SPEAKING OF HURRICANES

A YEAR AGO, at the opening of College, the usual formalities were overlooked because part of the student body was marooned throughout New England by the hurricane and everyone in Hanover was occupied with digging out from under the storm's debris. In his Reminiscences ofHanover William W. Dewey has something to say about a storm that hit Hanover 150- odd years ago, which we reprint thanks to the eagle eye of Miss Mildred Saunders of the Baker Library Archives:

"About Midsummer 1787 or 8 & about 4 o Clock P M of the third successive Day of hard 8c almost incessant rain a tremendous tornado came in from S S East with a violence unparralled here before & sweeping down the tall pines thickly around us & seemingly threatening to prostrate our dwellings & to bury us under them— Whole acres of forest we would see bow before the wind seeming ready to yeild to its force untill the wind would subside somewhat when the treetops would rise again save those that were uptorn & such we could see their fall & hear their crashing in every direction— The dry pines were very near our dwellings all about us 8c standing detached in open land they semed to find little mercy from the wind— It was a season of no little anxiety while the gale lasted which was perhaps three fourths of an hour—

"The roads were filled with fallen trees. We could not pass one mile north of here untill more than 40 large trees were cut away in the road the next day— A new unfinished house in the village was so badly shattered that it was almost ruined & several other buildings were considerably injured.

On the sea coast the gale was still more violent— Some Sea fowls—called Gullswere driven in the storm as far north as Lebanon."