The Ocala evening star. [volume] (Ocala, Fla.) 1895-1943, 1921-10-27
STORMS HAVE PASSED
MARION COUNTY BY

pherlc disturbance might make Ocala
bullseye, but the truth is that in the
thirty years the writer has dwelt here
there has been nothing unduly severe
IN wind or rain in this town or within
twenty miles of it.
Storms are said to travel IN circles.
like doughnuts, and 0cala has been in
the hole in the doughnut every time a
hurricane has come along. We have
been in several places where such
wind as that of Tuesday was a COM
mon, everyday thing.
If, when the first telephone and
electric light wires were strung in
Ocala, many of them had not been run
between the branches of trees, and
since then many more followed them
with the usual slavish imitation of
custom, Ocala would not have been
bothered to any great extent with
Tuesdays storm. We have not heard
of any substantial buildings suffering
and comparatively few trees have
been blown down. The streets and
roads have not suffered any more than
from some of the heavy summer
rains, of which we often have twenty
in thirty days in the rainy season.
The principal damage done in the
county seems confined to the wind
threshing a good many oranges and
grapefruit off the trees, but not
enough to seriously diminish the crop.
In the latter part of September,
1894, heavy gale struck the east
coast of Florida and ragged for three
or four days. It is the rule with these
storms to last about three days, but
the commotion one causes seldom
ceases until about a day after it has
passed. This 1894 storm afflicted
Ocala about thirty-six hours. The
wind blew much harder than it did
Tuesday and with it was a rain which
it drove with such force against the
buildings that every leak was pene-
trated, and good many houses that
had been considered waterproof were
unequal to this severe test. Some
houses and good many trees were
blown down, but the people generally
suffered little inconvenience beyond
being kept more closely under cover
than they liked. Ocala's electric plant
then was small and feeble, and prob
ably two-thirds of the residences in
town were illuminated with oil lamps,
so fouled wires were among the least
of the city's troubles.
This storm flooded the South Caro-
lima coast, causing the drowning OF
scores of negroes, and did consider
able damage to the seaports as far
north as Norfolk.
Just about two years later there
was another storm that smote Florida
heavily on both coasts. It fairly raked
the east coast from Biscayne Bay up,
but on the west it was felt as far
north as Fort Myers and then went
out to sea, from where it returned TO
strike again near Cedar Key. It didn't
hit that town in full force, tho it did
much damage there, but it tore mile
wide swath thru the country clear up
irto Georgia. Luckily, it didn't hit
any thickly settled sections-which
were easy to miss those days-but
whatever it struck, houses, among
them three or four churches, timber,
etc., went down. A hundred yards or
more of the railroad trestle between
Cedar Key and the mainland were
washed out. Turnout Florida several
people were killed. This storm doesn't
seem to have been as severe IN Ocala
as the one two years before.
The first of these storms didn't
bother the Star at all, for it wasn't
in existence. The second didn't worry
it much, as the Office didn't use cleo
tricity at the time, kerosene oil being
the luminant, the type set by hand
and the press driven by a water
motor.
The 1896 storm was the last trop-
ical hurricane to strike peninsular
Florida with full force until the one
of this week. There have been local
storms that caused Ocala much more
trouble. There was one about dozen
years ago that put the electric light
plant out of business for more than a
day; however, such a storm now could
not so much affect the new plant. But
until there is a better method adopted
than the one of running the wires
thru the trees, every high wind and
heavy rain is liable to shut the cur
rent off from some parts of the town.