1953 — June 8, Tornadoes, MI/125 (especially Flint/115), OH/18 — 143

–143  Blanchard estimated range.

–143  Grazulis. Significant Tornadoes 1680-1991. 1993, pp. 506, 973-974.[1]

–142  Carbin, Schaefer, Edwards (SPC). The 15 Deadliest U.S. Tornado Days since 1950.

–139  AP. “Six Roaring Twisters Hit Michigan and Ohio…” Ironwood Daily Globe, MI. 6-9-1953, p. 1.

 

Michigan        (125)

–123  AP. “Six Roaring Twisters Hit Michigan and Ohio…” Ironwood Daily Globe, MI. 6-9-1953, p. 1.

—    1  Ann Arbor

—    1  Brown City

—    4  Erie

–113  Flint

—    4  Tawas City

–125  Grazulis. Significant Tornadoes. 1993, p. 506.

—    4  Monroe Co., 18:25 F4. Motorist seeking shelter in ditch; 3 people in one house.[2]

—    1  Washtenaw Co., Pleasant Lake area farmhouse, 19:30 tornado. Grazulis 1993, p.973.

—    4  Iosco County, Big Island Lake cabin; 20:20 F3. Grazulis 1993, p. 974.

–115  Genesee/Lapeer Counties, Flint, 20:30 F5. Grazulis 1993, p. 974.

—    1  Lapeer County, Brown City area; 21:30 F4. Grazulis 1993, p. 974.[3]

 

Flint-Beecher Tornado (MI):

—       116  Bloomberg. “Missouri Officials Debate Joplin Deaths.”  May 24, 2011.

—       116  Ludlum. The American Weather Book, 1982, p. 107.

–115-116  National Weather Service, Detroit 2003

—       115  AP. “Six Roaring Twisters Hit Michigan and Ohio…” Ironwood Daily Globe, MI. 6-9-1953, p1.

—       115  Brooks and Doswell. “Normalized Damage from Major Tornadoes…US,”  2000.

—       115  Grazulis. Significant Tornadoes. 1993, xiv

—       115  Grazulis. “The Top Ten US Killer Tornadoes.”

—       115  Flint MI. Grazulis. The Tornado: Nature’s Ultimate Windstorm. 2001, p. 292.

—       115  NWS WFO, Paducah, KY. NOAA/NWS 1925 Tri-State Tornado. “General Info.”

—       115  Storm Prediction Center, NOAA. The 25 Deadliest Tornadoes

—       113  Historyorb.com. Today in Michigan History.

—       113  Flint. Levine. F5. 2007, p. 70.

 

Ohio               (  18)

–18  Grazulis 1993, pp. 506 and 973.

–5  Wood County, Cygnet area, 19:00 tornado. Woman and four children.

–3  Wood and/or Sandusky County, 19:00 tornado.

–1  Erie County, Ceylon area home, 19:30 tornado.

–5  Cuyahoga County, Cleveland westside home; 21:08 F3. Grazulis 1993, p. 974.

–2  Cuyahoga/Lorain F3; 21:03 F3. No detail, though included as direct tornado deaths.[4]

–1  Cuyahoga/Lorain F3; 21:03 F3. Heart attack. Grazulis 1993, p. 974.

–1  Cuyahoga/Lorain F3; 21:03 F3. Electrocution afterwards. Grazulis 1993, p. 974.

–10  Cygnet area. AP. “Six Roaring Twisters Hit Michigan…Ohio…” Ironwood Daily Globe, MI. 6-9-1953, 1.[5]

—  8  Wood County (Cygnet is in Wood Co.).[6]

—  8  Cleveland area. AP. “Six Roaring Twisters Hit Michigan…Ohio…” Ironwood Daily Globe, MI. 6-9-1953, 1.

—  1  Elyria. AP. “Six Roaring Twisters Hit Michigan…Ohio…” Ironwood Daily Globe, MI. 6-9-1953, 1.

—  1  Ceylon. AP. “Six Roaring Twisters Hit Michigan…Ohio…” Ironwood Daily Globe, MI. 6-9-1953, 1.

 

Narrative Information

 

Grazulis: “MI  JUN 8, 1953 1825 4k 18inj 200y 7m  F4.  MONROE–This tornado touched down near Temperance, and moved due E along East Temperance Road to Telegraph.  Lifting over Erie, the funnel touched down again along Substation Road and moved out over Lake Erie as a waterspout for another 44 minutes, for a total path length of almost 40 miles. It was last seen 10m SW of Kingsville, Ontario. Cars and trucks were hurled off the road as the funnel passed over US-24. Damage totaled about $500,000, as 15 houses were destroyed and 14 were damaged. A six-ton truck was thrown 80 feet and three cars were seen in the air at one time. A motorist who had sought shelter in a ditch was killed, as were three people in one house….

 

“OH     JUN 8, 1953 1900 8k 48inj…20m F4.  WOOD/SANDUSKY—Moved ENE, then NE from 4m NE of Deshler, passing 3m NW of Cygnet. A woman and four children were killed in one home west of Cygnet. Damage in the Cygnet area may have been of F5 intensity. $500,000.

 

“OH  JUN 8, 1953 1930 lk 23inj…10m F3.  ERIE–Moved ENE from 4m E of Kimball, passing just south of Ceylon, parallel to the lake shore, and ending near Vermilion. One person was killed as a home was nearly leveled near Ceylon. Most of the injuries were in a home between Ceylon and Axtel. Six people were injured at Vermilion.

 

“MI  JUN 8, 1953 1930 lk 5inj 70y 15m F3.  WASHTENAW–Moved ENE from Pleasant Lake, 5m NE of Manchester to just north of Ypsilanti, and ending 5m SW of Ann Arbor. A timber was blown into a basement near Pleasant Lake, killing a fanner and injuring five others. A home and three barns were leveled. $40,000….

 

“MI  JUN 8, 1953 2020 4k 13inj 400y 18in F3. IOSCO–Moved ENE from Indiana Lake to Lake Huron. Five vacation “cabins” were leveled, and six others were badly damaged. There was $300,000 damage to vacation property. Four in one family were killed in a cabin on Big Island Lake.

 

“MI  JUN 8, 1953 2030 115k 844inj 800y 27m  F5.  GENESEE/LAPEER—Moved ENE and E from 2m N of Flushing, devastating the north part of Flint, ending 2m N of Lapeer. The tornado virtually obliterated all homes on both sides of Coldwater Road for about a mile. It was there that the damage swath was over a half mile wide, and most of the deaths occurred. There were multiple deaths in at least 20 families. This was the last single tornado, as of this writing, to cause over 100 deaths in the United States. $19,000,000.

 

“OH  JUN 8, 1953 2108 7k 300inj 400y 20m F3.  LORAIN/CUYAHOGA—Moved NE from south of Elyria, passing across the NW edge of Hopkins International Airport, then out onto Lake Erie at east 40th Street. About 100 homes were destroyed. Five people were killed in one home on the west side of Cleveland. There was a square mile of damage from West 117th to West 130th Streets and Massillon. Damage may have begun near Birmingham at the Erie-Lorain County line. The official death total is nine, but one death was from a heart attack and one by a post-tornado electrocution.

 

MI  JUN 8, 1953 2130 lk 34inj 500y 34m F4.  LAPEER/ST.CLAIR—Moved E across farmland from Kings Mill to Lake Huron, passing north of Yale, then south of Jeddo and 2m N of Lakeport, where it moved out into Lake Huron. This tornado was in the same family as the Flint tornado, and its one death is often added to the Flint total. That death was in a home 4m SSE of Brown City, Lapeer County. Two homes and many barns were “blown away.” $500,000.”  (Grazulis.  Significant Tornadoes 1680-1991. 1993, pp. 973-974.)

 

NWS: Oldest fatality 80; youngest fatality: 5 months; injuries: 844

 

Damage: $19 million in 1953 dollars ($125 million in 2003 dollars).  340 homes were destroyed, 107 suffered “major damage”, and 153 suffered “minor damage”. Another 66 buildings destroyed or damaged to farms, businesses and other buildings.

 

Path Length: 27 miles.”  (NWS, Detroit/Pontiac Forecast Office, Beecher Tornado Facts, 1970)

 

Newspapers

 

June 9: “Flint, Mich. (AP)–Six roaring tornadoes, their black-clouded funnels dealing multi-million dollar destruction, ripped furiously through parts of Michigan and Ohio last night, killing 139 and injuring 750. The most deadly of the shrieking windstorms flung full force against Flint, a heavily industrialized city of 163,000 about 70 miles north of Detroit. In Flint alone at least 113 persons were killed. Forty houses in one Flint street were flattened like pancakes. Many managed bodies were found today in the wreckage of homes.

 

“The tornadoes shot the nations spring twister toll to 358 dead. Alabama, Texas and Oklahoma have been hit hard recently.

 

“The new tornado struck Michigan while the state was still cleaning up the May 21 twister that whirled through the outskirts of Port Huron, Mich., and jumped the St. Clair River and tore through Sarnia, Ont.

 

“The first tornado lashed Erie, Mich., just over the Michigan-Ohio line from Toledo, O., at 5:25 p.m. (CST). At 7:10 p.m. a twister hedge-hopped through Washtenaw County, 35 miles to the north and swept into Milford, Oakland County, 15 miles to the northeast. Tawas City, midway up the eastern coast of Michigan on Lake Huron, was hit at 7:25 p.m. and Flint at 7:45 p.m. The tornado area extended from Tawas City down across the Ohio-Michigan border to Bowling Green — a path of 350 miles.

 

“Ten persons died in the twister that truck the Cygnet, O., area. Eight died in the Cleveland area,; and one each at Elyria and Ceylon.

 

“Michigan fatalities, in addition to those at Flint, included four dead at Erie; four dead at Tawas City; one at Ann Arbor; and one in Brown City, near Lapeer.

 

“Flint hospitals were filled with the injured–many crowded into corridors still stunned by the swift destruction that hit their homes.

 

“National Guard troops, state police and police officers from numerous Michigan cities converged on the Flint area to aid in the rescue work. Gov. G. Mennen Williams took personal command but did not declare a state of martial law.

 

“The Flint tornado killed many in homes on Coldwater Road and Kurtz Street, before it hedge-hopped eastward through Michigan’s ‘thumb’ toward Lake Huron. It was so powerful it tossed huge trailer trucks off highways and smashed brick houses as though they were matchboxes….

 

“Gov. Williams asked President Eisenhower to declare the Flint area, as well as other Michigan communities, ‘disaster’ areas….

 

“Flint was a sorrowful town this morning. Relatives trooped through the National Guard armory which had been converted into a temporary morgue looking for wives, children and parents….

 

“Nurses and doctors and ambulances came from cities across the lower portion of Michigan. When hospitals ran out of bed space, the injured were placed on floors of the corridors.

 

(Associated Press. “Six Roaring Twisters Hit Michigan and Ohio; State’s Worst Disaster.” Ironwood Daily Globe, MI. 6-9-1953, p. 1.)

 

Sources

 

Associated Press. “Six Roaring Twisters Hit Michigan and Ohio; State’s Worst Disaster.” Ironwood Daily Globe, MI. 6-9-1953, p. 1. Accessed 5-15-2019 at: https://newspaperarchive.com/ironwood-daily-globe-jun-09-1953-p-1/

 

Associated Press. “249 Tornadoes Are Recorded Over Nation.” Middletown, OH. 6-10-1953, p. 1. Accessed 5-15-2019 at: https://newspaperarchive.com/middletown-journal-jun-10-1953-p-1/

 

Bloomberg. “Missouri Officials Debate Joplin Deaths.” 5-24-2011. Accessed at:  http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-24/storms-may-sweep-across-u-s-plains-after-tornado-that-killed-at-least-116.html

 

Brooks, Harold E. and Charles A Doswell III (NOAA/National Severe Storms Laboratory).  “Normalized Damage from Major Tornadoes in the United States: 1890-1999.” Revised manuscript submitted as Note to Weather and Forecasting, Vol. 16, 9 p., Sep 2000.  Accessed 11-25-2017 at: http://www.nssl.noaa.gov/users/brooks/public_html/damage/tdam1.html

 

Carbin, Greg, Joe Schaefer, Roger Edwards. The 15 Deadliest U.S. Tornado Days since 1950.  Storm Prediction Center, NOAA. 10-12-2009 at: http://www.spc.noaa.gov/faq//tornado/fatalday.htm

 

Grazulis, Thomas P. “Descriptions of the Top Ten US Killer Tornadoes #9: The Flint Tornado.”  Accessed 10/12/2009 at: http://www.tornadoproject.com/toptens/9.htm#top

 

Grazulis, Thomas P. Significant Tornadoes 1680-1991: A Chronology and Analysis of Events. St. Johnsbury, VE: Environmental Films, 1993, 1,326 pages.

 

Grazulis, Thomas P. The Tornado: Nature’s Ultimate Windstorm. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2001, 324 pages.

 

HistoryOrb.com. Today in Michigan History. At:  http://www.historyorb.com/countries/usa/michigan

 

Levine, Mark. F5: Devastation, Survival, and the Most Violent Tornado Outbreak of the Twentieth Century. New York: Miramax Books, 2007.

 

Ludlum, David M. The American Weather Book. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1982.

 

National Weather Service Weather Forecast Office, Detroit/Pontiac, MI. Beecher 50^th Anniversary Commemoration, 1953 Beecher Tornado. June 2003. Accessed 5-15-2019 at: https://www.weather.gov/dtx/1953beecher

 

National Weather Service Forecast Office, Paducah, KY. 1925 Tri-State Tornado: A Look Back. NWS, NOAA. Nov 2, 2005 update. Accessed at: http://www.crh.noaa.gov/pah/1925/

 

Storm Prediction Center. The 25 Deadliest U.S. Tornadoes. Norman, OK: SPC, National Weather Service. NOAA. Accessed 10-12-2008 at: http://www.spc.noaa.gov/faq/tornado/killers.html

 

 

 

 

[1] Includes one heart attack death and one post-tornado electrocution.

[2] Grazulis. Significant Tornadoes. 1993, p. 973.

[3] Grazulis notes that “This tornado was in the same family as the Flint tornado, and its one death is often added to the Flint total.”

[4] Grazulis. Significant Tornadoes. 1993, p. 974.

[5] Since an AP report the next day referred to eight deaths in Wood County, which includes Cygnet, we assume death toll was downgraded.

[6] Associated Press. “249 Tornadoes Are Recorded Over Nation.” Middletown, OH. 6-10-1953, p. 1.