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| 1919 Flood, Unknown Location Water wagon in the center now sits in front of the Relic Home |
In response to an invitation from my grandchildren to tell them about my early life, I pondered for a
moment, cleared my throat and began---
“Let me tell you about a devastating flash flood that hit Mt. Pleasant and did an untold amount of
damage to property and took the life of one man. It was a day I will never forget. It was the summer of
1918.”
“It was like all hell was turned loose. My brother Vernon and Daddy and I were out at the farm
irrigating our alfalfa hay. Rain began to fall, and as we took shelter in our barn, Daddy looked toward the
mountains. With a very worried tone of voice, he called our attention to the cloud burst on top of the
mountains and told us that it might bring a flood, and a food could mean trouble. He then told us that at
about 18 years of age he had witnessed a terrible flood and didn’t want to see another. He then urges us
to hurry and hitch old Tillie, our old bay mare, to the buggy while he set the water for the night and we
would go home early.”
“In a matter of minutes we were ready to go, and with the crack of the whip old Tillie was off on a
fast trot toward home.
About half way home Daddy stopped the buggy to listen. We heard the fire bell
ringing. In those days when there was a fire or an emergency of any kind, the fire bell was rung to warn the
people of the emergency. We could also hear a faint roar towards the mountains and Daddy said he was
sure there was a flood and it could be a big one.”
“As we reached the edge of town, we could see people hurrying in all directions, some in wagons,
some on horses and others running on foot. A man on a horse came up to us and said to Daddy, ‘Say, Fred,
I don’t know whether you can get home or not. They say nearly every bridge across Pleasant Creek is
washed out. It surely is a mess there in the center of town.’”
“I was sitting next to Daddy. I grabbed his arm and cried, ‘Gee, Daddy, what will we do if we can’t
get across the creek and get home to Mamma?’”
“we were soon at 3rd North.
We could now smell the mud. We stopped briefly and talked to the
people gathered there. One said, ‘It’s terrible!’ another, ‘What a mess!’ Still another, ‘It’s just like all hell is
turned loose, led by the Devil himself!’ Someone said that we might get across the channel on 2nd East by
Tobe Candland’s home.”
“As we drove up 3rd North, we learned that the bridge by Tobe’s was the only bridge left and that a
few people had gone over it. The road for about one block from the bridge was covered with thick mud,
ranging from six inches to a foot deep. I grabbed Daddy’s arm again and Vernon held on to me as Daddy
urged old Tillie through the water and mud.”
“As we approached nearer the bridge, a big boulder had been deposited in the middle of the road
and Tillie needed extra urging to pass the big smelly thing. When we were directly over the channel, I
remember how horrified I was as I looked down into that seething, smelly mass of mud, having the
consistency of thick, brown, boiling gravy. Although by now the peak of the flood had passed, we could still
hear the bump, bump, bump of the boulders being carried by the force of the heavy water.”
“Even old Tillie was glad to get across the bridge, for she lost no time getting us home. I remember
how glad I was to see Mama. She was out in the road waiting for us. She was wiping her eyes with the
corner of her apron.
I remember that night the feeling of security as we safely sat down to a supper of salt
pork, potatoes and gravy, and fresh vegetables from our garden, with applesauce for dessert.”
“After supper Vernon remarked that Daddy surely did set the water for the night awfully quick.
Daddy explained that he was worried. He said he was sure when he saw that cloud burst on top of the
mountain that there would be another flood like the big flood he mentioned out to the farm that he had
witnessed when he was eighteen years old in the summer of 1893. He said he and his mother and sisters
and a brother were on their little homestead farm in the mouth of Pleasant Creek Canyon. They were
caught in a cloud burst. Soon they could hear a flood coming down the canyon. His half brother, Andrew
Peterson, then about twenty-four years old, jumped onto his horse and raced to town and warned the
people that a flood was coming. Daddy then said the rest of the family climbed the hill where the Mt.
Pleasant electric power plant now stands and watched the flood come out of the canyon. He said it was
like a wall of water and mud twenty feet high rushing forward with a deafening roar. Everything in its path
was taken with it. Large trees were simply uprooted and tossed end over end downstream. Huge
boulders, some as big as a room, were moved and left down on the farm land below. So great and terrible 
; was this flood that whenever anything is mentioned or anything happens that reminds him of this
experience, it strikes horror into his heart and a sickening sensation in his stomach.”
“As we were talking, a neighbor came and excitedly asked, ‘Have you heard the terrible news?
Lewis Oldham lost his life in the flood. They don’t know where his body is.’ Our neighbor then explained
how she had heard it had happened. According to George Rosenberg (Petersen), he and his wife were
visiting the Oldham family, whose home is about one mile out of the mouth of Pleasant Creek Canyon.
When the first sounds of the flood reached their ears, they went to the main channel, which is a short
distance from the house to see the flood. Soon they discovered that a small part of the flood, which had
overflowed the main channel, was coming down a little hollow between them and their house, so they
hurriedly found a pole to walk across the small newly formed stream. They were all safely across except
Mr. Oldham, and as he was crossing, a flush of much more flood water came and covered the pole, and Mr.
Oldham slipped and fell into the now suddenly increased stream.
The shock of this sudden emergency in
his life either caused him to have a heart attack, or he was so confused he could not act. He merely sat
motionless on the thick mud as it carried him down to the main channel of raging water, mud, and rocks.
George Rosenberg ran along the bank trying to reach him, begging him to hold out his hand so he could get
hold of it and help him out, or grab onto that bunch of willows, but Mr. Oldham just sat dazed and rode the
thick mud to his death.”
“One week later the fire bell rang again and the people gathered on Main Street and learned that
the battered body of Lewis Oldham had been found lodged against a fence west of town near the D. & R.G.
railroad tracks. All his clothes had been torn off his body except one shoe.”
“The death of Lewis Oldham was of course a great shock to the whole community and added
determination to public sentiment to do something better about the floods if they could. But what could
they do? Back in 1894 a flood dam was built. Shortly after, a small flood came. The dam diverted the flood
to the North and South Fields. A law suit resulted and the city had to pay the damages.
The dam did not
solve the problem, it merely shifted the area of destruction. Over the years, several other projects were
suggested, but it was not until 1950 that fifteen agencies in all initiated a comprehensive investigation
which resulted in a program of flood prevention. This was a program of controlled grazing and terracing
the steep slopes and reseeding the range. As a result of this flood investigation, it was learned that there
had been twenty floods since the big flood of 1893, or an average of one every three years. Four of these
were major floods causing damages into thousands and thousands of dollars. There four major floods
occurred in 1893, 1918, 1936, and 1946. The flood in 1946 was a ‘hum-dinger.’
I will never forget it either.
It was the 24th of July. The whole town was ready for a big 24th of July parade. The banks of Pleasant Creek
overflowed at the bridge over State Street; diverting the water, mud, rocks, and tree stumps down Main
Street. And what a parade that turned out to be.”
“I want to mention before I quit two more things about the flood that I remember vividly. The next
day after the flood, we rode around town looking at the extent of the damage where the flood had gone.
We saw a straw stack down in the middle of Main Street. The flood had taken the straw stack from the
yard of Emil Hafen, and floated it down six or eight blocks unmolested, and even a setting hen ’scrook’ was
still on top devoted to her task of trying to hatch out the nest of eggs she had secretly stolen away. The
other was the ‘digging out’ or the ‘clean up’ which was such a tremendous task that Mt. Pleasant City
requested help from the State Government. The State responded by sending a group of convicts, as they
were called then, from the State Penitentiary. I remember weeks later as we passed over the bridge one
day, a uniformed guard with gun drawn was guarding these convicts. I noticed one convict in particular
who was shoveling rocks into a wheel barrow. When he had a load, he picked up a big steel ball that was
fastened to a four foot length of chain which was locked to his ankle. He put the ball into the wheel barrow
with the rocks and walked over to dump his load.”
“So, young people, you can understand why I will never forget the devastating floods that hit Mt.
Pleasant.”
Source: History of Mt. Pleasant
U.S. Soil Conservation Service
Verlyn Oldham, Leora Oldham, and John A. Peterson
Family records and author’s memory.
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