Johnstown weekly Democrat. (Johnstown, Cambria County, Pa.) 1889-1916, 1890-03-07
JOHNSTOWN TO-DAY.
THE FLOODED CITYS PROGRESS SINCE
THE GREAT CALAMITY.

The special staff correspondence of The
Press, New York, Sunday has IA full
page illustrated article on "Johnstown
Today" contaIng picture of Johnstown
before the flood Johnstown, after the
flood. the Cambria Iron Works and p. r.
r. stone bridge, and portraits of Mayor
elect w, Horace Rose, General Manager
John Fulton, of the Cambria Iron Works,
Rev. DIR. Beale, Rev. Father Tahaney,
and L. D. Woodruff. We take the fol-
loving from the article:
The morning, as we reached Altoona,
was crisp and bright, with just enough
frost in the air to make one enjoy the
ride over the western foot hills of the AL
leghanies. Coming toward South Forks
everybody in the car seemed instinctively
to recur to Johnstown aud seek window
from which to view the scenes of the de-
struction that were beginning to unfold
themselves. Up to the north, nesting in
the mountains, only just out of sight, lay
the dam that wrought such a ruin and out
avalanche that, while it lasted, outdid the
great Niagara in volume and velocity.
Skinned over with frost, as | saw it
afterward, it seemed more like great
meadow over which silver gauze had
been spread than anything else. A small
stream ran through the center, but moth
ing save the memories of the flood of
1889 suggested that with it Was connected
the most ghastly tragedy of the past de-
cade of centuries.
1t lay their a peaceful ruin. Not so,
however, was the country through which
it carried death and desolation. For ff-
teen miles down that beautiful valley it
had swept onward in wild carnival of
destruction. Great trees, robust and ma
ture with the growth of ages, powders
and hillsides that had been landmarks,
homes that had harbored a people pro-
verbally hospitable, hard working, moral
and generous, men and women and chill
dren who had toiled until the valley
smiled with plenty and was the most
cheeful setting in the ring of hills that
bounded ii, all were its victims. The
story of Johnstown, of its dreadful chas.
tening, of the sorrows that came so sud
denly upon it is known by every one.
The suffering of its people made them
dear to every heart. They were the
wards of the world in the highest sense of
the term. There was 10 home in all the
land that from out of generosity did not
send them It's mite. There was no one so
poor whose aims did not go cheerfully
into the stricken valley. The charity eX-
tended was almost as broad as the ruin
that had been wrought If money could
have compensated for the loss of life or
sympathy heal the wounds of hearts that
were breaking with anguish then Johns
town would have been itself again.
But they could not.
THE JonNsTowN OF OLD GONE FOREVER,
To-day, after lapse of almost nine
months, only one conclusion can force it
self upon the impartial observer, and that
is that the JohustCwn of old has gone
survived the food are shrouded in a sor-
row tnat has. dcadened their ambitions
| that the old town with its once cherished
beauties holds for them too many memo
res of the dead to ever be the same again.
There are many of them living near the
place, but the cid borough Of Johustuwn
itself contains only a comparatively small
percentage of the survivors. They who
still remain near the scenes prefer to live
up in the adjoining homlets that fringe
| the base of the hills.
Johnstown mry be rebuilt but it will
not be by the survivors. If it is to be
Iesurrected stranger hands must do it and
another people alien to those who once
dwelt there live on the banks of the Con-
emaugh.
This, be it understood, is no reflection
on the unfortunate people. 1t does credit
rather to those finer feelings that make
life worth the living and that distinguished
the civilized from the savage. There are
thraldoms from which no human energy
can free the soul. 1t is not the loss of
fortune that clouds the lives in the valley.
If it were, Johnstown long ago would
have been even a better city than it was
before the food. The people are inuus
trious and honest. They are fusion of
the Welsh, the Celtic and the American
blood that never knows what il is to be
dsheartened. But they have been tried
as have no other people. One hours work
of a ranging river of death, sweeping with
it loved ones that were as dear to them as
life itself, has left them with a paralysis
that commands admiration, however much
its existence may be deplored. They would
have been less than human did they ever
forget the scenes of which they were the
victims.
In venturing the opinion that have, |
realize that in doing it may run counter
to the opinions of some of its best and
leading citizens, but it is the opinion ar
rived at only after survey of the sur.
vivors and their conditions I do not bu