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    Ruthless Tide: The Heroes and Villains of the Johnstown Flood, America's Astonishing Gilded Age Disaster
    Ruthless Tide: The Heroes and Villains of the Johnstown Flood, America's Astonishing Gilded Age Disaster
    Ruthless Tide: The Heroes and Villains of the Johnstown Flood, America's Astonishing Gilded Age Disaster
    Audiobook8 hours

    Ruthless Tide: The Heroes and Villains of the Johnstown Flood, America's Astonishing Gilded Age Disaster

    Written by Al Roker

    Narrated by Mirron Willis

    4.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    A gripping narrative history of the 1889 Johnstown Flood—the deadliest flood in US history—from New York Times bestselling author, NBC Host, and legendary weather authority Al Roker.

    May 1889: After a deluge of rainfall—nearly a foot in less than twenty-four hours—swelled the Little Conemaugh River, panicked engineers watched helplessly as swiftly rising waters threatened to breach the South Fork Dam in central Pennsylvania. Though they telegraphed neighboring towns on this last morning in May, warning of the impending danger, residents, used to false alarms, remained in their homes.

    At 3:10 P.M., the dam gave way, releasing twenty million tons of water. Gathering speed as it flowed southwest, the deluge wiped out entire towns in its path and picked up debris—trees, houses, animals—before reaching Johnstown, fourteen miles downstream. Traveling forty miles an hour, with swells as high as sixty feet, the deadly floodwaters razed the mill town—home to 20,000 people—in minutes. The Great Flood, as it would come to be called, remains the deadliest in US history, killing more than 2,200 people and causing seventeen million dollars in damage.

    Al Roker tells the riveting story of this tragedy, which remains one of the worst weather-related disasters in American history. Ruthless Tide follows a compelling cast of characters whose fates converged because of that tragic day, including John Parke, the engineer whose heroic efforts failed to save the dam; Henry Clay Frick, the robber baron whose fancy sport fishing resort was responsible for modifications that weakened the structure; and Clara Barton, the founder of the American Red Cross, who spent five months in Johnstown leading one of the first organized disaster relief efforts. Weaving together their stories and those of many ordinary citizens whose lives were forever altered by the event, Roker creates a classic account of our natural world at its most terrifying.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperAudio
    Release dateMay 22, 2018
    ISBN9780062682215
    Author

    Al Roker

    Al Roker is cohost of NBC’s Today. He has received thirteen Emmy Awards, ten for his work on Today. He is the author of The Storm of the Century, an acclaimed history of the 1900 Galveston hurricane. He lives in Manhattan with his wife, ABC News and 20/20 correspondent Deborah Roberts, and has two daughters and a son.

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    Reviews for Ruthless Tide

    4.5/5

    12 ratings2 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Written by NBC Weatherman, Al Roker, this book is an account of the event that took place on May 31, 1889 when the dam creating the lake at the South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club about five hundred feet above and miles away from Johnstown, PA broke causing the destruction of the industrial city of Johnstown. The club was a secret subscription club owned by rich businessmen from Pittsburgh, PA. The disaster is usually remembered as The Johnstown Flood. The club and it's members were never held accountalble for the death and destruction caused by the faulty construction of the dam. There are many similarities between this story and some of the environmental issues we still face today. Then book reads like a novel, with many first person accounts.
    • 4/5
      I listened to this as an audiobook and while it was interesting, some of the discs in the set I borrowed skipped frequently. I grew up hearing about the Johnstown Flood, but for some reason, I never registered what year it took place--so I was surprised that it was in 1889--for some reason I thought it has been in the first few decades of the 1900s. I did learn more of the history surrounding the flood than I remembered from other accounts I'd heard or read. That may not be surprising as I've found myself more interested in history now than I was during my schooling. Since Hurricane Katrina, I've wondered why people would want to place a city in an area that could flood if levees or dams break. Johnstown was in a similar position, though I don't think it was in such a precarious position when it was first settled. It seems that the Industrial Age waste dumping (pre-regulations) and the rich men's desire to make the area a resort destination complete with stocked fishing lake created by a dam, changed the topography of the area and made it more likely for flooding to occur (due to river narrowing) and when the dam failed and released all the water that had been pent up for the lake into the already flooding river--well . . . you have The Johnstown Flood.