Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1902-07-21
AWFUL LOSS BY FLOOD
Overlooking OF the Mississippi
Below Keokuk Causes Incal-
culable Damage.
Estimate of Losses Already
Reach Total of S6.OOO.OOO.
More Losses Expected.
Miles and Miles OF Territory
Covered by Rising Waters--
Crops Carried Away.

~
hope against absolute ruin, added to
losses already reaching $6,000.000.
| The flood situation is growing worse
| hourly. The greatest crop ever known
buried far beneath the spreading water.
hundreds of farmers homeless and pen
niless, and the loss in money constantly
growing, tell the tale of damage already
done
| ELABORATION of the flooded districts of
the river from keokuk south shows
conditions beyond the appreciation or
realization of any but people OF long
experience with the Father of Waters
| in its most destructive mood. There
| is absolutely not the slightest chance
e stopping this dozen times most costly
flood in the history of the great river
above st. Louis.
Careful estimates of the territory
covered and the statements of the best
informed people indicate the loss up to
today to be about S6.000.000, with every
pros pect of two or three millions being
added Most of this loss is on the Mis-
and Hannibal.
Passing the water Tapped lumber
wards of keokuk, the mouth of the Des
Moines river is seen to be nearly two
miles wide. Normally there are two
mouths, and an island delta covered
wish farms is now under raging tor
rents
Alexandria was protected to the last
by the Egyptian levee the breaking Of
which would send four feet of water
all over the town. Gregory is submerged
except the White church in which serN-
ice was held today, the congregation
from the country reaching the place by
the railroad track, which is still above
the flood in u waste of waters miles
wide. Other towns and cities on the
islands are beyond the danger line.
Immense fields are seen in a great
lake with the shore visible only with
a glass. Islands dotting the river at its
normal stays have disappeared. except
for the tops of trees or fringe high shore
willows slightly protuding like a cir
cular green coral reef. Occasionally &
house on piles or stills is seen. but
generally only roofs protrude to mark
edge OF the flooded river corn gradually
rises on n slope. tassels. tops, ears, and
stalks appearing in order.
In a few of the half-submerged fields
a few shocks of wheat are left. the
remnants of many more washed to the
Gulf of Mexico. In the middle of the
present river the tracks of the st. Louis,
Keokuk & Northwestern railroad, nor
mally the Missouri shore, are now few
inches above the water, and under it
in some stretches.
Shore lights for pilots are standing
in the midst of a waste of waters where
steamboats, can run over them. The
river is five to ten miles wide and
seventy miles long, and another great
lake is added to the geography.
All this territory was practically COW
cred with corn fortnight ago, esti-
mated to make seventy1ive to hun
dred bushels TO the acre.
Previous estimates of the loss have
been greatly increased by the pros
pective yield being found much greater
than ever before, experts telling of
many farms that We're good for one
hundred bushels TO the acre before the
flood. The loss is total.
Experience is that of water stays
fortyeght hour S even four inches
over the surface it kills corn, and every
stalk wet by waves perishes from rot
ting roots. Much of that back from
the channel looks to the casual observer
as if it would recover when the flood
subsidies, but a month will see it all
brown and scar.
Nh., hait r1,f ,f no IT,, 4
by an incident at La Grange. Tho
steamboat warehouse was we'll back
from the river bank. on Il high point
Astrong current and a gale caused the
pilot to make an imperfect landing,
and the cornice of thereof of the ware
house Was torn off by the guards of
the boat.
The river is rising six inches day
in the immense area of seven hundred:
square miles. 1t is feared the worst
is yet to come by the extension of the
Flooded area, should the water pass
levees it is now topping.
The chief flood thus far is on the
Missouri side. from keosuk to Lousi-
ana, With Canton and West Quincy as
centers of the country injured most
severely. On the Illinois side three
continuous levees for forty miles from
Warsaw to Quincy are above the water,
and are thus far safe. but farmers are
afraid of crevasses forming from musk
rat holes, and every rod of the redoubt |
is watched day and night.
The breaking of thes levees would |
flood 1l5 square miles in Illinois and
destroy $2,000,000 to s3,000,000 worth |
of corn. The levees below Quincy are
in thes anne situation except that they |
are lower and less tiriim.
Opposite Quincy, in Missouri, is an
other appalling devastation. North |
twelve miles to La Grange and south to
EIolton large prairies are under water
reaching from the Illinois bluffs to the |
bluffs, distance of at least
ten miles.
Levees hastily thrown around farms
have disappeared in n fierce current
rushing thru the draw of the Burling-
ton bridge, and carrying everything be-
fore it. Lone Tree prairie. ten miles
square, is deserted. The population
has gone to Quincy and the bluffs on
the Missouri side.
labius river fifteen miles above Han
nibal is high and furnishes route
for the mississippi to flank the levee as
the Fox river does forty miles up the
Mississippi.