The Johnstown Flood

MTC · 11-12-2002, 09:11 AM

I'm not sure why it was on the Travel Channel, but while surfing last night, I saw something on the Johnstown Flood of 1889 in Pennsylvania.

Over 2200 people died when the South Fork dam burst upstream of the town of Johnstown. They were either drowned or crushed by debris (like entire railroad cars, huge pieces of earth, chunks of homes from towns between the dam and Johnstown, and huge bales of barbed wire from a nearby factory). As if that wasn't bad enough, if you managed to survive but was trapped on debris, the oily water that you were floating on later caught fire. You were burned alive on a river.

Okay, so more than 2200 people died and it was called the worst disaster to happen in America at the time. But if you lived outside of Pennsylvania, had you heard of it? I hadn't until last night.

Now to the point. In 110 years, if we haven't managed to blow ourselves up, will September 11th be just a distant faded memory that few outside of New York, or Pennsylvania, or DC will remember? Probably not, I think, because Johnstown was an American made disaster. Link Johnstown Flood

Will the overall perception of what happened change as the view/opinions/etc. of the "relocation" of native americans have? Or no change like Pearl Harbor? Too bad I can't stick around to see. I think it would be interesting.

**Lathan** · 11-12-2002, 09:51 AM

I've actually been to the Johnstown Flood Museum in PA and it was surprisingly interesting. I was out that way to see Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater and had some time to kill. I hadn't heard a word of it until I 'stumbled' upon it. Here is another site that has a lot of pictures and facts about the event.

As for September 11, I don't know how it will be seen in the future. On one hand, I hope it is readily remembered so that similar events can be avoided and because that might mean that nothing comparable has happened since. Although it would be also be nice to have it fade into the background as an unfortunate occurance to look back upon from a time when we're free of such problems. (If that makes sense?) Wishful thinking, I know.

aza1 · 11-12-2002, 10:18 AM

the flood is amazing in that it was completely a manmade disaster. For years afterwards, people went to moving pictures about the flood....

trampledmoss · 11-12-2002, 10:34 AM

I've heard of it, read a book about it, and went there on a field trip in elementary school . . . but I'm from Pennsylvania. I was only 11 at the time, so I don't remember much about the any of the stuff, but I found it quite interesting at the time.

It actually wasn't that long ago that I was wondering why I hadn't heard about the flood in any history classes since then. It seems strange that such a huge disaster is never has been mentioned in history books I've read since then.

entropy · 11-12-2002, 01:12 PM

i only heard of it when i was in the air force and met someone from johnstown.