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Then and now
also see Observing two anniversaries
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Things looked more settled in Tuckasegee (bottom photo) Tuesday (Aug. 29) two days before the 66th anniversary of Jackson County’s greatest natural disaster, the 1940 flood, which occurred during the night of Aug. 30-31. Looking south up N.C. 107, the Tuckasegee Wesleyan Church, established in 1919, is visible on the hill in both photos. The bridge over the Tuckaseigee River’s East Fork, which can be seen past the buildings on left in the bottom photo, withstood the river’s rampage, but the roaring waters damaged the bridge approaches, rendering the road impassable to vehicles and forcing people to use a ladder to climb onto the bridge to cross the river. The 1940 flood was the worst ever recorded on the Tuckaseigee, killing four and causing property damage estimated at $2 million. What were termed “cloudbursts and “waterspouts” that occurred mainly in the Canada and Caney Fork sections sent the river on a rampage that destroyed every bridge in Jackson County that crossed the Tuckaseigee’s main stem. Flood waters crested at 21 feet, or 40,300 cubic feet per second, according to a gauge at Tuckasegee. For comparison purposes, flood waters measured at the Cedar Cliff powerhouse, which is just upstream from Tuckasegee, were 13,000 cfs during Hurricane Frances in September 2004. – Duke Energy photo courtesy of Fred Alexander (top) and Herald photo by Nick Breedlove.
THEN AND NOW EXTRA: This week’s 66th anniversary of the August 1940 flood also marks the first anniversary of The Herald’s “Then and Now” series. These other two Tuckasegee flood photos, above and at right, are hard to replicate but provide additional flood context. As mentioned above, the left photo shows the East Fork bridge, built just upstream of the confluence of the Tuckaseigee’s East and West forks in 1935 by the N.C. State Highway and Public Works Commission, standing high and dry after the flood. The photo at right, taken from below, shows the massive amount of debris the flood waters left behind at the other end of the bridge. – Duke Energy photos courtesy of Fred Alexander
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