Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1907-06-13

hundred dollars will not pay for the
damage to the vehicles. large NUM-
Der Of chickens were killed and carried
away.
Shade Trees and Orchard.
AS IN the case of the Brown disaster
the main loss at the Kitterman farm
Is to the trees. The farm was noted
throughout the county for the beauty
OF Its shade trees. Hedges, willows
eFersreens and NAPLES are all laid low
many Of them over fifty years old.
Two evergreens stood at the front
ct the dwelling. fir and spruce
The fir tree was thrown westward and
tne spruce tree, scarcely fifteen feet
away, was blown east clear into the
read In the orchard, the same symp-
toms OF the gyrating movement Of the
STORM exist-trees standing side by
SIDE were hurled in opposite directions.
some carried clear to the northeast OF
the place and some southwest.
me total. wreck Of the orchard r.
s some nL' awful. MANY of the trees
were thirty years old and some were
hfteen and eighteen inches in diane
ter. It will take a lifetime to repair
the damage of a few seconds. 1t rests
with another generation to replace the
beauties Of a farm on which the care
and devotion of one generation have
been expended. No cash value can be
placed upon destruction of this ma
ture.
Haystacks Demolished.
After leaving the Kitternan place the
storm did but comparatively little dam
age until 1T struck the Rocker farm,
1lve miles away. Here barn root
was torn away. Two hay stacks on
the Pickens farm in the path of the
tornado were torn down and scattered
over. the fields. In the Pickens home
q window In the northeast corner Of
the ground floor was broken out. A
piano stood in this room near the win
dow and was stripped of every orna-
ment. A vase was found in the field.
many rods from the house, which had
apparently been blown out through thu
broken window
Scarcely a fence remains on the
Kiterman place and many of the
fences on the Pickens farm are damag-
ed to some extent.
Freaks of the Storm.
The fields northeast Of the kitternan
farm present a curious spectacle. For
half mile or more the fields are dot
ted with wreckage,-boards timbers,
rails, fence posts and splinters arc
stuck in disorderly array In the mead
ows, many Of them imbedded eighteen
inches.
At the Brown farm chickens were
a.mlessly around all ready for the mar
ket.
A section of the Brown roof 16 by 20
feet, was found in the Pickens fields,
over one and one-half miles from the
original location. Shingles dot the mea-
dows for miles around.
In the path of the storm across tha
Pickens farm, field of corn stalks is
swept clean in a path for several hum
dred feet wide and piled neatly in q
swath In the center for a distance of
half a mile or more.
From the appearance of the big Kit
terman barn, 1t might have been bonn
barded by cannon. Great holes are
torn in the sides where timbers have
bene driven in end ways. Fragments
OF boards and splinters dangle from
the roof and sides where they have
| pierced the building through the vio-
lence Of the wind
A giant maple at the Kitterman place
Is split from top to bottom, one part
gene tneirely and the other standing
| intact with no branches injured. Cans.
| boxes and fragments of farm machin-
cry are swaying from branches of tho
remaining orchard trees, where they
have been cast by the fury of the
| clements.
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