Dodge City times. [volume] (Dodge City, Kan.) 1876-1892, 1882-07-13
Tornado Freaks at Griunell, Iowa.

developed some wonderful freak.
which are thus related in the I0ird Stat,
Register:
The drove of thirty cattle belonging
to MIR. A. A. Foster, west of Grinnell
that were killed were lifted out of TIE
barn-yard. carried sixty rods, and were
seen by some of the family in the flash
of fire at height of three or four hun
drcd feet They were dumped down
in gully, in pile. and all close to
gether. and looked as though they were
dead before they touched the earth.
1t is asserted by many reputable peo-
pie that in the center of the awful cir
Gle or loop that the tornado made al
Grinnell objects were carried thou
sand feet high, and one small house
was taken up bodily some four or five
hundred feet. and then dropped in q
lump some two hundred feet from it.
original site.
Many people state that they saw the
balls of fire or electricity during the
tornado's time, and report them to
have been of sizes varying from one
foot to five in diameter, and exploding
with a strong smell of sulphur, or more
like smell of hot copper. Others re-
port dense and sitting odor more of
fensiye than sulphur. and as foul, al
most, as that of putrid flesh.
The rain fall was phenomenal. as all
report. At the college it was heaviest
of all. The earth there still bears evil
dence of this.
One gentleman says that he saw
Deacon Ford, during livid and pro-
tracted flash of light. up in the air al
least five hundred feet high.
The storm of mud was phenomenal
The pouring water made soft mud OF
the earth, and the wind took this up and
filled the air with it in places and plas-
tered it over everything.
Everything tends TO confirm the theory
that the tornado is of electrical origin,
and that it is the marvellous power OF
electricity alone that can apply itself to
such small surface and work such havoc.
Against its resistless force, house OF
stone walls ten feet thick, or walls ten
feet of wrought iron. would stand no
more than house of frame. Its power
is the impossible made possible. No
Aoitt tiiit 10 hIoh COtilu nave inc pow Ct
in small compass that this has but elee-
tricity.
We saw to-day several large lumber
wagons that were dashed to pieces. all
the spokes broken out OF the wheels. a
hub split open. and the tires broken and
flattened out as straight as though they
had been Strengthened on an anvil.
j. NJ. Wishart's horse stood in the
barn. This was stallion weighing l.
600 pounds. The barn was broken up
and carried OFF in one direction. while
the horse and part OF his manger to
which he was battered were carried off
in another direction from the barn. The
two lines of travel may be described as
on sexangular sides eastward. The
horse was found thousand feet from
the stable. and unhurt.
George Toney's house, at the north
west corner of a square northeast from
the depot, was lifted BY the air current
and deposited on the southwest corner
OF the square east, while the house at
the northwest corner of the square in
which had stood Toney's house, was
carried to the northeast corner OF the
square east. This will be understood
by using the letter X as an illustration,
AID supposing that the two houses
originally stood each at the foot of q
st n of the letter. and met in the center
to be deposited at the top of its own
sten;.
Tie freakish work of the unloosed
devil Of the upper air was well shown
in one street. On one side dwelling
house was torn to fragments and left
mass of splintered ruin. while the op-
posite house was unframed below the
corniee but was entirely stripped of its
shingles.