Mail: PO Box 368 Niles, Ohio 44446

1913 Flood

Trudy E. Bell, M.A,, now considered the foremost national authority on the Flood of 1913, in describing the effects of the flood is quoted as saying—

"This mammoth storm system with its ferocious tornadoes and floods set records for fatalities and flood heights that still stand today - and which dwarfed both Sandy and Katrina in geographical extent - created institutions that evolved into today's United Way, Red Cross, Rotary, IBM, and Cox Communications."

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Newspaper account of 1913 Flood.

Flooding from the four-day rain that began on Easter, March 23, 1913, however, was unprecedented and never to be equalled in the century that followed.
“It was attributable solely to an almost unceasing rain of four days and four nights, something akin to the biblical deluge,” Joseph Butler wrote in his first-hand account of the event. Although Mahoning River dwellers were forced to flee their homes, “it was the industries that suffered worst,” wrote Butler, the industrialist who founded the Butler Institute of American Art in Youngtown.

“All of these located in the river valley were put hopelessly out of operation, the water standing many feet deep in the mill buildings and covering the machinery.”
Immediately after the 1913 flood, the Ohio Legislature allowed the formation of conservancy districts and authorized counties to form three-member boards to construct and maintain flood-control structures.

In the Mahoning Valley, the Lake Milton dam was completed in 1916, forming the lake that would increase Youngstown’s industrial water supply and begin the creation of water-storage capacity to alleviate flooding here.
In the decades that followed, dams were built to create and regulate the water levels of Berlin, West Branch, Mosquito and Shenango River Lake reservoirs. Those lakes became part of a vast U.S. Army Corps of Engineers-managed network of water-storage lakes that would reduce downstream flooding, help maintain consistent river water depths and provide recreational boating opportunities.
Each fall, the Corps reduces water levels in these lakes to increase their capacity to store snow melt and spring rains, and thereby reduce downstream flooding.

“It was officially called the ‘reservoir design flood,’” for Berlin, Mosquito and West Branch, said Werner Loehlein, a hydraulic engineer with the Corps in Pittsburgh. Those lakes and dams were designed to withstand a recurrence of the 1913 flood, but with some water going over the dams’ emergency spillways, he explained.

“From a volume standpoint, it was a record flood,” Loehlein said. The 1913 flood consisted of “a bunch of intense rainstorms with short periods of little or no rain in between,” he added. Over the four days, the Mahoning Valley got between 7 and 9 inches of rain, Loehlein said, adding that rainfall averages were 8.8 inches in the west branch basin of the Mahoning River, 7.15 inches on the river’s main stem and 8.35 inches along Mosquito Creek, which flows into the river in Niles. — By PETER H. MILLIKEN | milliken@vindy.com

Gilmore Restaurant and Manhattan Hotel on South Main Sreet and Water Street during the 1913 flood.

Visible are people watching from second floor windows and standing on roof. The building is dated 1892.

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Damage to the Pitts house located on East Federal Street right by Mosquito Creek.

1913 Flood.

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Main Street looking south from Mill Street during flood, March 1913.

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The streetcar waiting station on Robbins Aveenue during the 1913 flood.

Kestner & McIntyre photographers.

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The streetcar waiting station on Robbins Avenue during the 1913 flood.

Kestner & McIntyre photographers.

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Pennsylvania RR station after the flood.

Kestner & McIntyre photographers. 1913.

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East Park Avenue bridge over Mosquito Creek and rear of buildings on ast. State Sreet.. 1913 flood.

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South Main Street Niles, Ohio looking north from Penna. RR during flood March 1913.

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Looking north up Main Sreet. from bridge

1913 flood.

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Looking south up Main Street from bridge. 1913 flood.

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Along South Main. 1913 flood.

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South Main Street iron bridge was extensively damaged during the flood of 1913.

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Pennsylvania passenger and freight stations in Niles during the January 1904 flood.

Photo by Cook and McIntyre.

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