February 26, Palm Sunday 1965

Although I was not yet born at the time of the disaster, I often heard my father talk about his brush with a tornado. He was on a two lane highway headed home when the weather turned nasty.  The radio would have been turned to the only station he ever listened to, WJR A.M. (The great voice of the Great Lakes) out of Detroit, MI.   I am sure he heard the announcements to take cover, but he was in Erie, MI, just about 30 minutes from home, where his family was. I am sure we were on his mind as he rushed toward us.  I know he was driving fast - he was a speed demon in the best of times.  This time he had even more reason to race down the road.

Dad was a travelling salesman at the time.  He would leave home for days at a time making his rounds. Mom would always be glad when he came home safely.  But on Palm Sunday, April 11, 1965 he almost didn't make it.  As he barreled down US-24 he spotted the tornado whipping his way and at the last moment he decided he couldn't outrun it and  he abandoned his car on the side of the road and dove into a ditch, grabbing onto weeks and grass to hold himself down.  Sounding like an approaching freight train, the monstrous funnel created havoc on its path of destruction.  Miraculously Dad was unhurt.  His auto remained in the road, still idling.  As he viewed the aftermath and attempted to help, he spied a small girl.  She was naked, the clothes having been ripped from her back.  Dad took off his jacket and wrapped it around her.  Worried about his own family, he did what he could and then continued on to Carleton, MI, our home.  It was an event that he never forgot.  In that small town there were four deaths, 18 injured. and one little girl protected by my Dad's jacket.