Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1894-05-24
AN OREGON cLoup-suRsT.
AEor that Section, . Nero Incident, Hardly
Worth MentIonin~

AEor that Section, . Nero Incident Hardly
Worth Mentioning.
When you talk of rain" said Mai
wharton, who built most of the snow
sheds on the Union Pacific road. and
who runs haIf-a-dozen saw.mills on
the Falls river in Oregon-.'when YOU
talk OF rain In the east you simply
never saw anything more than a
sprinkle. I've been out all day in
what you probably call a down-pour
out II a drop or two hadn't hit nv sore
ear l shouldn't have known it was
raining"
what's your idea of a rain-storm,
MAORI? asked the interviewer as the
Two got seated after the usual pre-
1iminary.
why, water, of course." he an
severed. This drizzle can't be called
real water, you know. It's just fog
and smoke and evaporation from mud
Puooles which went up to come down
again. Say, young man, you ought to
nave been out to mill No. one night
last August and witnessed what we
call genuine rain-stormi 1t wasn't
the biggest and latest ever saw, but
NJ would have given you 4 pretty fair
IDEA OF what we can do out there on
short notice"
"Was it a cloud burst?''
Some folks call 'em by that name,
put it's defamation of character A
cloud burst is simply an effort on the
part OF the weather to get about half
q million barrels of rain-water together
In some particular locality and then
knock In all the heads of the barrels
at once. The object is to clear
the drift-wood off the banks of the
streams and discourage the umbrella
trade. As side issue cloud-burst
usually browns about half a tribe of
Indians and starts the tops of three or
four mountains to sliding down-hill to
fill up some valley"
About this particular rain-storm,
major?"
"Oh, yes! Well. about three o'clock
one afternoon the barrels began to
gather over the Cascade range, to the
west of u.s. They snuggled together
between two peaks. and judged there
was water enough up there to wet
down half the west. Falls river had
just three feet of water in it that after
noon. and the ground for fifteen miles
to the west was valley-land on
which lot of cattle and horses
were grazing. 1 had four build
ings besides the sawmill, and in
the river and around the mill were five
thousand sawlogs- When / saw that
1t was going to rain-that we were in
for genuine rain storm-I called all
hands and we made for a hill half
mile away"
''And the rain descended, did it?'
queried the interviewer as the major
seemed to have stopped short.
1.-THE rain! Oh! certainly. Yes. sir,
the rain descended in due time. When
everything was all ready the heads of
the barrels were busted in and down
poured the water. A food seven feet
deep and two miles long came swishing
across the valley and poured into
Falls river. In about three jerks of
deer's tail the mill, buildings and logs
went on a voyage, and haven't seen
splinter of 'em since. The flood brought
along about one hundred head of
horses and cattle, and the bones of
some of them are in the tree tops
around there to-day"
''And what did you do?''
''Began getting out timber for new
mill next morning, of course. We
don't let a little cloud-burst knock the
sand out of us in Oregon, you know.
Had new mill humning away inside
of thirty days. Don't write it up in
SEN ational way, or our people will
give me the laugh. 1t was simply one
of our summer showers. A reporter
from Portland happened to be down
that way and how much space do you
suppose he gave it? Just five lines!
hundred Thousand tons of mountain
slid into the valley, a dozen people
were drowned, and every thing on the
river swept clear for a distance of
thirty miles, but five lines covered it
all. Sorry that I can't make a big
thing for you. but see me again see
me next winter-and I'll tell you about
some of our snowdrifts which have
been bored 4 distance of four hundred
and twenty feet without striking bot.
tom.-Detroit Free Press.