THE 'TORNADO KIDS' WILL BE GRAND MARSHALS
Desloge Class of 1958 holds 50th reunion
By C. CLINE, Daily Journal Staff Writer
Aug 30, 2008
Pat AuBuchon looks at her senior yearbook from 1958.
DESLOGE — It’s been 50 years since they posed by the railroad tracks
in Desloge for their senior picture. For 44 seniors at Desloge High School, the railroad
tracks were the glue that held their class together. After a tornado destroyed their
school the end of their junior year, the Class of 1958 attended class during their senior
year in four rail cars that were parked on the railroad tracks. On Saturday the Class of
1958 will gather again near the railroad tracks for their 50th reunion.
“Of the 44 in the class, we are expecting 23 at the reunion,” said Pat AuBuchon.
“We are going to recreate our senior class photo by the railroad tracks. The last
time we all got together was for our 20th anniversary. It’s going to be emotional
seeing everyone again. The tornado made us all very close.”
On May 21, 1957, a tornado devastated Desloge. Nine people were killed by the twister as
the city suffered massive destruction.
“My dad was in World War II,” AuBuchon said. “He used to talk about all of
the destruction. It reminded me of that. All you could see was just rubble.”
AuBuchon said anybody that was near Desloge that day has a story to tell about where they
were when the tornado hit.
“I was 16 years old at the time and was working at Venker’s Drugs across from
the railroad tracks,” she said. “I was looking out the window and drying a
glass. I didn’t know a tornado was coming. I kept staring at the sky and kept
thinking that Grandma always said a tornado would never hit here because of the chat
dumps. A customer then grabbed me and opened up a trap door in the floor. He shoved me
down in it. I don’t know how he knew about that hole because I didn’t even know
about it. Everything got so eerily still.”
She said the school nearby exploded. Her home was up on Chestnut, which was where her
parents were at the time. When her parents heard the school explode, they feared the worst
for their daughter. Her boyfriend at the time Mel AuBuchon, now her husband of 50 years,
also was frantic and feared the worst.
“I remember my Dad came and got me,” AuBuchon said. “Our house on Chestnut
was still standing. My grandfather built the house in 1925. The tornado actually twisted
the house on the foundation to where it was just off kilter. Before the tornado you could
look out the kitchen and see if someone was at the front door. After it hit, you
couldn’t do that anymore. The basement has leaked ever since, but we were some of the
lucky ones. Some people lost everything.”
Pat still lives in the home with Mel. It’s the only home she has ever known. The
Class of 1958 used her garage, which still stands in the backyard, to build each of their
class floats.
“I don’t know how we all crammed in there, but we did it,” she said.
“There are a lot of memories in there.”
AuBuchon said she is inviting her fellow classmates back to the old garage for an after
party following the reunion.
Delores McGrael lived just east of Bonne Terre when the tornado hit. She had left the
school late that day and had only been gone 15 minutes when it hit.
“My home had been destroyed the year before by a tornado,” McGrael said.
“So I was very afraid. I didn’t find out that the tornado had hit Desloge until
I got home that day. You could hear the sirens going off and see the lightning.”
She said one thing that sticks out in her mind about her senior year is the time it took
to get from class to class.
“You didn’t have just five minutes in between classes,” McGrael said.
“How ever long it took you to get there, that’s how long you had. We have lots
of memories. We were a small class anyway, but the tornado just brought us that much
closer.”
Earl Coleman was in Farmington at the time working for a contractor when the tornado hit.
He said he heard it touching down in Desloge all the way in Farmington.
“Our house suffered considerable damage,” he said. “A neighbor lady was
killed. I remember a pickup truck from Cantwell School was blown up onto the Baptist
Church on Chestnut.”
He said the experience of the tornado gave the Class of 1958 a common bond.
“I wouldn’t want anyone else to have to go through that, but I wouldn’t
have wanted to miss what we went through our senior year.”
Dean Richardson describes how big the hail was
that fell on Desloge on May 21, 1957.
Dean Richardson had just gotten off the school bus and barely made it into his house when
the tornado hit.
“My dog was a couple of feet behind me and didn’t make it,” he said.
“There was hail falling that had to be a foot in diameter. There was a nearby farm
where all the chickens had lost their feathers. My neighbor was killed in the tornado. He
had $9,000 in cash inside the house. The money was blown and scattered into the nearby
woods. I can remember all of the neighbors getting together and gathering up the money.
Nobody kept any of it. It was all returned to the surviving family members.”
Dick Boyer was the student body president at the time of the tornado and was also the
president of the Class of 1958. He said he learned later that the tornado had a lot to do
with him getting elected president.
“I didn’t know this until several years later, but the ballot box for student
body president was blown away before the votes had been counted,” Boyer said.
“Instead of having another election Mr. (Clarence) Brightwell (high school principal)
declared me the winner.”
When the tornado hit, Boyer was in his basement with his mother, his sister, his brother
Charlie and a couple of neighbors.
“We were lucky, we only lost a couple of shingles,” he said.
Boyer said the school administration should be really commended because they only had two
to three months to put plans in place for the next school year.
“How they did it, I don’t know,” he said. “They really had a lot of
work to do. It was a different year for everyone, but everybody took it in stride and made
the best of it.”
He recalled spending time with his classmates at Dunks Pool Hall, even though it was
supposed to be off limits to students.
“We went anyway and would always post someone at the door to make sure the principal
wasn’t coming,” Boyer said with a laugh.”
The Class of 1958 took their senior trip to Daytona Beach. Boyer said the first stop on
the trip was the Grand Ole Opry where the seniors saw Johnny Cash.
The class reunion will be held from 4-8 p.m. today at Celebration Hall. On Sunday the
Class of 1958 will have an EZ Up Tent set up in the northeast corner of the Desloge Park
to socialize. On Monday the senior class will serve as the grand marshals for the annual
Labor Day parade.
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