Say Anything Blog

Whatever you do:

NORTHWOOD, N.D. Joe and Frances Adams live here because 10 years ago their Grand Forks home was destroyed by the Red River flood.

“We lived at 201 Lincoln Drive, at the bottom of Lincoln Drive,” Adams said. “The water went right up to our roof. We lost 98 percent of our household possessions.”

After the flood in April 1997, they moved to Fargo for a couple of weeks, then moved to Finley, N.D., for several weeks, then stayed at Grand Forks Air Force Base for two months. Joe retired in 1988 after 20 years in the Air Force and Frances recently retired from a federal civil service job.

For those of you that don’t live around here Lincoln Drive was the hardest hit area in Grand Forks in 1997.  I don’t recall a tornado that devastated a North Dakota town like the one last Sunday that damaged their home.

“We were in here and grabbed our cell phones, purses, wallets and the cat and headed for the basement,” Joe said. “Then we waited for it to hit. The sirens went off about seven minutes before it actually hit. We heard the noise, all the glass crashing; it sounded like a hailstorm, only about 10 times or 15 times worse.

“We waited for it to settle down and came up and found everything a mess.”

His garage was slightly akilter, and sticking out of its outside wall was an old board, driven like a stake about 5 inches into the wall.

But Mr. Adams is a survivor:

“We’ve already had people checking the insurance, and a general contractor has been here seeing what needs to be done. DISH Network already has been out here checking on our (satellite) dish. So, as soon as we get power. . .”

That’s North Dakotans for you.  A little bit positive and a whole lot stubborn.

After the 1997 flood, residents of Finley welcomed many flood victims, including the Adams, fixing up the former radar base just outside town to house them.

“I don’t know if it’s a Norwegian custom, or what,” Adams said. “But they put something in every drawer in the house. If they didn’t have much, they had at least a towel in every drawer.” Adams has to pause, overcome by the memory. “To not have a home and then go in and find that. It really, really helped.”

Adams grew up in Philadelphia, but all in all, he’d rather be in Northwood.