Columbus Day - 1962

It was just past five o'clock when I closed the office door and headed for my car.  The October wind was blowing briskly.  Little swirls of dust danced across the lawn and a big sheet of newspaper came blowing  around the corner of the building.  There was something exhilarating about the atmosphere.  Overhead little puffy white clouds, perfectly spaced in formation, resembled white lines on the bias of a sky blue fabric.  The sun would be setting soon.  Its orange glow reached out from the west to tinge the edges of the cloud formations.  The radio announcer warned that a hurricane strength windstorm was headed north through the Willamette Valley.

Five minutes later I pulled into my driveway.  My husband and toddler sons were there to greet me,.  "Better park up close to the house tonight," he advised."  I immediately started preparing dinner and even thought it might be a good idea to heat a big pan of water.

Ben and Mark went down to their bedroom.  They were definitely hyper!  Mark tossed the little play table upside down on the floor while Ben threw in several sofa pillows and jumped in.  Mark grabbed the converted table leg like a gear shift and they were varooming off on a big adventure.  "I think we should open a couple of windows a crack to equalize the pressure," commented my husband as he headed for a bedroom.

Just as we were sitting down to eat dinner the lights went off.  "What'll we do now?" asked Ben.  We looked out of the dinette window and watched a small tree heaving at its roots, but it held.  Our neighbor's trees were also straining at their roots.  None were close enough to fall on our house so we didn't get too worried.  We dined by candle light and I washed dishes by flashlight, glad I had heated that pan of water.  My husband built a fire in the fireplace.  Since we couldn't watch our favorite TV programs we spent the evening singing songs, telling stories and playing games until it was time for the boys to be in bed.  Then we dashed out to the car so we could hear the storm report on the car radio.  Wind gusts were clocked at 100 miles an hour!  It was the storm that became known as The Columbus Day Storm.

Our lights came on about 6:00 a.m. because the line going to the hospital went past our street, but we didn't get phone service until 4:00 p.m. the next day.  The day dawned as a beautiful crisp, clear day.  A little dew sparkled across lawns strewn with fallen leaves and storm debris.  We lived in the center of a horseshoe shaped drive, and big trees had fallen across the roadway on both sides of us.  Chain saws could be heard in every direction as neighbors were helping neighbors to clean up, board up, or do whatever was necessary. As far as I recall, we were not afraid.  We had experienced the Storm of the Century and lived to tell about it!