The big hurricane of 1933. Yes, it was a hurricane way up North here in Michigan. It was not a tornado. No churning or spinning around from those winds. Just flat line winds that came from the west, and then turned around and gave us another pounding from the East.
It was early morning. I was on McDonald's Island with two of my high school girlfriends, Ethel and Norma Ray. Our parents were in Detroit - they had absolute trust in us, because when they said "Don't leave the island" - we didn't. When they said "no boys in the house", we didn't have any boys in the house. Ah, such long distance control they had over us in those days.
I awoke to an eerie stillness, where the sky was strangely yellow and ominous. In panic I called out to the girls in the other room to get downstairs right away. They could recognize the urgency in my voice and we all three piled down the stairway to the first floor of the cottage.
And then it hit. (In those days storms came upon you with no warning as there were no weather predicting agencies.) There were five big poplar trees at the western part of the island near Long Point Bay, These trees were used as a landmark, as we could always find our way back to our little island by locating those five poplars, like sentinels all in a row. The wind tore all those poplars down in one fell swoop, came barrelling across the marsh behind us and started its barrage at our cluster of cottages.
It tore the shingles off the next-door cottage. We saw them peel off one sheet at a time, as we coward under the big oak table in the dining area. Then, all sorts of debris banged into our windows, wheelbarrows, boats, wooden swings, everything that wasn't nailed down. The windows were broken, one by one, while a big willow came crashing down on our roof falling into the bedrooms we had just vacated. Big willows were yanked out of the ground and we marvelled at the tangle of white roots that were exposed.
Every boat on the island was blown out into the channel. It became dark as night. All the outhouses were, of course, blown over - except ours! My father had built a little dock from the cottage to the outhouse, as a I was afraid to walk on the ground at night. Snakes, you know! Well, that little dock held that outhouse upright. And for several days we had line-ups to use our outhouse, while our neighbors built new accommodations.
We thought we would all be blown into the blackened channel ourselves. Then, the wind turned around and hit us from the front. Couldn't believe it.
In those days, people didn't steal boats. They were all returned to us by the residents of Harsen's Island, across the Middle Channel, even though they had problems of their own.
Months later when my father was rebuilding our cottage, he found one of my socks which had blown between the walls.
My friend of 75 years, Ethel, often recalls that terrible day when for the grace of God our little cottage - and that big oak dining table - gave us sanctuary from the big storm of 1933.
Lorraine