New Ulm review. (New Ulm, Brown County, Minn.) 1892-1961, 1916-07-19
HEAVIEST RAINFALL
EYER KNOWN HERE
:. NEW ULM FLOODED WHEN STORM
FOLLOWS WEEK LONG DRY
SEASON.
DAMAGE. TO CITY PROPERTY
TOTALS lO0O.OO.-HAY CROP
SPOILED.

And the rains descended and the
' floods came,' was literally true last
Friday afternoon and evening when the
weather man let loose all the gates of
the skies and poured out the accumulated
moisture of the past two weeks. In all
the records kept by the local weather
bureau there is only one other entry to
show rainfall approaching the volume
that fell between three o'clock that
afternoon and ten at night. Fridays
precipitation amounted to 7.57 inches
and the previous heavy rainfall shown
by the local records was SIT inches in
August OF 1893.
For days the heat had been almost
prostrating, the humidity of the atmos-
phere rendering it almost too oppressive
to bear. No promise of any change
appeared until Friday morning when
the sky was more or less overcast all
day. In mid-afternoon the storm broke
in a glare of lightning and the great roll
and crash of thunder. The wind was
from the east at first but in few minutes
it, veered sharply and drove back the
shower that had just passed to the west.
Then came the downpour. So heavy
was it that the sheets of rain looked
like the drift of a blizzard, almost Opaque
as one tried to see thru them. The wind
swirled and whirled, sometimes from
one direction, sometimes from another.
The streets ran rivers in the downtown
section. At Ottomeyer's corner the
man-hole became clogged with the sand
that washed down from Center Street
land the water could not be. carried off
as fast as it gathered and it rose above
the curling and almost to the very door
of the stores at the corner. The sewers
became too full and began to back up,
in some places actually overlooking in
Easements along Broadway. On State
Street some of the residents had lately
cut their lawns and thrown the grass
into the cutters. 1t clogged the man.
holes and the lawns became lakes and
tho grass was all foated back upon the
Gwns it had been cut from. Similar
/scenes were noted in the east end of
town where that disposition of lawn
cuttings is common one.
Down on German Street the wind
displayed its force by uprooting large
tree and twisting another one off several
feet from the ground. On South Broad
way the lightning struck tree in front
of the Anton Dorm home and split it,
the occupants of the houses in that block
feeling the shock very distinctly. One
housewife was preparing potatoes and
the pan in which she had them was
denied by being thrown against the table
violently.
The greatest damage was done by the
flooding of various properties, public
and private. Probably the city streets
suffered more than anything else altho
farmers and others who had just cut
their hay will stand to lose great deal.
At the Loretto Hospital meadows and
again below College Heights the grass
:. had just been cut and the floods carried
s,,nch of it into the bitches or'spread it
all over the meadows and little of it
can be saved. The Hospital reported
that their hay crop will be practical
l0ag.
The damage to the city property oc-
CURED wherever there was a small
bridge over ditch or creek, at the city
cemetery and on Hospital Hill. At the
cemetery the entire place became lake
and when the water finally sank into the
ground it was found that score or more
of the graves had sunk foot OF two and
it will require an immense amount of
labor and material to replace the damage
~>there alone On Hospital Hill great
xutters were washed in the highway,
some four or five feet deep and stones
too big for man to handle were washed
y out, and down the hill leaving great
holes behind them and forming a pile
at the foot of the incline The Stoeckert
bridge and the one over the Cottonwood
at Schelis suffered great damage.
Damage to private property at the
breweries was small. A great deal of
sand and earth were loosened by the
= 4s-ent and a number of men were
\ = At busy an entire day at Schells re-
u loving the sand that had accumulated
about the buildings. At the Eagle Mill
water came into the engine room in such
volumes that it was necessary to shut
down FOX hour OF two in order to sweep