My 1963 Cherry Tree Flood Memories

By Bob Piros
In Memory of my Dad Joe Piros Sr., who died on January 11, 1962.

This info was taken from the US Weather Bureau in Washington, DC for March 1963: “Due to the extremely warm weather in the mid-50s and the snow on the WV mountains melted faster than usual. At the same, there were heavy rain downpours in WV and Ohio. The Ohio River reached flood stage on March 6 and for that time, it was The longest flood on record in Cincinnati was when the Ohio River remained above flood stage for 22 consecutive days.”

After my Dad died in 1962, my Mom (Helen) and I tried to keep the Egg business going as a source of income. Dan Thompson had worked for my Dad for four years and kept working for us driving our two trucks.

Dan, 22 and wife Peggy lived in Mt. Gay in a house with other family members.

In 1963, I was 16 and got my driver’s license and was able to drive the Chevy truck.

My Dad had routes in the Ohio farming areas in Peebles, West Union and Decatur. He used a 1958 International truck with a wooden bed built in it to carry a larger load of eggs, leaving at 6 am on a Saturday coming back at 10 pm. For local Logan County deliveries to the coal mining communities, he used the Chevy pickup.

On March 6th, my Mom returned home after having Gallbladder surgery. She was confined to the upstairs of our two-story home in Cherry Tree. My Aunt Anna Tarkany owned the Duplex after her husband Steve died in 1949. Steve was my Mom’s brother. He had owned  Handy Andy Grocery in Cherry Tree.

On March 9th, Dan took the International truck down to Ohio to do the routes. On his way back, he said that the Ohio River was running bank to bank and many of the low lying area roads were flooded out, but he was able to get back to Logan. He said the brakes were almost out on the truck. I called John Bush who lived across the street from me with his wife Anna. I asked him if he thought the truck would be ok to drive to Logan. He said,” why you don’t bring it over and leave it in my garage as the water will never get up that high to harm it.”

On March 10th, Dan borrowed the Chevy to move his family to a safer area. When he brought the truck back at 8 am on March 11, he said that only the Blvd road was open. There were only a few inches of water in Cherry Tree at that time so we decided to take the vehicles down to Logan but the floodwaters had already reached the City, so we parked the vehicles in the parking lot at Logan General Hospital.

Dan and I walked back on the railroad tracks. It was a cloudy day but no rain, in about mid- 50s. I took some photos along the way. Dan went to Mt. Gay and I went home to Cherry Tree.

When I got home the water was already knee-deep in the back yard, so I had to climb up over a fence that ran along the track area and drop down to the fence that separated the two yards. Then I jumped over to my porch.  After entering the house, the water was ankle deep so I checked on my Mom and took some food, milk, water and sodas from the refrigerator and took them up the 12 steps to her.

I started unplugging everything, took jackets out of the hall closet, going into the dining room and started pulling out drawers and stacking them as I didn’t think the water would reach the ceiling. I turned off the gas stoves that we had in each room.

Looking out the windows I saw a 6’ tree log floating along the side of the house. I suppose that it must have come through the creek culvert floating through the back alley and over our fence to get beside our house and our neighbor’s fence. It was still there when the water went down.

The water kept rising in the house and I had to go up to the second floor. It got almost to the ceiling on the first floor, close to the 6th step.

During the ordeal which I think lasted three days, a boat came by with two men in it and asked me if we needed to leave the house. I walked out to the edge of the roof as they were about a foot below the roof and told them that my Mom couldn’t climb out of the window due to her surgery.

I think that these were the same men who cut a hole in the attic area to get John and Anna Bush out as they were trapped there. Before the water started rising, my Aunt Anna had asked them to stay at her house and they said: “we’ll be ok in our attic as the water won’t get up that high.”

Walking on the railroad tracks behind us, Dan came by to check on us. I would stand on the back roof and throw some money to him in a bag and he went somewhere and got us some food and throw the bag back standing on the cable shop roof.

I spent some of my time visiting with my Aunt and we searched everywhere upstairs for her camera film as we knew this was a historical moment that needed to be recorded. No luck.

In the end, the water went down and it took about two weeks to clean up the mess. Our refrigerator was hosed out and after it dried, it worked for many years. The Red Cross replaced our furniture. I think we had to buy a new gas stove. My Aunt Anna had to replace her floor furnace. We lost our 1958 International truck in John Bush’s garage, he gave us some money for the motor.

The loss of the truck made it hard for us to stay in business with only one truck. Therefore In June 1964 we quit the business and moved to California.