Drumight's tornado memorabilia

The more we learn about tornadoes, the harder they are to explain. They leave behind the oddest things, wood stuck through concrete, twisted steel beams. <br/><br/>News on 6 reporter Rick Wells went

Tuesday, April 4th 2006, 10:22 am

By: News On 6

The more we learn about tornadoes, the harder they are to explain. They leave behind the oddest things, wood stuck through concrete, twisted steel beams.

News on 6 reporter Rick Wells went to Drumright to check out the Drumright Historical Museum's records of the big storm that hit Drumright 50 years ago.

Fifty years ago, April 2nd of 1956 a big tornado rolled through Drumright in Creek County. It left behind damage and destruction, and some odd things impossible to explain. A grocery store with roof and walls gone but some groceries undisturbed on the shelves.

The storm hit a chicken farm south of town. Daryl Grisham: "They were everywhere, dead and alive." They told me chickens were strewn for about a mile, school kids were asked to help collect them.

Brenda Grisham manages the Drumright Historical Museum, she was at the movies when the '56 storm hit. "It was the long long trailer Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, I was grown before I saw the end of that movie."

The Historical Museum has lots of photographs of damage from both the â€˜56 storm and one that hit 18 years later in 1974. Two scrapbooks contain a complete file of newspaper stories and photos.

But the piece of storm history that causes the most ohs and ahs. A wheel and tire off a 50's model Chevy.

It was in the garage when the storm hit, wood through one side and out the other. Brenda Grisham: "We had some little boys in here the other day, how'd that do that? A tornado done it, How? I can't explain a tornado." Hard to believe, but there it is.

You can see the tire with the wood through it and all the other exhibits at the Drumright Historical Museum. They are open Wednesday through Saturday. For more information, call them at 918-352-3002.