Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1913-04-02
STORMS IN ANDERSON COUNTY.
Two in the Past that VIII Not Soon
BE Forgotten,
(Anderson Mail, March 27.)

Anderson and the surrounding Sec
ton have been visited by some right
destructive storms in years past, but
it has now been several years since
any great amount of damage Of this
nature has resulted here. Some
twenty or more years, ago a cyclone
hit the section just south of the city,
it's main path being just about where
the Orr Cotton Mill now stands, and
some fifteen years ago there was an
other that did it's grea Cest damage,in
the Starr section. Many SMALL build
ings, and some La q ones, too, were
thrown down, trees uprooted and
other damage of a like nature done
on both these occasions. There have
been several storms over the county
since then, but the damage done has
never amounted to a great deal in
comparison.
Storm 20 Years Ago.
Il remember well the storm that
passed through some twenty or more
years ago. said a citizen to-day. "Its
main path was just about where the
Orr mill is now. Houses we're blown
down and great pine trees in the
path of the wind, some hundred or
more yards in width, we're torn from
their roots and twisted in pieces. The
trees were piled in every direction in
the wake Of the storm, showing that
the winds force came from almost
every direction.
"Old man Joe Strickland used to
tell a story of his having been caught
out on the highway and blown from
his buggy by the roadside. The wind,
he said. picked him up in no gentle
fashion and laid him down in the
edge of the woods in about the same
manner. He was knocked and cuffed
about by the breeze for some little
time, but finally managed to lay hold
with both hands on a small sapling
that grew by the ditch bank. He held
on there for dear life until the fury
Of the storm had passed, but declared
that he was wound round and round
the bush, and battered up and down
against the ground by the fury of the
wind, being handled much after the
fashion of a blade of fodder in he
breeze, until he was black and blue,
and just alive for some considerable
time afterwards.
q have heard Mr.. Strickland tell
that story owe and over again" said
the citizen, land l have never yet
heard anybody dispute it. 1t is GER
tan that there was a great deal of
damage done by the storm at that
time. He will never believe anything
else than that that sapling saved his
life, and maybe it did
g Years Later Mt Starr.
Down at Starr, a few years later,
the. fury of the storm was about the
same. The wind again travelled in a
path some several hundred yards in
width, leaving wrecked houses and
trees as it passed. = The town of
Starr got about as much Of It as any
other section, and the damage there
was considerable. The wind, as in
the first instance, also blew in a gale
in the town and almost all over the
county, but with nothing like the
fury as that at Starr.
For a long time said the citi-
zen, there was a gate post on exhibit
ton at n of the newspaper offices
in Anderson which told OF the fury
OF the wind. 1t was taken from the
lot at the home of Press Allen and
brought in. Through the center of
the post a spoke had been driven,
just as if it had been made of ron and
a sledge hammer used in the process.
Il don't suppose anybody ever
knew he continued, "whether or not
the wheel from which the spoke vas
ake originally was torn from some
wagon and hurled against the gate
post, but it is a fact that the spoke
was driven through the post by the
wind. There were hundreds of peo-
pie who saw it, and the force Of the
wind of the storm could not have
e more strikingly emphasized.
I'm glad we don't have any more
storms like that" he said. 81 am
one of those fellows you meet every
little while who are afraid OF them"
PICKENS MAN "UNBELTS" GOLD.
Astonishcs Passenger Agent i'm Allan
IN by Display o? yc!!3w Metal.