The Great Fergus Falls Cyclone

The Great Fergus Falls Cyclone. . The heat was oppressive during the week of June 16, 1919. People opened their windows hoping to get some air while many slept on their porches instead of sweltering inside. Sunday, June 22, dawned as sticky and hot as the previous day., By late afternoon a continuous thunder sounded like "many steel drums rolling across the floor of a distant palace." After an hour the thunder turned into an angry growling and it began to rain with drops "as big as dollars." Suddenly a giant funnel cloud appeared near Vine Street and Summit Avenue. As the funnel moved north and east it ripped apart everything in its path., Lake Alice was one of the hardest hit areas of town. Dozens of homes were flattened, leaving the lake so filled with debris it looked as though a person could walk across it. The cyclone destroyed or damaged nearly two-thirds of Fergus Falls, leaving over fifty people dead with hundreds injured., Moments after the tornado W. T. Oxley took hundreds of photographs of the damage. Some were published across the nation and helped raise money for relief efforts., Visit the monument on the north end of Lake Alice that lists the names of the people who lost their lives in the cyclone or died as a result of their injuries., Captions: , Grand Hotel before the cyclone. , National Guard searching the ruins of the Grand Hotel for survivors. , Debris floating on the surface of Lake Alice. , Red River Milling Co. before the cyclone. , The Red River Milling Company survived the cyclone. , Walter T. Oxley and his Cirkut camera. , Walter T. Oxley