| Accession# |
VE1-2010 |
| Catalog date |
01/07/2010 |
| Collection |
OSHP Collections |
| Date of photo |
varies |
| Description |
Patrolman John Evans, who died in 2003, joined the Patrol with the 2nd Academy Class, also known as the "Delaware Men," in 1934. He didn't retire from the Division, but his recollections of the Patrol's early days are invaluable and recorded in a 2002 interview, a part of which is recounted below:
On the subject of the 1937 Ohio floods:
"We had boats brought in from all over the place and we were going around, trying to get people in these little areas out of their homes in safe ground, but we had very little luck with it. They wanted to stay in their house. They said, 'We have a 22-foot flood wall,' and they would say, 'I'll go over the flood wall,' so a lot of people stayed in their houses. Then, after the water started over the flood wall and it started flooding the streets of Portsmouth, then they changed their minds and we had to rescue so many people who were on the tops of the roofs of their houses. They had no place to go and we were patrolling the streets. There would be one patrolman in a boat with one city policeman.
"One night, I was with a city patrolman, he was in the front of the boat with a light. We had a battery-powered light and I was running the outboard motor and he was supposed to be the observer to avoid obstacles. We were going along at full speed and we came through the main intersection in Portsmouth, where one of the streets was called Chillicothe Street. All at once, our boat did a 180-degree flip and it dumped us out and dumped our light and our battery and everything else we had in the boat went out.
"Fortunately, we both were able to get hold of the trolley cable, which was under water and that is what caused us to overturn. It was also fortunate that there was a Montgomery Ward store right on the corner and there were several people there and two or three boats. The water was just about even with the second floor at the store and they came over and rescued us.
"Then they provided dry clothes for us and two or three days later, they told me that I had to go to Columbus and I didn't know what was going on that I should go to Columbus because it was more important to be down in Portsmouth. But in any case, I did go to Columbus and I found out that the Governor's Ball was being held that night and I thought that I was only there in case somebody needed help or something. But the Governor started his speech and he told the whole story about me being dumped in the water and so it made the papers and I got a lot of publicity over it, but I figured that I was very lucky that I was able to reach the cable under water. I don't think we could have lived very long without that cable.
"When the water went over the wall and it started building up, I went four days without getting any rest, any bed at all. We were rescuing people that entire time - four days - and by the end of that time, we had things pretty well under control. The officials responsible for measuring the water said that the water reached a peak of 79 feet and the wall was 62 feet.
"I'd see houses where just the cone of the roof would be sticking out of the water. You would see all kinds of things going down that river. We photographed this one thing that we noticed - there were four or five different breeds of animals on a piece of wood or something like that, and none of them would do anything. They were not animated at all.
"There were a lot of people who died. I think they built a new flood wall to 79 feet. They haven't had a flood since then - not to go over the wall."
|
| Year Range from |
1933 |
| Category |
8: Communication Artifact |
| Year range to |
2010 |
| Object ID |
VE1-2010-013 |
| Object Name |
print, photographic |
|
