Volume 18 , Issue 24

April 1935 - Great Dust Storm Told By Reporter

It was in the 15 April 1935, Monday, page 1, in The Independent Record, of Helena, Montana that we found this concerning the dust bowl: "Great Dust Storm Told By Reporter," Caught in it; cloud rises thousand feet; Car stalled amid heaps.

Found on Newspapers.com

By Robert Geiger, Boise City, Okla., April 14 (1935) -- (of all types of oil blowing the black duster provides the most awe-inspiring manifestation of the power of the prairie wind. It moves with express train speed and blots out the sun to darkness prevailed at mid-day. Such a storm was that which swept over part of southwest Kansas and the Panhandles Sunday. An Associated Press correspondent caught in the cloud tells of the experience.)

Boise City, Okla., April 14 (1935) - Old timers say it's the worst storm to hit this part of the country - dust-ridden though they've been in recent weeks.

The cloud caught us Staff Photographer Harry Eisenhland and I, on the highway about six miles north of town.
v We first notice it about nine miles out. Rain seemed to be coming. Then it resolved into a dust formation.

"What a swell picture, " Harry said, and stepped on the gas. But the duster was coming toward us fast. We stopped at a knoll, took several pictures, then turned the car around for flight. The great cloud rose a thousand feet into the air, blue grey. In front of it were six or seven whirling columns of dust, drifting up like cigar smoke.

We went down the road about 60 miles an hour to keep ahead of it. We had seen an old couple at a dilapidated farm house and stopped there to warn them, but they had already gone.

Speeding on, the car was suddenly engulfed by a flank movement of the cloud. Momentarily the road glimmered ahead like a ribbon of light tunnel, then the dust closed in. It became absolutely black as night. We slammed on the brakes and turned on the car lights. Exploring by touch, we found the car in a dust drift. Backing out and keeping a door open to watch the edge of the highway we took two hours to move the remaining six miles into Boise City.

En route we picked up Jack Atkins of Hunter, Colorado, his wife and three children from their stalled car.

"Without doubt," said Atkins, "this is the worst blow that ever hit this section."

Undoubtedly hundreds of cars were stalled throughout the area by the dust, seeming semi-solid in the darkness.

Lights can barely be seen across the street.

It took the storm just one hour 45 minutes to travel the 105 miles airline from Boise to Amarillo, Texas.

The funeral procession of Mrs. Loumiza Lucas, en route from Boise to Texoma, Oklahoma was caught eight miles out and forced to turn back. Mrs. Lucas was the mother of Fred Lucas, well known Texoma ranger, and E. W. Lucas of Boise City.

Half a dozen small boys and girls sought by police as missing were found to have been lost on the way from their home - they started when skies were clear - to a drug store.

The picture? There isn't a chance to get them out until the storm clears.

Stranded
Boise City, Okla, April 14 (1935) -- Intense dust storms in this vicinity today, the worst ever experienced in the region, generated static electricity in such quantities that automobile ignition systems failed to function.

Scores of autos were temporarily stranded on highways near here today as a result of the static. When the storm eased somewhat and the dust became less dense, the cars were started without great difficulty, drivers said.

When the storm was at its height, motorists reported receiving distinct electrical shocks when they touched door handles and other metal parts of their cars.

The experience of auto drives today substantiated the theory advanced recently by Fred Case, county agent of Baca county, Colorado, that static electricity generated by dos storms had helped kill what sprouts in his territory.

Case reported finding fields in which the tender wheat shoots were burned and shriveled. He said the static theory was the only plausible explanation for that condition.
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