The Bismarck tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, N.D.) 1916-current, 1928-03-14
SEARCH FOR
MORE BODIES
is CONTINUED
fTnr+;ruod 2,

Continued from page on-)
that State Engineer Hyatt would
conduct the inquiry.
Approximately 400 houses in the
1G-mile gorge of San Francisquito
canyon were torn to bits, thrown
and tossed along the 65-mile tur-
moil to the sea. Not q standing
timber was left as q marker to in
dictate the site of prosperous little
farms that dotted the valley among
their green fields. Three hundred
more homes at Santa Paula went
the same way. Thirty to 40 houses
were smashed at Fillmore, and Is
at Piru, nine miles south Of there
on the Santa Clara river.
AS the torrent rcceded, mountain
Gus blocks of concrete from the dam
were discovered half q mile or more
from the dam site.
Undertakers Needed
It was undertakers, not doctors,
as one Red Cross worker put it, that
were needed. A county health Off
Ger remarked upon the few injured
persons. Those caught in the
maelstrom Of muddy waters either
escaped unscathed or were killed.
He said most Of the victims did not
drown; they were crushed by
boulders and hurting timbers from
their own sheltering homes.
Tales of heroes uncounted, of
bravery in which men lost their
own lives to warn and save others;
Of grim stoicism when virtually
every member of some families were
counted among the missing, were
revealed.
Ed Locke, a guard of the South
ern California Edison company
construction camp at Blue Bend,
saved the lives of at least Al men,
and himself died with his boots on
and gun belted to his waist. His
surviving fellows told of the
hero running up and down the row
Of the tents without a thought Of
his own skin" He was found where
he fell after warning his fellow
men Of the oncoming peril.
Scotty Gordon, wizened and grey
bear led rancher, chuckled trium-
phantly at the valor Of his fellow
men. But it had to be dragged out
Of him that YVES q hero himself. He
had braved the rushing waters with
other hill neighbors to recover
eight bodies.
Losses Total Millions
Left behind by the gouging wall of
water, from half a mile to q mile
wide, sweeping Is miles to thessea,
were losses estimated at from $1O,-
100000 to $50, 1000, 900. The city of
Lr. Angeles, the heaviest individual
sufferer, put its gross in the totally
destroyed dam and the power house
below it, at 100000.
The waters flattened scores Of
homes, ranches, railroad lines and
bridges, tore out wire systems, light
and power wires, gas mains, high
ways and bridges, and wreaked in
estimablc loss in flattened and silt
buried orange and walnut orchards
and other farm lands.
Speculation on the cause of the
breaking Of the great dam covered a
wide variety Of theories. The post
mistress at Saugus, Mrs. A. X. Rum
sey, declared that for 10 days ranch
ers living in the shadow Of the dam
had talked of nothing else" but
leaks under and through the struc-
ture. She said they fearfully dis
cussed the possibility of the very
disaster which swept down in the
blackness of night to wipe out their
homes and families.
Concrete Crumples
A piece Of concrete from the dam
was crumpled in the hand of Los
Angeles County Supervisor Fred
Beatty. He commented:
"Yes, it came from the dam, but
j 1gment must not be passed until
a competent board of engineers has
conducted a searching investigation
and has reported to Governor
Young"
Demand for relief work and medi-
cal supplies was at a minimum as all
but few of the persons in the path
Of the torrent apparently persisted.
Police officers, sheriffs, valley
residents and American Legionnaires
were organized to continue the
search for bodies. Pack trains were
formed to move bodies from the
quagmire where other means Of
transportation failed.