Topeka, KS siren system 1966

[Unit of Civil Defense]

................... If a tornado followed an identical path today it would be..... bad.....

Eric

Bad would be putting it mildly...a lot of area that was in the Tornados path got developed into apartments(high density population)...in fact there are two high rise apartment complexes that where built in the path in the South West portion of downtown. There are many, many more homes that are in the path South West of the mound than there was in 1966. There is a HUGE apartment complex built on the North East slope of the mound that's been around for about 40 years.

A large part of the "old" neighborhood that I grew up in, that was destroyed, got developed into large 2 and 3 story apartment complexes.

Keep in mind that monster was on the ground aprox. 12 miles before it crossed over Burnett's mound in the South West city limits.....that area South West of the mound has seen quite a bit of development in the last 47 years.

[kswx29]

Wow, it's a small world. Family on my father's side is from Topeka, in fact I still have the special edition of the Topeka Daily Capital (now the Capital-Journal) from June 9, 1966 after Topeka took that nasty tornado right through the center of the city. My grandfather was Arthur "Scoop" Conklin, a rather famous news reporter for the Daily Capital from the 1930's until 1968. He's been dead since 1968 and you can still find references to him on the Internet, which had never been created in his lifetime. But, back on topic, I think that special edition had a picture of a T-bolt that had been hit and was hanging lopsided on a pole. I'll have to dig it out and go take a look now, it's been years since I saw it. If a tornado followed an identical path today it would be..... bad.....

Eric

Not to bring up an older topic, but did you find that newspaper article? I'll have to dig around at the Library sometime and see if I can't find anything.

[Unit of Civil Defense]

...If you don't find what your looking for at the library, my mother and myself have amassed pretty much every thing reference the tornado....If you make it up there be sure and check out the videos about the tornado.....