show your pass to police officers.  One thing, though, must be said.  The troopers and local policement without exception are always very polite, friendly, and helpful.  It was our first experience without our utilities, too, which you take for granted until you don't have them.  Then, too, it makes you stop and think when you drive or walk just two blocks from your house and find people like you who no longer have a house or anything!

It has been a lesson in human behavior, too.  It's strange how people react to disaster.  Almost without exception, regardless of the relative amount of disaster that has struck them personally, they express their thankfulness for being saved from even greater disaster.  Our first reaction was thankfulness for our home being saved while those whose homes were completely destroyed were thankful that none of their family was killed!  Today we drove past a home a couple of blocks from here which only had a few inside partition walls remaining and the front side of the house left and painted on the front of the house was this: "Milkman: Don't leave any milk today."

Strange little things happen too.  Chris' school lunch ticket was in his teacher's desk where they are kept each day after they punch out the day's meal on the ticket.  One of his friends, while rummaging around the ruins of the school yesterday, found Chris' lunch ticket in the debris!

The number of utility trucks, emergency vehicles, construction equipment, etc. that moved into the area in the hours following the tornado is amazing.  Saturday and Sunday was spent entirely with utility crews working in the area and allowing home owners to search their debris and today the first clean-up operation began.  Greg went down there this afternoon to help and reports that there are trucks and clean-up crews everywhere you look.

This afternoon they delivered a notice on schools.  Greg's school will continue as normally.  The children who went to the destroyed school will now be transported by school bus at 12:30 each day to the other grade school up town (part of Greg's school) and will attend classes there from 1:30 PM to 4:30 PM each day and will get home by school bus about five PM.  The grade school students who normally attend the undamaged grade school will go from 8:30 to 12:00.  By eliminating gym, etc. (I guess), they plan to get the required schooling in and still dismiss school as scheduled on June 2nd.

Oh yes, as if the victims didn't already have enough problems with the tornado, rain and dropping temperatures, it began snowing yesterday afternoon and we got 3.1 inches of snow!  It's all nearly gone today as temperatures are up into the low 40's but the new snow allowed Chicago to set another record - the most snow in one winter in Chicago's history!  The six months that we've lived here have been eventful ones - the most snow - the biggest blizzard - the worst natural disaster (the tornado) - in Chicago's history!

Well, in summary, we are all well - the children go back to school tomorrow - and we are very thankful.

Bill