New book chronicles the lives and deaths of 1927 tornado victims

Sallie Aylor was at a hardware store at Main and Poplar streets the day downtown Poplar Bluff was devastated by one of the deadliest tornadoes in U.S. history.

A porter made sure the women working at Wright-Bell-Dalton store were in a safe place as the sky darkened. This included Aylor, who would later marry a Strickland, information in a new book about the May 9, 1927, tornado shows.

There would be 14 survivors from that business, described as the largest of it’s kind in Southeast Missouri at the time.

A headstone for a victim of the 1927 Poplar Bluff tornado was recently added at the Poplar Bluff Cemetery. DAR/Paul Davis

There was a single fatality, the porter, whose body would not be recovered from the basement wreckage for more than two weeks, Kati Wylie Ray writes in what may be the most complete account to date of the victims lost in the tragedy.

Aylor’s family never knew the man’s name, Milton Lawrence Moore, but it is now recorded in the volume, which is on sale for $18 at the Poplar Bluff Museum and on Amazon. All proceeds go to the museum.

Ray will also lead a presentation at 3 p.m. May 9 at Poplar Bluff Municipal Library about the day. A moment of silence will be held at 3:13 p.m., the time the tornado first struck. It would be on the ground for four devastating minutes.

Huson

The tragedy of that day has been marked many times in the impact it had on the city, Ray said, and the ways Poplar Bluff has never recovered.

But it was the impact on the individuals and their families, that first sparked Ray’s interest in this project.

Moore, 47, was a widower who lived with his mother on Alice Street. He was survived by eight siblings.

Wilkinson

“I feel like a lot of these stories were just kind of on the cusp of being lost forever,” said Ray, a Poplar Bluff native and board member for the Poplar Bluff Museum. “Some of them still may be. I didn’t get them all.”

There were 146 children who lost their parents that day; 92 parents who lost their children; 41 spouses who lost husbands and wives; and 287 siblings who lost brothers and sisters, Ray recounts in the opening page of the book.

“It was a major, major event in Poplar Bluff history and in many ways, we’ve never recovered,” said Ray. “Just looking at the families that were impacted and the way it impacted the town too, I think was important, but there’s never really been anything written about the families, and how they were impacted.”

Hargrove

Among the stories captured in newspaper accounts and stories passed down by families, Ray learned about 33-year-old Pvt. 1st Class Houston Pleasant Craig Wilkison.

A World War I veteran, he had been out of the service for less than a decade by 1927.

He was a sheet metal worker employed by the Bes-Blo Pipe Company on Cherry Street.

Smith

He had married Hazel Sutton and the couple had four children under the age of 6.

Wilkison was on top of a building when the storm hit.

He suffered a skull fracture and would die five days later at Lucy Lee Hospital. He was buried at Kennett, with a monument that reads “God gave. He has taken. He will restore. He doeth all things well.”

Christian

Photographs of Wilkison and his monument are included in Ray’s book, along with an account of what became of his family.

Hazel would remarry, but to a man who did not like children, a family member located by Ray explained. All four children eventually ended up in an orphanage. They were later found and adopted by the relative who had adopted Wilkison when he was 2.

Hazel died in childbirth in 1931. Ray was able to locate the name of Hazel’s fifth child, among those at another orphanage in the 1940 Census.

“This was a tragedy for the town, but it was a tragedy for people’s lives and it’s just amazing how long it carried on,” Ray said.

At least one page in the book is devoted to each of the deceased. Ray was able to locate photographs for 23 people, and detailed accounts of the lives and deaths of many more.

Ray’s original intention was to simply gather as complete a list of the names as possible. Accounts vary, given the chaos of the time, and number the dead at anywhere from 78 to 105, according to most publications.

Ray was able to confirm 86 deaths through her work, which included extensive research into news accounts, death and cemetery records, periodicals, local history books and online resources, such as Ancestry.com.

Her original goal grew over two years, to finding a list of birth dates, so the ages of the victims would be known. The youngest was 4 months, the oldest 89.

And then a family gave Ray a photograph, and that kicked off a new goal.

“It just continued to blossom,” she said. “I decided to look for monuments, and cemeteries, and it just kept growing.”

When Ray realized not all of the victims had headstones, it even prompted her to seek funding for that.

Ray, along with her husband, Steve, a constant companion in this search, found the unmarked graves of five of the tornado victims.

Headstones have been placed for these individuals through the help of the Butler County Historical Society and Poplar Bluff Monument Works.

They, along with many others, contributed immensely to the project, according to Ray, including Angie Poole with the Poplar Bluff City Cemetery.

More than 20 of the victims are still without monuments, some of which were buried in the “free” section of the Poplar Bluff cemetery. Specific plots for some of these graves were not recorded, Ray said.

She may try to do a monument at the cemetery for those who have unmarked graves at a later date. Ray is also still looking for photographs, stories and artifacts belonging to those who were lost 92 years ago.

Lists of those without a marker, or a photograph, can be found at www.darnews.com .

Among those who do have photographs are Edgar Allen Burruss. He decided on his 21st birthday to leave behind the farming community of Black Creek where he had grown up and seek better work in Kansas.

He planned to take the train from downtown Poplar Bluff that day, his birthday.

The overcast sky made the young man decide to head to the Midway on Fourth Street for a game of pool before leaving.

Newspaper accounts would later report an unidentified man found dead at the Midway, trapped amongst the falling debris and fire damage, clutching an open knife.

Some 75 years later, his sister Edith would recall how their father and brother spent weeks helping clean up and searching for Edgar amongst the ruined buildings.

It was years before they gave up hope that he had left town before the storm hit, she told a local historian in 2002.

Also pictured in the book is little Wilma Esther Christian, age 4, clutching her Easter basket just a few weeks before the tornado. She died from injuries sustained when a second floor staircase collapsed at her home during the storm.

Her parents and two siblings survived, burying Wilma at Poplar Bluff’s Woodlawn Cemetery with a headstone that reads, “God needed one more angel child amidst his shining hand.”

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__LIST OF PEOPLE BURIED IN THE “FREE PART” OF THE CITY CEMETERY__ Edward Brown Edgar Burruss Troy Dunn Henry Hendricks Gerald Hickman Cora Hill Airy Johnson Dr. E.D. Shaw Ed Thomlison __LIST OF EVERYONE WITHOUT MONUMENTS__ Horace W. Barnett Edward Brown Grace Brown Pearl Brown Edgar Burruss George Henry Davis Troy Dunn Clarence Hastings Henry Hendricks Gerald Hickman Cora Hill Airy Johnson Reuben Mahan George F. McClellan John Wesley McCollum Ethel Overfield Laura Mae Overfield Bettie Robinson Dr. E.D. Shaw Berton Sheffield Clifford Allen Sheffield Evert Sheffield George Souders Frank E. Starkey Ed Thomlison Ethel Wooldridge __LIST OF PEOPLE NEEDING PHOTOS__ Paul Adams Harry Atkins Horace W. Barnett Conrad Berry Sadie Berry William G. Boyt Edward Brown G. Hunter Brown Grace Brown Letha Brown Lois Brown Pearl Brown Weldon Brown Zelma Brown Loyd Burgess Eli Cravens Aline Dalton Frances Dalton Harry Dalton George Henry Davis John Lee Davis Troy Dunn Loren Gatewood James A. Gray Arthur Greenwall Claude Gregory Sherman Groshart Kenneth Groshart Lee Groshart Clarence Hastings Henry Hendricks Gerald Hickman Cora Hill Sarah Frances Hudson Airy Johnson Lee Jonas Albert Kaich, Jr. Archie Kinnel Franklin A. Lundry Herbert Macke Reuben Mahan Pearl W. Mangold George F. McClellan John Wesley McCollum Alvin McDaniel Ed Mengel Milton Moore Ethel Overfield Laura Mae Overfield Harry R. Rexford Henry Robertson Bettie Robinson Ida Scott Dr. E.D. Shaw Berton Sheffield Clifford Allen Sheffield Evert Sheffield Opal Sherrill Frank E. Starkey Ed Thomlison Altha Vincent Dolley Vincent Sarah Wisdom