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History of the Johnstown Flood: Including all the Fearful Record; the Breaking of the South Fork Dam; the Sweeping Out of the Conemaugh Valley; the Over-Throw of Johnstown; the Massing of the Wreck at the Railroad Bridge; Escapes, Rescues, Searches for Survivors and the Dead; Relief Organizations, Stupendous Charities, etc., etc., With Full Accounts also of the Destruction on the Susquehanna and Juniata Rivers, and the Bald Eagle Creek.Johnson, Willis Fletcher

History

History of the Johnstown Flood: Including all the Fearful Record; the Breaking of the South Fork Dam; the Sweeping Out of the Conemaugh Valley; the Over-Throw of Johnstown; the Massing of the Wreck at the Railroad Bridge; Escapes, Rescues, Searches for Survivors and the Dead; Relief Organizations, Stupendous Charities, etc., etc., With Full Accounts also of the Destruction on the Susquehanna and Juniata Rivers, and the Bald Eagle Creek.

Name: History of the Johnstown Flood: Including all the Fearful Record; the Breaking of the South Fork Dam; the Sweeping Out of the Conemaugh Valley; the Over-Throw of Johnstown; the Massing of the Wreck at the Railroad Bridge; Escapes, Rescues, Searches for Survivors and the Dead; Relief Organizations, Stupendous Charities, etc., etc., With Full Accounts also of the Destruction on the Susquehanna and Juniata Rivers, and the Bald Eagle Creek.
Author: Johnson, Willis Fletcher

Johnson, Willis Fletcher

Floods -- Pennsylvania -- Johnstown (Cambria County)

"I not only heartily indorse that scheme, but have positive assurance
from other leading business men that the idea will be carried out, as it
certainly should be, the moment the work of cleaning away the debris is
completed. Besides that, a scheme is on foot to get a charter for the
city of Johnstown which will embrace all those surrounding boroughs. In
the event of that being done, and I am certain it will be, the plan of
the city will be entirely changed and made to correspond with the best
laid-out cities in the country. In ten years Johnstown will be one of
the prettiest and busiest cities in the world, and nothing can prevent
it. The streets will be widened and probably made to start from a common
centre, something after the fashion of Washington City, with a little
more regard for the value of property. With the Cambria Iron Company,
the Gautier Steel Works, and other manufactories, as well as yearly
increasing railroad facilities, Johnstown has a start which will grow in
a short time to enormous proportions. From a real estate standpoint the
flood has been a benefit beyond a doubt. Another addition to the city
will be made in the shape of an immense water-main to connect with a
magnificent reservoir of the finest water in the world to be located in
the mountains up Stony Creek for supplying the entire city as
contemplated in the proposed new charter. This plant was well under way
when the flood came, and about ten thousand dollars had already been
expended on it which has been lost."

Mr. John Roberts, the surviving partner of the banking-house of John
Dibert & Company, said:

"Aside from the loss to our own building we have come out whole and
entire. We had no money invested in mortgages in Johnstown that is not
fully indemnified by the lots themselves. Most of our money is invested
in property in Somerset County, where Mr. Dibert was raised. We will
exert every influence in our power to place the city on a better footing
than was ever before. The plan of raising the city or lowering the bed
of the river as well as widening its banks will surely be carried out.
In addition, I think the idea of changing the plan of the city and
embracing Johnstown and the surrounding buroughs in one large city will
be one of the greatest benefits the flood could have wrought to the
future citizens of Johnstown and the Conemough Valley.

"I have been chairman of our Finance Committee of Councils for ten years
past, and I know the trouble we have had with our streets and alleys and
the necessity of a great change. In order to put the city in the proper
shape to insure commercial growth and topographical beauty, we will be
ready for business in a few days, and enough money will be put into
circulation in the valley to give the people encouragement in the work
of rebuilding."




CHAPTER XXXV.

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