The Lake Charles echo. [volume] (Lake Charles, Parish of Calcasieu, La.) 1876-1898, 1886-09-11
THE EARTHQUAKE.

NeHs received from C1arlestOn, Is
! 81 during the past week Is, uufortun
ately, but TOO true as TO the destruction
Of life and property by the repeate,
shocks Of earthquakes that have Wis
tied that section. For the first tim,
in the history Of this portion of tht
continent an earthquake has caused
calamity recalling by its destructive
meas and its terrors the doom of the
crumbled cities of the Old World AMI
South America. Heretofore earth
quake disturbances in the United
States have been little more than eartl
tremors. But the Charleston earth
quake which marked the close Of the
summer Of 1886 will be long remem,
bered for the extent and duration Of
the disturbance, and for the appalling
features of the devastation which il
has wrought in the unfortunate city
of Charleston, millions worth of prop.
erty and many human lives being de.
stroyed.
Hundreds of people are homeless in
the once beautiful city of the old
Palmetto State and must remain so
until the damages occasioned by the
shocks can be repaired. Happily such
calamities as earthquakes along the
Southern coast are of rare occurrence,
and this warrants the hope that it will
be many years-perhaps a century or
two-before there will be a recur-
renee of this ever to be remembered
disaster.
Quite q scare, however, still exists
about prospective tidal wave on the
Atlantic coast; while in Charleston,
where the feeling is naturally still of
panicky character, they are looking
forward with dread to the equinox and
the storm, which is popularity sup
posed to come with it, and declaring
all the conditions to indicate that it
will be one of great force and violence.
Charleston has reason to feel anxious
on this point. Her last years equi-
noctial was of terrific violence and
caused the loss of several millions of
dollars of property; and in the pres
emit shattered condition of buildings
in Charleston it would take but little
wind TO bring them down.
"Such disturbances" says Prof
Proctor, speaking of earthquakes, as
sures US that as yet the earth is not
near death. She is still full of vitality.
Thousands-nay, tens, hundreds of
thousands, of years will still pass be-
fore even the beginning OF the end is
seen in the steady dlsintegration and
removal Of the land without renoya-
ton or renewal by the action Of sub
terranean forces"
The following are some of the freaks
Of the earthquake at Charleston, as
given by special to the s7Denso-
crat day or two after:
Pedestrians in their walks through
the city discovered many new and in
teresting freaks of the earthquake.
Some of them were found at Major |
J. II. Robinson's residence--a well |
known citizen. The building was
badly wrecked in some places, while
in others it seemed to have escaped |
injury.
In one bedroom of the house the
strangest freaks imaginable took place.
On one side of the chamber oil paint
ings were thrown from the wall with
such force as to destroy the canvass
and crush the frames, while on the
mantel-piecc a few feet away in the
same room stood a slender tall vase
which retained its place. On another
wall in the room two or three small
photographs in frames were left undis-
turbed, while within three feet of them
the plastering was as it were wrenched
off and ground into dust and the
scantlIng on which the lathlng was
nailed was torn out Of its place. A
lounge was darted across the room
and broken to pieces, while chairs a
few feet away were not even over
turned.
In some places gate post on one
side of an entrance was twisted off,
while the other post, three or four
feet away, was neither loosened nor
cracked.
The old magazine in Cumberland
street, a building constructed of brick,
stone and concrete in the eighteenth
century, which stood as a monument
imopg the landmarks of the city, hay
ng weathered three wars and the
many earthquakes and cyclones of the
country in its time, and which carried
n its wall a shell from a British gun
ired during the Revolution, building
which the oldest inhabitant thought
ould not be destroyed by an earth
make which did not engulf the city,