1936 Gainesville, Hall County, Georgia Tornado

Gainesville, Georgia
Tornado of 1936

On 6 April 1936, just before 8:30 AM, a tornado ripped through Gainesville, Georgia. About 200 people were killed and about 1600 injured. This tornado was one of the 25 deadliest in United States history. W. M. Brice compiled information about the twister in a book, A City Laid Waste. The following information from the book was provided by Marya James.

On 9 April 1936 President Franklin D. Roosevelt visited Gainesville for half an hour following the tornado to confer with city and county officials. He did appear and talk to the people. The books contains a photo of President Roosevelt speaking from the rear platform of a train.

The book also includes oddities of the storm. "The St. Paul Church was a large edifice on Grove street. An eye witness told Rev. E. C. Swetnam, former pastor, that the building was lifted bodily into the air and burst open like a fire-cracker. Although the church contained heavy pews, three pianos and an organ, only one piece of it of any size has ever been found. That was the back of one of the pianos, discovered by Mr. Swetnam several blocks from the site of the church. He knew it because one of the boys of his former congregation had carved his name on the back."

Additionally, a telephone pole on East Spring street, where destruction was great, was so twisted by the force that it resembled a corkscrew and still remained upright. One should also notice that every storm of any consequence which ever struck Gainesville within the past half century has come on a Monday in the day time.

J. S. Pope, assistant managing editor of The Atlanta Journal, wrote the most comprehensive outline of the path of the storm for the 7 April 1936 issue: "The tornado started at the foot of West Washington street, and swished through the narrow valley that lies between Washington and West Broad. Nothing was left standing in that area. Broad river was the southeastern boundary of the destruction until the old Gainesville Midland depot was reached. There the path flared suddenly across the heart of the business district. The courthouse and city hall left but little for the wreckers to move away. At this point the path of the tornado was marked by Brenau avenue and Church street, though no damage occurred outside this range. At South Green street, as though deflected by the new federal building, the twister veered eastward and rode across the residential section lying between Spring and Summit streets. From the high ground by the razed courthouse the prospect toward New Holland was one of contorted wreckage with hardly a wall left standing. This course was maintained past New Holland."

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