Heppner Flood
Many farmers in Oregon east of the Cascades were worried about water conditions during the late spring of 1903. Very low precipitation totals in April and May had left the soil dry and began to threaten crops. The agricultural report for May 25 stated “ranges drying up, and more rain needed in eastern and southern Oregon. Wheat backward and becoming weedy ... corn, sugar beets, field onions and gardens making very slow growth.” Dry and warm weather continued, although local showers brought some relief. The June 8 report included a single sentence about water conditions: “Spring wheat and forage plants deteriorating on account of the drought.” Little wonder, then, that gathering clouds on the afternoon of June 14th were welcomed by the residents, many of them dry-land farmers whose economic survival depended on summer rains.

Heppner is the county seat of Morrow County, and had a population in 1903 of about 1,400. Willow Creek, which originates in the Blue Mountains only a few miles southeast of Heppner and flows northwestward toward the Columbia, had created an alluvial valley 500 to 1,500 feet wide, a fertile strip of cropland on which Heppner was built.

As storm clouds gathered over the Columbia Plateau on the afternoon of June 14, they seemed to congregate near the slopes of the Blue Mountains just south of Heppner. They grew darker and darker. Thunder was heard. Abruptly, a massive ( and deadly) hailstorm began. John T. Whistler, a U.S. Geological Survey agent, later reported:

Some of the hail stones are said to have measured 1 1/4 inches in diameter ... A grim evidence of the amount of hail that fell is that, while most of the bodies being recovered on the fifth day were already badly decomposed, one was occasionally found almost perfectly preserved in a large drift of hail. Nearly all the hail was of clear ice and, unlike the usual hail stones, which are of a more opaque ice, being built up from a nucleus in successive layers.

As bad as the hail storm was, things quickly grew worse. Heavy rain, appropriately called “cloudbursts” by residents, inundated the slopes of the Blues and the upper parts of the valley. Most of the rain fell in areas beyond any measurement gauges, but later reports estimated that an average of 1.5 inches fell over an area of 20-square-miles, most of it in a short period of time.

Unfortunately for Heppner, most of this 20 square mile area funneled into Willow Creek and its tributaries. A wall of water surged downstream; in many places, the first surge of water coincided with the peak depth. Eyewitness reports of the height of the “wave” at the head of the flood waters ranged from 15 to 50 feet high, but many of these appear to have been exaggerated. Nonetheless, the water was very deep, and arrived so suddenly that residents were taken almost completely by surprise. The first notice that the people in the business district had of the flood was when T.W. Ayers’ large two-story residence left its foundation, floated across the street, and crashed into some wooden buildings. Poplar trees over 2 feet in diameter were “snapped off like cornstalks.” Julian Keithley, age 70, stayed in his home until everything was gone but the roof. He rode the current atop the roof for almost 2 miles, saving the life of another resident by pulling him onto the roof as he floated by.

About one-third of Heppner was completely destroyed, and more than 200 people died (about one-fourth of the total population). About 150 residences were destroyed. Whistler speculated that the destructiveness of the flood “is due more to the rugged character of the topography and the almost utter absence of vegetation than to the unusual rainfall.” If this statement is true, it suggests that the biggest reason for the disaster was the location of Heppner in a very exposed and potentially dangerous location.

In the days following the flood, many remarkable stories were told as residents began to clean up, bury the dead, and rebuild their town. The heroic story of a Paul Revere-like ride by two horsemen became a legend. Leslie Matlock and Bruce Kelley, expert horsemen, secured horses from a livery stable and, armed with pruning shears, set out to warn ranchers and residents of Lexington (9 miles away) and Ione (18 miles away), both on lower Willow Creek. Below Heppner, Willow Creek meanders considerably, so the two riders cut across country, cutting fences as they went. Said Matlock in recalling the ride later, “We (Kelley and I) didn’t talk much, except to call warnings at homes along the way. The flood waters had already beat us to Lexington, but we felt we could make it to Ione before the water hit.” In Lexington the flood waters had swept through the community at about 7:00 p.m., destroying several buildings and forcing residents to evacuate to the hills nearby. Matlock and Kelly secured fresh horses and continued on to Ione, beating the crest of the flood.