Picture Rock Collapse - Two Die - 1920

MILLER, SCHULTZ, HITCHENS

Posted By: Reid R. Johnson (email)
Date: 8/31/2022 at 09:38:31

Two persons were instantly killed, two others injured and a score narrowly escaped serious injury or death about 2 o'clock last Sunday afternoon when several of the large rocks on Picture Rock Cliff, about a mile and a half south of South McGregor, crashed down on a party of Waterloo and McGregor picnickers in a ravine beneath the cliff

The dead -

Miss Ruth Miller, age 18 years, of Waterloo.

David Schultz, age 11 years, of McGregor.

The injured -

F. O. Hitchens, of Waterloo, foot crushed.

Son of Mr. Hichens, minor injuries.

The cave-in of the rocks, seven huge boulders, the beautiful colors of which gave the cliff its name - Picture Rock - occurred while Mr. and Mrs. Hitchens, their son, Miss Miller and a number of McGregor people were seated or standing in the ravine between two piles of sand and stone. The party had been viewing the beautiful boulders and had just finished lunch when a rumble at the top of the cliff sent them a warning. The people glanced hurridly at the top of the cliff and saw the huge boulders slipping from their place and start tumbling down the hill, gaining momentum each second. They began to scatter hurridly, but for the Waterloo girl and the McGregor boy the warning came too late.

They were unable to escape the tumbling boulders and were caught under their several hundred pounds of weight, hurled to the ground and literally crushed beneath the rocks. Mrs. Hitchens, who sprang from the ground at first sound of the falling rocks, escaped from their path while her husband grabbed their young son and while he managed to get from the path of the huge boulders the smaller stones struck him and his son, bruising them badly.

The little Schultz boy, playing under the rocks with members of his family and other McGregor boys, was unable to get from under the falling rocks and was crushed. The other McGregor people managed to escape the rock and were uninjured.

The Pictured Rocks, which plunged into the ravine carrying death with them, were about three hundred feet above where the picnic party was sitting. Under them was a steep hill of beautifully colored sand which has become famous throughout the country and which was being dug away by tourists and others. The continual digging away of the sand under the rocks is believed to have gradually loosened the base on which the huge boulders rested until they were but the plaything of the elements. A fairly heavy wind is believed to have started the rocks on their death-carrying roll down the steep hill.

A peculiar coincidence in connection with the cave-in Sunday is that 47 years ago Sunday - June 27, 1873* - other rocks on this cliff caved in burying two men, one named Miller, under their weight and crushing their lives out.

Elkader Register, Thur., 01 July 1920. Page 01.

___________

Notes: Another name for the Picture Rocks is Painted Rocks. The previous collapse referenced in this news article occurred in June 1877, not 1873.

Painted Rock collapse, 1877
 

Clayton Documents maintained by Sharyl Ferrall.
WebBBS 4.33 Genealogy Modification Package by WebJourneymen