(upbeat music)
- [Narrator] This
is a production of
South Dakota Public
Broadcasting.
Program funding is made possible
with your membership
and with corporate support from
Casey Peterson, Financial
Advisors and CPAs.
Helping organizations,
businesses,
and individuals
achieve their financial
goals since 1977.
And by Rapid City attorney
Brian Hagg of Hagg
& Hagg Law Firm
who characterized
the flood this way.
"Out of tragedy came
a strong resolve
to rebuild a better Rapid City.
This is our legacy.
Support for SDPB Documentaries
is also provided by
the Leo P. Flynn Estate,
Kitty Kinsman and Steve Zellmer
and by Charles and Kay Riter.
- [Robb] The Rapid City mayor,
Don Barnett said
a few minutes ago,
that's been about 10:40 PM
that any citizens living
on property abutting Rapid Creek
should leave immediately.
He said all of those properties
throughout the city
should be abandoned.
The mayor said that to quote,
"The situation is going
to get a lot worse
before it gets better."
- [Woman Survivor]
I just remember
that there wasn't any water
and then there was.
(camera snapping)
- [Man Survivor] It uh...
it happened so damn fast.
- [Man Survivor] And just
literally in seconds,
the water's up to
my knees and stuff.
And the current is so strong.
We couldn't make it.
- [Woman Survivor]
Pretty soon there was
a great big log came up
right by the windshield.
(camera snapping)
- [Woman Survivor]
I remember stuff
coming through this speedometer,
water coming through
this speedometer
and it opened up the,
the glove compartment.
And you know all
of the, the radio.
- [Man Survivor] There was
no swimming that night,
I'm telling you were just
moving with the current.
And as fast as you were
moving in the current
things were going by you
like ruptured propane tanks.
Well when they hit something,
they would explode like a bomb.
- [Man Survivor]
And you could hear
from where we were
people screaming
and the river running
and this and that.
And then pretty soon,
they wouldn't scream anymore.
- [Man Survivor] There
was a great big chunk
of the roof hanging up
in a Cottonwood tree about
a quarter of a
mile East of here.
And we measured it
and it measured 27 feet
from that piece of roof
down to the crick bottom.
So that's how deep the water got
coming through this area here.
- [Man Survivor] I
looked ahead and,
and I thought,
"My God, that's a house
coming down the road.
How can there be a
house in the road?"
- [Man Survivor]
Two story houses
were floating like a cork.
Just bobbed away.
- [Man Survivor] Lots and lots
of thunder and lightning
and people screaming
and yelling,
"Help, help!"
And there's no way
you could help 'em.
(camera snapping)
- [Man Survivor] It looked
like it'd been hit by bombs.
- [Man Survivor]
There was just not
a single board
left of the house.
- [Man Survivor] The magnitude,
I didn't have a clue
there were gonna be 230 plus
people die.
- [Man Survivor] Terrible,
terrible experiences.
Finding people that's just
like picking up jello.
They were so broke
up from the water,
just beating them up.
- [Man Survivor] It
was almost like well,
I don't know.
Like death was hanging
over the whole area.
(dramatic piano music)
- [Narrator] Friday
June 9th, 1972.
An air mass pushes
up the Eastern slopes
of South Dakota's Black Hills.
Powerful thunderstorms develop,
winds are weak
so the storms hover
over the mountains.
Some locations receive
15 inches of rain in six hours.
Flood warnings are issued,
but no one comprehends the scale
of what's about to happen.
A flood surge,
like a liquid
avalanche rolls down
Rapid Creek toward Rapid City.
50 years ago one of the nation's
deadliest natural
disasters begins.
Around 9:00 PM rain is falling
and the water is
rising in Rapid Creek.
29 year old Rapid City Mayor.
Don Barnett is on
the city's West side,
monitoring the situation.
- I had not put the
warning out yet.
And I went to the upper
levels of Canyon Lake,
where there was an
old wooden bridge
that crossed at the
very top of Canyon Lake.
And it was about 300 yards
downstream from
the fish hatchery.
And I pulled off
the side of the road
and I saw a crew from
Montana Dakota Utilities,
and they were pulling on
a industrial size wrench
trying to get the
natural gas service,
which was attached to that
old wooden rotten bridge.
And so the manager
of the gas company,
George Miller ran over,
he said,
"Come on mayor,
give us a hand!"
So I stepped out
willing to help.
And I would say
within five seconds,
I was wet from
the top of my head
to the bottom of my toes.
And we reached over there
and it was about a six
or seven foot wrench,
and we all pulled on it
and we heard the,
"Crunch, crunch, crunch."
And within about a minute,
we had that gas
line blocked off.
And we looked up and
saw this small car.
It was rolling in the creek
and going up and
down and underwater.
And it looked to be in terrible,
terrible danger.
And George said,
"My goodness Don,
I hope nobody's in that car."
And then the car hit
the wooden bridge
and went under
and got blocked with something.
And a few minutes later,
we were standing there
the crew was ready to move on
to the next challenge.
And George said,
"My goodness Don,
somebody could get
killed in this thing."
And then I heard this crunch
and the bridge imploded
and floated into the
middle of Canyon Lake.
And I looked at George,
I said,
"I'm gonna find a phone
and put out the
warning right now.
- [Narrator] Captain
James Whitehead
is sent West of Rapid City
after a day of training
with the National Guard.
- [James] We were down at
the Daisy Dell Drive In
for supper that night
when it started raining.
And when I got home,
it was all over
the radio that uh,
we were supposed to report
to our duty station.
They dispatched another,
major and I.
I was a captain at the time,
up to Johnson sighting to see
what the weather
was like up there.
And we got down this far
on 44 where the
water was running
across the road from
that other canyon there.
So we couldn't even
go any further.
And then there was
an older couple,
would've been about 50 yards
from where we left him
and they were just
standing out there
and the water was
about chest high then.
And so I helped them
get into a tree.
And I figured it was about time
for me to get into a tree.
So I got up into one of
these big Oak trees here
and pretty dark.
And all of a sudden,
something hit the,
hit the tree.
And it was a house
that floated down
and hit the tree.
And...
I thought,
"Whoa boy you know,
it was really,
I could feel the roots popping.
And while I was in the tree,
I'd just shake the
tree every time
one of them big
roots would break.
And I thought,
(chuckling)
"Well if this tree goes over,
the only choice is to jump
on the roof of the house
and see what
happens after that."
But...
it held and uh,
and then the water you know,
it just kept going
and it was just so noisy.
You couldn't hear somebody,
But I seen propane tanks,
semis going down through here,
houses...
whenever the lightning
would light it up to
where you could see.
And it was just,
it was really terrible.
- [Narrator] Teenager
Robbie Corner
is out with friends,
looking at flood damage.
When they return to his
mother's creekside home
on the city's far Western edge,
they find it surrounded
by fast moving water.
- So we stood there and debated,
you know should we try
to get to the house?
But about that point...
houses started washing by
where we were standing there
and propane tanks.
And propane tanks were
hitting trees and exploding.
And people were on the roof,
roofs of the houses
that were floating by
and they were screaming.
Um...
And so you know,
we could just see there's,
there's no way
we're gonna be able
to get to the house
and hoped that they had
gotten out of there
while we were gone.
The water was just washing
over the highway down here.
It was coming out of
Nameless Cave Road
and that canyon,
and it was just
like pouring over
the highway
embankment right here,
down into this canyon.
And I can,
I can remember that it
sounded like a freight train.
I mean you couldn't just
talk in a normal voice.
You had to like yell
because that was so loud.
And uh...
so before too long,
some National Guard
were going up the highway there.
And I guess,
we were yelling at 'em
to see if there's
any way they could,
you know do something
to see if my mom
and my neighbors had escaped.
And they said there was
nothing they could do.
And they also told us
we couldn't stay there
where we were standing.
And so we put up an argument,
but they basically
just grabbed us
and hauled us up the hill
and the house which is
now Mid-State Camper Sales
was owned then by a family
by the name of Paseka.
And so they took
us up to that house
and all night long
they were bringing in
other people into that house.
- [Narrator] Dave
Baumberger was moving items
out of his father's
low lying home,
along Rapid Creek.
- [Dave] And we came in,
my dad,
and a old friend of
the family and me
and we walked in
and we walked to the house
and we started getting
some stuff out of the house.
And the water
started coming up in
higher than we were
comfortable with.
And we decided we
should get out.
And there was a neighbor family
next to my folks
that uh...
Had three boys
and the mother and father.
And there was a lady across,
they lived on a small
cul-de-sac with four houses.
There was a lady across
that was left there too.
And...
we tried to walk out
and the water was coming up
too fast to get walked out.
So we decided we'd go
to the highest house,
which was uh...
the lady across the...
cul-de-sac.
And we got in the house
and...
we were waiting for
a rescue or whatever.
I don't know.
But anyway,
the water kept coming up and up.
And when the refrigerator
started floating in the kitchen,
we found a way to
get into the attic.
And we got up into the
attic of the house.
The water was coming up
in three or four foot...
increments at a time.
It wasn't just a
steady, slow rise.
So...
eventually the house
started shifting
off the foundation
and started breaking apart.
And we were all in the
attic at that time.
And the roof broke apart.
And...
to be honest with you,
I don't know what happened
with everybody else.
I got out through the
fracture in the roof.
I got out of the house
and I got carried by the water
down to the...
lake shore.
And I got hung up in a tree.
And so I stayed in the tree
until the tree next to me,
tipped over.
And the lightning was flashing
bright enough that night,
that it just lit everything up
like daylight when it did flash.
And I...
in one of the
flashes of lightning,
there was a big inner
tube come floating by
and I made a jump for it.
Cause I figured,
"Well my tree's next.
If that tree went."
And I missed it.
And I got out in the lake
and I was swimming to the shore
and I'm guessing I was maybe
20 to 25 feet off shore.
And...
the dam broke.
- [Narrator] The Canyon Lake Dam
holds back Rapid Creek
on the city's West side.
Stream gauges above the lake
record a rise of 13
feet in four hours.
At about 10:45 PM the
Canyon Lake Dam ruptures,
Dave Baumberger is in the lake,
when it happens.
- [Dave] I knew because
the way the water went.
The water just
started rushing out.
I mean,
immediately.
So I went down
and through where the
dam was in the spillway.
And...
I don't know.
I was swimming,
but I was,
I didn't know if I was
swimming up or down.
Half the time,
to be honest with you.
And...
after that,
I just started
bouncing off stuff,
going down downstream.
And I wound up down
close to where the mortuary is
on Jackson Boulevard.
- [Narrator] About a mile
downstream of the dam,
pastor Ron Masters
and his wife LaVonne
are preparing to evacuate
with their five children.
Including their oldest
daughter, Karen.
- Well when we decided to leave,
there was water
gushing downstairs.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- [Karen] Don't
you remember that?
- [Ron] Right.
- [LaVonne] Yeah.
- [Ron] It was coming
into our basement
and we had a Mercury
and then we had a 65
International four wheel drive,
and I said,
"Let's take the
four wheel drive."
So we got out
and got in it
and then came across the,
just across the bridge
and the current caught us,
if we'd have had another,
- The first wall
of water came.
- If we'd have had another...
15 seconds.
- Yeah.
- Or less we'd have
been ahead of it.
But the first wall
of water caught us
and swept us right across,
over here in the trees,
right over there.
- [Karen] The picture
doesn't show it real well,
but we were kind of backed
up against three trees.
- [Ron] Yes.
The back bumper.
- [Karen] That's why
I think...
- [Ron] the tree...
- [Karen] That's why I think
we didn't get...
- [Ron] But that tree held it.
It was about,
that much of the back bumper
that kept us
forced between these two trees.
- You know what's
interesting though.
I just wanna say,
in our vehicle,
there was peace.
We all...
were telling each other
that we loved each other.
And we all thought we were
gonna be in heaven together
was what we thought,
because we thought there
was no way to get out.
And then dad just felt
really prompted to move and,
and get some of us out.
- Because I had in the vehicle,
I had my nose to
the ceiling already.
And I said to God,
I said,
"God, are you threw
really through with me,
is this time for
me to come home?"
- And it was about then
that Jonathan or Steven,
our oldest son
said to his dad,
he said,
"Dad this is all in God's hands.
- And that's the last
word we heard him say.
- And then Jonathan said to me,
he said,
"I just love you so much."
- Oh, he came up and
hugged your neck.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
And I uh...
that's when I,
when I said,
"God, are you through with me?"
That's when I just started
acting without thinking,
I...
it was just like,
everything was automatic then.
That's when I let my legs
float up over LaVonne
and kicked the window
on the opposite side
where I was sitting
and then was able to
get out through that,
reached out and pulled her out
and then reached in for Karen.
- [Narrator] While Ron is
pulling 14 year old Karen
out of the vehicle.
The raging current sweeps
two year old Timothy away.
- And that was because
I was holding him
when I got pulled out.
- And he was just two.
- So he was two and a half.
- Yeah.
- He was my buddy.
We were buds.
- Yeah.
And I lost him.
- [Narrator] Water
covers their car,
Ron, LaVonne and Karen struggle
to survive in the roiling
debris filled current.
They fear the other children,
Joanne, Stephen and Jonathan
have not survived.
- Once I got out of the vehicle.
- Yep.
I had LaVonne where
I held onto her
with one arm like this
from about 10:30 at night,
till four o'clock
in the morning.
Just hung on.
- [LaVonne] And I
had a hold of...
- [Ron] She had a hold...
- [LaVonne] Branch...
- [Ron] Branch of the...
- [LaVonne] Up above my head
tree and she said to me
several times in the night,
"Honey, just let me go."
And I said,
"I'm not gonna let you go."
And it was,
- I was getting so tired.
oh, miraculous the way
I could hang on to her.
And Karen was like,
right where she is now,
she was hanging on.
- I climbed a little tree
that was there.
- She found a little tree
was being protected
by one of these big ones.
And it, so the water kind of
swirled around her this way.
- [Narrator] Rapid Creek
continues its swollen rampage.
Knocking out electrical power
and throwing flood
victims into darkness.
Tom Haggerty is in bed
at his parents' home.
- [Tom] My dad
started yelling for me
at like one in the morning,
got me out bed.
And uh...
we lived on
Lanark Road which is about a
not a full block from where
the main force of the
water came through.
And the water was hitting
the front of our house.
And it was,
there was so much pressure
that it was raising
our garage doors.
So my dad had me come out
and help him tie down
the garage doors.
When we opened the ground
level door from the garage
about a foot and a half of water
came falling into the house.
Anyway we closed up
the garage doors.
There was not any light.
I mean you know,
if you've been in a cave
and you know what it's like
when they turn off the lights,
that's what it was
like that night.
Except there was this,
this huge sound
of water rushing.
And I mean it was
just like this roar.
And we went out
on our back porch
since the water was going around
both sides of our house.
And it was probably
a couple feet deep.
And so we were on our back porch
and in our backyard is a pond,
it's still there today.
Well the water was running
straight back down
behind our house.
And it was very eerie
because you could hear
people screaming for help
as they floated by.
But I couldn't see...
you.
I mean it was so dark.
It was,
you couldn't see anything
past the length of your arm.
Occasionally there'd
be lightning strikes,
but even that you couldn't see
cause the clouds were so thick.
And uh...
Anyway I sat there with,
stood there with my dad
and my neighbor Fuzz Ewing
and talking about
what could we do
to help these people
that we had heard
screaming floating past
and we didn't have a rope.
We couldn't see anything.
It would've been suicide
to try to go down
and you'd never found
the people, anyway.
So it was just a
horrible situation.
- [Narrator] Just
west of downtown,
surging floodwater
from Rapid Creek
rises around a car filled
with six teenagers.
They pull into a parking lot
near the multi-story
Rushmore building,
looking for protection.
- As soon as we stop the car
behind Payless shoe store,
Kay just instantly
jumps outta the car
and takes off running
to the Rushmore building.
And there was fire escape
ladders in the back.
- And I just ran you know,
I saw the fire escape
and it was like,
"Well that's off the ground,
fire escape it's safe."
- And she made it and I said,
"Let's go!
And just literally in seconds,
the water's up to
my knees and stuff.
And the current is so strong.
We couldn't make it.
- So I got over here
and got up there.
Well then I was
hollering at em',
you know and,
but it was getting loud by then.
And um...
I uh you know,
said...
was motioning and
hollering you know,
"Come over!"
You know, "Come over here."
And uh...
Ed.
The other gentleman
that had gotten in the
car with Gayle and I,
he tried to bring
Gale over to me.
But by that time the
water was too swift.
They couldn't get through.
So they went back over.
Were attempting to get up
on top of the roof when
the wall of water came.
- So we're back there,
we're looking for a tree
or anything that
we can get up on.
And then I spot
some plumbing pipes
coming outta the top
corner of the building.
And I said,
"You know I can get in my car
and I'll pull it up next
to the side of the building.
Then I can jump up on the roof
and I can grab those pipes
and I'll pull you guys all up."
Well as soon as I
went over the car
and opened up the car door,
I looked up and the back wall
of the building blew out.
- [Narrator] Ed Healy
and Gayle Nemeti
are standing near the wall
when it blows out,
their bodies are found later.
- I saw the wall come down,
you know wash out
and take,
Ed and Gayle where...
he was trying to
help her up there.
And um...
I saw them
and um...
shoe boxes,
the inside of the
building, you know?
And so then I ran up.
That's when,
that's when I ran from here
up to the next one,
cause I couldn't
get in this door.
So I ran up to the next one
and that door was open.
- The car shot straight
back into a tree.
I was hanging onto the car door.
And then I see Randy
and John are on the back
bumper still hanging on.
So I work my way back to them
and as we're hanging
on to the bumper,
well the water just
keeps increasing
and it's shooting over
the roof of the car
and it's like being
underneath a waterfall.
It was drowning us.
And we looked at each
other and we said,
"I hope to see you
again tomorrow."
And we all just let
go and took off.
- [Narrator] Arlene
Mattis is in a vehicle
with her husband Jack,
her sister Millie Raywalt
and Millie's husband, Gene.
They reach the center of town
and encounter high water.
Their car stalls.
So they get in with another
man who's driving by.
- He got us all up there
and there was a rack
on top of the car
and we all five got up there
and floated on that car
until a little roof came by.
Cause there was some kind of,
a little camping thing I think
was at that intersection
at the time.
And...
so we got on this roof
when that roof came by,
we five got on this roof.
And then we floated
a while on there
and a bigger roof come by
and we all stepped across
and got on there.
Because we were a little
higher up from the water.
And we were on there for a while
and all the while these,
these um...
gas tank things
were going by and
fire, and
logs,
and then about that time
kind of a...
little smaller house came
and it came by us
so we all got on there
and about the time
we all got on there,
it split.
And my husband just
got over with us.
We were all on there.
And when it's where he split,
he just stepped across.
And half of it
went down the crick
and then we kept going on down.
We were not too far from Omaha
heading East on this house.
And then a bigger house came.
It was a little bigger.
So we all crawled
up on that house.
And then...
we floated on that for a while
and then a bigger house came
and we all got on
that bigger house.
And then this house
was big enough
that it went down about well,
Rice Cycle was
across the street.
We were about right,
where Rice Cycle was
on the other side of Omaha
and it,
this house wedged
up against a tree
and uh...
there was two big trees I think.
And then there was
a trailer house
that was kind of wedged.
And our house caught there.
And that's where it stayed.
- [Narrator] Denny Bohls is
at A and B Welding Supply
playing cards with coworkers.
They plan to spend the night
protecting the store's
merchandise from high water.
- [Denny] We heard a
knock at the back door
and went to back door
to see who it was.
It happened to be one
of our employees wives.
And she says,
"Well..."
He to be in Sioux Falls.
On the way back from Sioux Falls
with a transport.
And she said,
"Well tell Joe
that we're gonna
go to the church.
The police just told
us to evacuate."
So we were by the back
door of the building,
which was on the North side.
And we looked out at the
pickup she was driving
and the pickup was
already starting to float.
And she had her two
girls in the pickup.
So myself and the other employee
ran out and we got the girls
out of the pickup,
headed back to the store.
And before,
when we got back to the store,
we turned around and looked
and the pickup was
floating away already.
(camera snapping)
And then we saw our neighbors,
which was right to the
South of the building.
They were walking,
they were trying to
across New York street
and they couldn't get across.
So we let 'em in the building.
And we no more got
in the building,
we heard something crack
and it turned around and looked
and the cinder block building
which was on the West side
of the building cracked.
And it started coming in.
So we headed to the East,
the front of the building,
which was on the East side
to get it out.
And we got to the
front of the building
and we couldn't
get the door open
because there was so
much pressure on the,
on the building itself.
So my boss Harold,
kicked the glass out
and he went out
and the neighbors went out.
A man, woman and their son.
And then um...
And then that's,
they just went in the dark
we just lost them.
That's when we,
that's when we got
pushed up in the corner
and climbed up in the counter
and stayed there all night long
and the water was coming
up inside the building,
getting deeper and deeper
and I kicked the plate
glass window out,
the front window out
to let the water release
and let it run through.
And uh...
we sat on that,
or stood on that,
that counter...
should I say.
And I had one of the girls
and the other employee
had the other girl,
and that was midnight.
And we watched
houses floating by
with people with flashlights
and people hollering.
And you can see the flashlights
in the upper windows.
These were two story houses.
We see propane tanks floating by
with a fire shooting
out of them.
The National Guard was here.
Uh...
They were following
the crick down
and they were
shooting their flares
so everything had
an orange glow.
(mournful orchestral music)
- [Narrator] Dolores Allen flees
to hire ground with
her husband and nephew
before the flood surge comes.
But she can't
convince her mother
and others to leave a
house near the creek.
- [Delores] While we was walking
away from the house,
it was raining.
And it was like,
people were like
being poured on,
buckets of water were
being poured on us,
but we wrapped up by
nephew in some plastic.
And so that was really
a huge downpour.
And then my mother,
I guess she looked
out the window
and she seen waves coming.
She saying like "Hawaii Five-O."
So she said,
"She's right.
We better get outta here."
And my aunt said,
"No I'm gonna stay.
You know where its warm."
And my mother
and my cousin went running
towards Philadelphia Street
where my mother's house is
and um...
they reached it
and she could hear a thud.
And she knew my,
my cousin got,
she hit a tree.
Of course she died.
And then my mother hung onto
the porch up to the ceiling,
you know the rafter,
she hung there.
She said,
"She had to grab
onto something."
But she was saying
she was praying
and asking for her to let,
or she let me live.
I've got grandchildren
and stuff like that.
And she was up there,
but you know,
the water was still coming up.
So she heard,
or the neighbor,
her neighbor crying,
crying out for help.
And uh...
finally that the
rescue boat came by
and seeing them
and picks them up.
Yeah.
But my cousin was gone.
- [Narrator] As the
water begins to recede
after a night of terror.
Survivors take stock
of the situation.
Local veterinarian
Keith Johnson,
joins friends to look
for people in need of help.
- [Keith] Stan
Lieberman showed up
with a boat right
here on the West
side of Bennet Clarkson Hospital
and Bill Groethe was there
so the three of us
were in his boat
and thought we'd do
what we could to
find some survivors.
So basically that's
got us to this point
where,
uh...
we did see this
Matthew Vanderbeek.
- [Narrator] Matthew
Vanderbeek is 14 years old.
His father, mother, and brother
have died in the flood,
leaving him as the
family's soul survivor.
- [Keith] Hanging in a tree,
shivering and shaking
and worried about his family
more than anything else.
But they,
his family got into a boat
and the family perished.
But uh...
the house stayed intact
if they'd stayed with the house.
This is the upper branches and
sure he went by various trees
trying...
to find his,
to get outta the water.
But uh...
he managed to get,
get up in that tree
and was hanging on.
- [Narrator] Robby Corner
takes shelter for the night,
with others in a house
high above the creek,
hoping his mother has survived.
The flood surrounded her home.
- First light,
my friends and I,
we walked outta the house
and down to the
edge of the highway
and looked over.
And we could see that uh...
if you get rid of that carport,
basically what we were
looking at from up there
was what you're
looking at right here.
There is just not a single
board left of the house.
Um...
And so,
you know,
we really didn't know
what happened to anybody.
Strangely enough,
that house never got hit.
And so what happened was
it kicked a wall out,
um...
but the house remained there.
And uh...
So again,
the speculation is that nothing
floated down and hit it,
but I'm sure where this
house was located here,
there was a lot of
houses coming down,
hitting you know,
one house hitting another house
and so on and so forth
and everything getting
knocked off its foundation.
Um...
So,
I had a neighbor
that was renting
a house right over
here at the time.
And he was,
he had walked out here from town
to see what was going
on with his place.
And so...
we said,
"Well let's walk into Rapid City
and see what's going on
and see if you know,
we can get to a
telephone or something
to let...
my sister know,
try to let my sister know
what was my situation
and my relatives that
lived here in Rapid.
Um...
So we walked into town
and it was,
you know,
it was just a nightmare.
There was fish laying
all over the highway
from Canyon Lake
and the creek.
So one of the friends I was
with was Steve Mills.
And so we walked
over to his house.
He lives near
Steven's High School,
and it was up you know,
away from any
flooding or anything.
And the telephones
worked and so forth.
So I called up to
my uncle's house
up on Frontier drive.
And I told him,
I said,
"Here's where I am.
And do you know
what's going on with my sister?"
And they had heard from her
and she was alive.
Um...
And so,
but I couldn't,
I hadn't heard anything
about my mother.
Well probably about,
I dunno, 4 or 5:00 PM that day
um...
my uncle's neighbor from
up on Frontier drive
came over to Mill's house.
Cause he knew where we were
to pick me up and take me up
to my aunt and uncles.
And he said you know,
"They found your mom
a little bit earlier
and she'd washed a number
of miles down the creek.
They found her body.
- [Narrator] Dave Baumberger
is about two miles downstream.
The house he's in breaks apart
sending nine people
into the water.
- [Dave] I got out
at the mainstream
and off to the side
and there was a pickup stranded
with a family in it.
And...
I couldn't pull myself
into the back end of the pickup.
They were in the box.
And...
I finally,
they got me drug in over
the side somehow or another.
And so until the water receded,
we stayed in the back
end of that pickup.
It was me and one of the,
one of the boys from the family
that survived that night
and seven died.
- [Narrator] Ron
and LaVonne Masters
and their daughter Karen
hold onto trees in the water
all night after their
car is submerged.
They've seen two
year old Timothy
swept away by the current.
They fear the same has happened
to their other children,
Steven, Joanne and Jonathan.
- I heard a voice under my feet.
I couldn't believe
I heard a voice.
And so I laid my
cheek in the water
and I spoke up to the window
and I said
"Who is it?
Who is it?"
And Joanne,
was how old at that time?
- She was eight.
- She was eight.
- Eight.
Came floating right across
- I thought she was 10.
- She was 10.
and came right up...
- She was 10, Ron.
- And looked in my eyes.
- She was 10.
- She was 10.
- I'll never forget
the look in her eyes
like...
- Cause she thought she
was the only one left.
- Cause her two brothers
had died beside her.
- They had suffocated,
- They had suffocated.
The funeral director told us
there was no water in
their lungs at all.
- My sister actually
had to move them
when they died.
So she has her
own story to tell,
but she had to
move them aside.
- But she tried
to talk to them.
- They talked for a while
- But they didn't answer.
- Yeah they talked for awhile
and then they
didn't answer back.
But one of them was sitting.
I don't know that scout had a,
had seats on the side.
And one was sitting there,
she actually had to move him
so that she could keep her feet.
Cause she was in a wall of water
or the water was like
up to here to her
and she just had her
head up at the ceiling.
- And that's the way
- And there wasn't
enough air...
- She lived more many hours.
Well there wasn't enough air
for three of them to survive.
- No.
- There was only
enough air for one
- For one.
Our little two year old son
that had floated all the way
through Rapid City
and was found clear out
where the Open
Bible church is now.
Do you know where
it is out East?
He was caught up
in a tree up there.
And the only way
he was identifiable
was his little
Minnesota Twins jacket
that LaVonne had put on him
before we went to left off.
- [LaVonne] I don't think
you ever get over it.
Ever, ever, ever.
Because they're part of you
and to lose a child is probably
the most traumatic of any death.
- [Narrator] Tom
Haggerty listens
helplessly through the night
to screaming in
his neighborhood.
In the morning he walks
to his father's business.
Haggerty's department store
near the creek in
central Rapid City.
- [Tom] Basically our
store was that size,
not quite as wide,
but the entire front
of that building
was glass panels.
So it was a huge glass front
on that's where,
and all the glass was gone.
And the parking lot of
course was full of mud.
It was full of broken
fixtures from the store.
When I walked through the front,
which used to be,
you know a wall of windows,
there was about...
two to three feet of mud
in the store
and everything was gone.
I mean it was a 40,000
square foot store
and there was no
merchandise left visible
except what happened
to be mounted
up on the walls above
about a five, six foot level.
There's still some
product hanging up there.
But everything else was just,
mud.
And uh...
my dad and his main employees
were standing in front of
the store and just kind of
this helpless look
on their face.
Like what do we do?
- [Narrator] Kay
Schriever escapes
rising flood water
and runs up a fire escape
into the multi-story
Rushmore building
just West of
downtown Rapid City.
- I ran literally ran into
because it was dark.
Couldn't see anything.
I just felt my
way down the hall.
And I ran into some people
and um...
it was,
the people that were
from the radio station
that was here.
And they had move
it up to that floor.
Or maybe they were
on that floor.
I don't know,
cause I'd never been in
the building or anything.
And um...
there was I know
at least one lady
cause she was,
trying to comfort me.
I told her that my
friends were out here,
you know,
help.
You know,
my friends were out
here and everything.
And I don't remember
if she came with me or not.
But like I said,
I went in and out a few times.
- [Narrator] Five teens
with Kay Schriever
are trapped by the flood.
Ed Healy and Gayle Nemeti
die when the wall of a
nearby store blows out.
The other three,
Mike Faust, Randy Shacklett
and John Dengis are
swept downstream.
- But I lucked out
and I shot down almost to,
I went down basically about
where Founders
park is right now.
And the current starts
pulling me back into the stream.
Well I managed to grab
one of those big Oak trees there
and I was hanging
on for dear life.
And literally this is the truth.
The current was so strong.
I had slip on boots,
like beetle boots or something
and the water
completely stripped me
from the waist down.
So when they found
me the next day,
I was basically naked
from the waist down,
but my t-shirt had
stretched down so much.
It was down to my knees.
So it was like a dress.
John was swept all the way down
to buy where the packing
plant bridge is down there.
And he was caught up
in the bridge and debris.
And somebody he told me,
threw him a rope,
but he couldn't pull 'em out
because of the current
and the debris and stuff.
So he literally said
this guy hooked this rope up
to a car or truck or something
and pulled him through.
- [Narrator] Randy Shacklett's
body was found later,
farther downstream.
Among the six teens
in Mike Faust's car
on the night of the flood,
three died and three lived.
Arlene Mattis spends the night
moving from one piece of
floating debris to another.
She ends up on a floating house
that wedges against some trees
surrounded by the flood.
- [Arlene] And then
my husband said,
"Well."
He looked and he saw
there was an attic
window right below.
And he knocked that out
and we all crawled in there.
So it was warmer.
And so that's where we spent
the rest of the night then.
And then I don't know
what time it was,
but I stayed real
close to the window
and I would holler,
you know, "Help,"
every once in a while.
And every time I hollered help,
you could hear help
all the way down,
far away you know,
people wanting help.
And we stayed there until,
oh I don't know if
it was getting light.
I think it was
still pretty dark.
And we heard a boat.
Somebody was coming with a boat
and they went by
and we hollered at
'em and they said,
well that they would,
just stay here.
We'll be back.
And then they came
back and got us.
- [Narrator] Denny
Bohls spends the night
standing on a display counter
in the flooded A and B Welding
supply store where he works.
Denny and a coworker
helped rescue
a woman and her two daughters.
They spend the night in
the flooded store
and all survive.
- Pretty much,
pretty much had
destroyed our building.
We only had one standing wall.
All the merchandise
inside was lost.
A lot of that the next day
after we,
after I got home.
I had cut my finger pretty bad.
My thumb that is,
I got home and got cleaned up
and got something to eat.
And got a ride back down here.
We started looking for
the owner of the company,
Harold Elliott,
cause he was missing.
And we didn't find him at all.
We did see the neighbors
that we had let in.
We saw them the next day,
they were okay.
But Harold had lost
his life in flood.
(mournful piano music)
- [Narrator] In 1972,
there are two hospitals
in Rapid City.
One of them Bennett
Clarkson is flooded.
For several days
hundreds of injured
people are brought to
St. John's McNamara.
Sharon Weber is a nurse
and the manager of the
emergency department.
- At the emergency entrance
there was a big canopy across
that connected over to
the nursing home,
nurses home.
And...
one of the doctors and a nurse
was assigned to be
out there on triage
and tell 'em whether
to come into the ER
or where to go you know.
Whether to go across the street,
where they were
keeping people in.
If they were deceased,
the doctor checked them
and told them to go,
which morgue to go to,
And that.
And it was a foggy
dreary spooky night.
It was just a...
I still have that eerie
feeling from that night.
But then we worked and we worked
and were worked on people.
A lot of kids came in
that needed tetanus shots
and we sewed up
lots of lacerations.
Some were in their night clothes
and uh...
some their clothes were
muddy and wet
and just I...
I can still see the faces
of some of those
just scared to death.
- [Narrator] Ozzie
Osheim works at
the flooded Catron Funeral home.
He goes to help
the morning after
the flood at the Campbell
Paula funeral home.
- [Ozzie] Well it was chaos.
You can imagine.
Now in the course
of a normal year,
the three funeral homes in town
at that time would
probably handle
plus or minus around
300 funeral homes,
excuse me,
300 funerals between
the three firms.
Now overnight,
or say
from day one
until the body,
last body was found,
you had 238 cases.
There were only 11 licensed
funeral directors on staff
at the three funeral homes.
And fortunately the
funeral profession
responded beautifully
within the next number of days.
We had approximately
55 funeral directors
from five,
from Rapid City, the
Black Hills region,
the state of South Dakota,
and about a five state region,
about 55 funeral directors
came in and volunteered
their time to assist us.
- [Narrator] Within
a couple of days.
The Catron funeral home
where Ozzie Osheim works
is back and running
and receiving bodies.
- [Ozzie] Obviously there
weren't enough tables
in which to place everyone
up off the ground.
So we neatly put sheeting
and blanketing on the floor.
And as a body was prepared
that had brought to the building
and brought downstairs
was properly cleaned.
Bathed, embalmed.
Then the body was placed on
the unidentified
section of the garage.
When the public came to
identify their loved one,
we had nurses on duty.
We had clergy on duty
to help those who might
need medical help,
the help those who needed...
physical support.
But the families would
be taken into the garage.
One family at a time,
usually just one or two of
the family members
would come in with us.
A staff member
would go with them.
If the body was identified,
it was properly marked,
and placed in the
identified section.
- Kay Schriever is
asked to identify
the body of her
friend Gayle Nemeti.
- [Kay] And um...
she was...
on the floor in the garage.
And it was her.
But...
she wasn't all messed
up or anything.
I was so thankful.
I just saw like...
bruises on the side of her face.
And you know,
she was a muddy mess,
but...
she was all there.
And so I just thought,
felt to my heart that,
I hope she didn't suffer a lot.
(mournful orchestral music)
- The three funeral homes
realized very shortly
that they couldn't,
it was going to be
almost impossible
to have a full funeral service
for each and every family.
So the three funeral
homes sat down
with the ministerial
associations
that were here in
town at the time.
And it decided that
they would offer
graveside services only.
Not full services
with a church service
or a service in the chapel.
Most families were
content with that plan.
Once one of us had sat
down with the family,
took care of,
we would take care
of all the paperwork
for the death certificates
and all the legal data.
We would schedule a
time for the service.
And then in cooperation
with the cemeteries,
one certain funeral home
would schedule their
services on the hour.
The second funeral home
would schedule their services
on the quarter hour.
And the third funeral home
would schedule their services
on the half hour.
So that we were
all jammed together
at the same time,
trying to...
Made it easier
for the cemeteries
to accommodate everyone.
- [Narrator] Some of the bodies
are not easily identified.
Dentists,
including Gerry Harms
use dental records to
make identifications.
- When people drowned,
they bloat.
And you cannot recognize them.
So uh...
I took care of a lot of
the people down there.
One of my best friends
was down there.
He and his wife and
son drowned that night.
But anyway,
I got all my dental records out,
cause that's the only way
you can find out
specifically who people are.
And so uh...
they had a 18 wheel trailer
there at the morgue.
They kept bringing people in
and you know,
if I thought I knew something
about who they were or whatever,
then I'd get their records out.
And uh...
it was just a terrible ordeal.
- [Narrator] James
Whitehead flies
a National Guard helicopter
into the wreckage,
retrieving bodies.
- That's the only way we could,
we could get into some of
these places, you know.
Especially down by Baken Park.
That was a,
that was really a lot
of mess down there.
And uh...
people wrapped around trees
and of course all the...
bushes
and brush and limbs
and stuff was piled around em'.
I mean you just,
you literally had
to pull 'em out of there.
You know because they're,
entangled in there so much.
And I remember this
one 18 year old girl,
I'm sure she was
about 18 years old.
She had her leg
completely tore off
and uh...
it was,
it was bad.
You couldn't even imagine
what it looked like.
You couldn't even imagine.
I mean it looked like...
The...
World War II when
they bombed in series,
you know,
and all the destruction.
- [Narrator] City workers spend
the days after the flood,
repairing badly
damaged utilities,
they look for survivors
and count the dead.
Two days after the flood,
Mayor Don Barnett calls
a meeting of the city council.
- We got the council together
in a small room
in the courthouse.
It had one little
light bulb on the wire
and we were sitting
around the table,
but the reporters
weren't there yet.
I had told him about the meeting
and you just can't have
meetings in South Dakota
without the reporters
in attendance.
And they were on the way,
but we got to talking
to this federal employee
and he wanted to
bring the muscle
of the federal government in
and repair about 700
mobile home pads.
They had been located
in mobile home camps
or parks they called them.
But they had,
they were all damaged.
They were undercut with water
and mud and crap
and sewer lines were broken.
Water lines were broken.
The power was out.
The telephone poles
were on the ground.
It was just like war.
And so he said,
"I need authority
from the council
to use federal money,
to repair those 700 mobile
home site locations."
Leonard Swanson had been
with the city since 1947
and he was public
works director.
He said, "No!"
Just real sharp like that.
And he said,
"The council and the
city cannot permit
the reoccupation
of the flood plain,
because that would
endanger so many lives."
And he said,
"We should never sentence,
Like a judge was sentenced
you to the gallows?
We should never sentence
the flood survivors
to one more night
on the suicidal flood plain.
And Kay was there,
my administrative assistant
and she wrote that down
and then I repeated it
and then she repeated it
and Swanee broke down in tears.
And Dr. Lytle was president
of the city council
and deputy mayor.
And he said,
"I think Swanee's right!
We should not
permit the federals
to repair those
mobile home parks.
Maybe nobody should repair
their homes near the creek.
So he made a motion
and low and behold,
all 10 councilmen
adopted that policy.
We did not buy all of
the land near the creek,
but we certainly purchased
all of the residential
land by the creek
and then had a
relocation program
when the HUD people
out of Denver
granted Rapid City 48,000,000.
And we used that to buy,
the places where 1500
families had lived.
And we converted that
to an open space park.
That's five miles long
and five blocks wide
all the way through town.
Now when we have high
water again in Rapid City,
those parks will be damaged.
But they won't be damaged
to the tune of 700
destroyed mobile homes
and over a thousand
wooden homes,
because now it's golf course
about 18 miles of hiking trails
and biking trails
and soccer fields
and so many recreational things.
And that flood plain
park makes Rapid City
one of the most beautiful
cities in America.
But with all this growth
in Rapid City now,
they're growing East,
West, North, and South.
My God they're gonna
pull Rapid City
into Mead county
here before long
and clear to the air base.
Box Elder was a mobile
home park when I was mayor
and now is an American
South Dakota city.
And all of that growth
will turn around
and put pressure
on the council to
again reoccupy the
beautiful flood plain
with residential housing
of all varieties.
And as long as I'm alive,
I'll be at those public hearings
to remind the people
about the stupidity
of the planning
and the zoning and the
bad land use patterns
that were in place at 5:00
on June 9th in
the evening hours.
Because by 5:00 AM
they weren't there anymore.
(gentle guitar music)
♪ You were 72 on June the 9th ♪
♪ When the rain that fell ♪
♪ Made the water rise ♪
♪ Canyon Lake lost
its dam that night ♪
♪ And took all of it higher ♪
♪ They found him on
Jackson Boulevard ♪
♪ Ankle deep in their
own front yard ♪
♪ They prayed to God ♪
♪ Their car could start ♪
♪ And they went
for higher ground ♪
♪ If I ever learned ♪
♪ a thing from my father ♪
♪ Its to never fear ♪
♪ Hell or high water ♪
♪ Even when there's
problems all around ♪
♪ You just look ♪
♪ for the higher ground ♪
(gentle guitar music)
♪ I remember the lies ♪
♪ that people swore ♪
♪ turning from love ♪
♪ to brandish their swords ♪
♪ I remember you stood ♪
♪ without saying a word, ♪
♪ Hey you took the
higher ground ♪
♪ Cause if I ever learned ♪
♪ a thing from my father ♪
♪ It's never fear ♪
♪ Hell or high water ♪
♪ Cause even when ♪
♪ there's problems all around ♪
♪ You just look ♪
♪ for the higher ground ♪
(gentle guitar music fades)