A fellow returned to a spot close to his childhood home after decades of working in construction.?ÿ He built his new home out of concrete, including the roof.?ÿ That was about 25 years ago.?ÿ His widow still lives there.
@flga-2-2
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Here's the best kind of hurricane:
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On one of the many tornado-damage surveys I've done for the power company there was one house I remember well.?ÿ The 'nader was an EF-4 and completely leveled standard frame houses in that area.?ÿ Metal shops were completely gone.
There was one house still standing and it had become the gathering spot for everyone.?ÿ It was an older place of concrete block construction.?ÿ It had a flat roof and I noticed the windows were still intact due to real live storm shutters.
I got to talk to the old man that lived there.?ÿ He told me the house at one time had a standard pitch roof but it had been blown away a few years back by a tornado.?ÿ That was when he installed the flat roof.
It wasn't the prettiest house I've ever seen but it was still standing after a direct hit from an EF-4 that toppled a half mile of lattice transmission lines.
There is a rural school that was built, I think, in the mid-1950's named Zillah School.?ÿ Although the school has not been used for school purposes for about 25 years, the building will stand for a long, long time.?ÿ They gymnasium was built from poured concrete with a design that was labeled "tornado proof".?ÿ Take a look at it at Lat. 37.790752 and Long. -95.341363
ICF construction is not a bad idea in an area like that.?ÿ
Snappy looking building for the-middle-of-nowhere-Allen-County-Kansas, especially if it's that old.
From the looks of the H-frame transformer mounts someone was thinking of putting up ball field lights...or using the place for the vo-tech's welding class.?ÿ 😉
It was only Grades 1-8 when built.?ÿ I'm sure the gym was also the lunch room.?ÿ Later, they moved the kids to a different grade school building in Humboldt.?ÿ Then they added a double-wide or two for a few years and had various?ÿ special ed programs there.
If you look again at the aerial view, scan to the north for a half mile and you will see a rectangular metal building due north of the school.?ÿ That is now just a home.?ÿ It was originally built as an airplane hangar/house with a huge door on the south side that folded upwards in two pieces in line with the large concrete slab.?ÿ A grass runway started close to that and ran towards the school until a few hundred feet from the south section line.?ÿ Now, take a look at the shadows falling on the north-south paved road.?ÿ You will see the power lines plus a circular dot in between each set of poles.?ÿ Those are the orange spheres they put on power lines to make them more visible to pilots.
About a quarter of a mile to the east of the school and then north a few hundred feet you will see a somewhat rectangular pool of water.?ÿ That was a rock quarry.?ÿ Near the southeast corner you can see two white sticks heading out over the water.?ÿ Those are diving boards that came from some city pool somewhere at sometime.
For a technical treat, scan along the road by the school heading west for one mile where the road has a small curve in it.?ÿ Look at the road going south from that corner closely and you will see a 7-box box culvert made of concrete.?ÿ Up until about 20 years ago it was a 7-arch bridge constructed of hand-laid stones like the way Romans did things.
If you start again at the school corner and follow the road east for four miles you will get to a spot known by locals as Vincentville.?ÿ I can only remember their being a building plus one house in my lifetime. Scan about 800-1000 feet north on the west side of the county road and you will see a metal building and four odd-looking concrete "sidewalks".?ÿ Skeet shooters will recognize what this is.
From that same corner, if you went south a mile or two, you would be looking at the farm where the father of @squirl was raised.?ÿ I'm not sure which one it was though.
Buddy, keep in the back of your mind when dealing with auto insurance adjusters, wholesale and Bluebook ain??t the same. ?????ÿ
I love armchair tours.?ÿ My GE overlay showed an AP in the quarter no. of the school but I didn't see even a grass strip.?ÿ I just figgered GE was a bit confused.?ÿ Closer inspection does show marker balls on the aerial power lines.
I found one of those balls laying in the grass after a storm, about half disassembled.?ÿ I thought I'd take it home as a trophy along with all my other junk I've collected over the years...damned things weigh about twenty pounds.
I didn't want it bad enough to carry it a half mile back to the truck.?ÿ
