During the past one hundred years many towns in the Thumb area have had their problems with flood waters. People living along the many rivers and streams can remember the high water marks and the damage to their homes. One hundred years ago all of the towns in the Thumb had dirt roads including the main streets of every town. So when the spring rains came, the townspeople did their shopping in the mud. You couldn't drive the buggy very fast, because you would have mud flying everywhere. Fortunately, it didn't rain all the time, but when the big rains came, the pigs on the farm enjoyed their mud bath.

The Thumb area, prior to 1900 had many problems with irrigation, and people always complained about flooded roads. Many ditch systems were developed; many were dug by hand or they used horse drawn implements to carve out a ditch. By the 1880s the big steam shovels made the job of irrigation a little easier.

At Sebewaing, in the spring of 1904, a heavy rain storm raised the level of the Sebewaing River, which flowed through the town and out to Saginaw Bay. The ice broke up in the river east of town and due to the amount of rainfall, the current picked up in this narrow river. From the photo, in this article, you can see people standing on the bridge watching the ice move below them. They could only hope and pray that the ice would not jam up and take out the bridge, which had happened in the past. By 1921, the old iron bridge at Sebewaing was replaced with a concrete bridge, and the road bed over the river was raised to accommodate future spring ice floes. In 1922, the ice again backed up in the river and the business district and residential area were flooded. One resident, who witnessed the flood, said "a whole woodpile could be seen flooding down the street". I was also told the main street barber opened the front door of the shop (see photo) and then quickly opened the backdoor to let the water flow through which took the pressure off the back wall and foundation of the building. In 1935, Sebewaing had another great flood which received major press coverage around the state.

The town of Pigeon was developed in the area of a tamarack swamp in the 1890s. The small village in the early 1900s had flood problems even though the Pigeon River was a mile away. The business district and residential area flooded several times in those early days (see photo). Eventually the building of ditches and storm sewers solved the problem at Pigeon.

The town of Bad Axe had a solution to their flood problems. In the 1880s, they built a large village pond a block north of Sand Beach Avenue near Woodworth St. They stocked it with fish and let the residents go fishing (see photo). The pond was used to collect the run off from heavy rains. Storm sewers were later installed and the old fishin' hole was filled in and later became residential home sites.

At Oxford, Michigan, in the early 1900s, the main street, now M24, was often times flooded, and there were also big potholes in the street especially along the curbs. The residents complained and finally Mr. Seeley Sherwood, the town jokester, decided to do something about it. It just so happened that some prominent Michigan state politicians were coming to town on the D.U.R. (the inter-urban electric railroad). They were having a scheduled whistle stop to meet town dignitaries. Mr. Sherwood bought a large fish at the market and with his fishing pole, went to one of the large flooded potholes and cast his line (see photo). When the politicians arrived they saw him fishing. Naturally, the fish was on the hook and occasionally he would lift it out of the water to get a big laugh from the crowd. The newspapers covered the story and soon after Oxford had their roads and flooding problems solved!

If you have ever been in the town of Vassar, Michigan, you can only admire the beautiful Cass River that weaves through the central part of town. Many times in Vassar's history the river has crested and flooded the lower main street stores and homes nearby. In 1904, the spring weather developed into one of the worst floods due to record snow falls and 15-foot snowdrifts. Warm March rains quickly melted the snow and ice, which created a flood condition of major proportion, knocking out the Vassar power plant and water pumping station. Some of the old timers in Vassar will tell you that back then the flooding occurred about every four years (see photo). In March of 1976, Vassar saw another big ice storm followed by flooding, which devastated the business district and some residential areas. The town was without electricity for two weeks.

Cass City was also hit by a blizzard and ice storm in 1904. The March warm weather quickly melted the snow, and the Cass River filled with packs of ice and a fast-moving current quickly wiped out the bridge (see photo). A foot bridge was hastily built, and the first to cross was Dr. Wickware on an emergency call.

There have been many more towns in the Thumb with flood problems during the past century. I bring these stories to you to remind us all of the power of Mother Nature and to remember in your prayers the hundreds of thousands of victims and the injured in the recent Asian Tsunami disaster…and That's The Way It Was.

Al and Dave Eicher provide television production services to corporations, ad agencies, and nonprofit organizations. They also create Michigan town histories and offer lecture services on a variety of Michigan History Events. You may contact them at 248-333-2010; Email: info@program-source.com; Website: www.program-source.com; Address: PSI, P.O. Box 444, Bloomfield Hills, MI 48303.