The Great Xenia Tornado of April 3, 1974

Great Xenia Tornado of April 3, 1974

About 3 years before I met her, Linda was almost caught in the nastiest, deadliest tornado ever to hit Ohio. She was just outside the town of Yellow Springs, with a group of school children, hiking through John Bryant State Park with Jan Wolanin, an environmental educator, when the tornado hit. Xenia, just mikes away, took a direct hit (see the article that follows for the incredible impact of the tornado on Xenia). Linda's Volkswagen Beetle was clobbered with gigantic hailstones, dented beyond belief. But she, Jan, and all the little children were safe. When Linda tried to drive back to Dayton through Xenia, she saw the devastation and thought that, somehow, Xenia had been bombed. The area was awash with sirens, ambulances, fire trucks, police cars, and astonishing devastation.

That same tornado hit the west side of Cincinnati, devastating the Saylor Park neighborhood. My old friend Henry Scott was working that day at a Cincinnati hospital and could see the tornado sweeping across the west side of Cincinnati. The Over-the-Rhine neighborhood, where I lived, was spared the destruction.

Source: (click on the link for photos relating to this story.
http://www.ohiohistory.org/etcetera/exhibits/swio/pages/content/1974_tornado.htm

The tornado superoutbreak of April 3-4, 1974 resulted in 148 tornadoes in 13 states. Across the United States, 315 people were killed, more than 6,000 injured, and 27,000 families suffered property losses. The Xenia Tornado caused the most deaths of any tornado in the outbreak. In Ohio, 12 tornadoes touched down, killing 36 people.
The Xenia Tornado touched down at 4:30 PM nine miles southwest of Xenia and entered the city about ten minutes later. It continued northeastward on a path of 32 miles through Xenia and Wilberforce into Clark County. The Xenia Tornado killed 32 people from Xenia to Wilberforce. About half of the buildings in the city of 27,000 were damaged and 300 homes destroyed. Nine Xenia churches were destroyed, as were seven of the twelve schools in the city. Fortunately, the tornado occurred an hour after classes had been dismissed. The roof and windows were blown from the Greene County Courthouse. A train passing through Xenia was struck by the tornado and 7 of the 47 cars were blown over, resulting in the blockage of Main Street.
More than 1300 people were treated for injuries at Green Memorial Hospital. Restaurants that were not destroyed handed out thousands of free meals to residents and rescue workers in Xenia. Convoys of generators, floodlights, bulldozers, and dump trucks arrived overnight from nearby Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. The tornado also struck Wilberforce University and Central State University, destroying many buildings and injuring several people on each campus.
Another violent tornado struck west of Cincinnati where homes were leveled and two people killed in Saylor Park. Other tornadoes that night caused significant damage in London and Mason and in rural areas of Adams and Paulding Counties.