A Saturday Never Forgotten
There were many times in my life that I find myself looking back reflecting on things that happened when I was a child.
There was one Saturday afternoon that I will never forget as long as I live.
I have heard many stories about the explosion that rocked Richmond, Indiana on April 6, 1968 at 1:47 pm, but not many people have ever heard my accounts of the things that took place on that day in my life and the lives of my family members.
I have become a believer in fate because of the memory, and I am hoping after hearing my story you will be inspired to believe that everyone's life has a purpose, but sometimes fate helps you to find it.
My grandmother was a wonderful woman.
She and my Grandfather lived on SW F Street, in Richmond just behind the Richmond High School at the time.
There were five of us, and during those times it wasn't unusual for grandparents to take care of the grandchildren while the parents worked.
This particular Saturday was just that case.
Mom and Dad worked for Belden Corporation and worked most Saturday's.
My two older siblings didn't need attention as they had jobs already or were old enough to take care of things themselves.
My two younger sisters and I however, usually spent Saturdays with my Grandmother.
On this particular afternoon she had errands to run, as she was a part time Fuller Brush lady.
She had a delivery to make at around 2 pm at a downtown location, Marting Arms to be exact as Louis Marting had placed an order a few weeks ago, which was now ready to be delivered.
I remember us whining and complaining about not wanting to go there.
We wanted to do something fun! "Let's go green picking" we all screamed in unison.
Green picking was a task that involved much skill, I state jokingly.
Simply put, it was taking a small knife, cutting a dandelion green at the base and then throwing it into a paper bag! Great fun for three little girls on a Saturday right! Wrong, to this day none of us can remember why we would even have wanted to do that.
I mean the greens were amazing after she cooked them, but who wanted to go out and dig them up? She agreed to take us green picking if we would agree not to whine when it was time to leave to deliver her order.
Of course we all said yes, we got our way.
It wasn't unusual as most people who knew us, knew that she spoiled us rotten.
We arrived at the greenhouses on Peacock Road, shortly after 1 pm.
Now once you got started, picking greens didn't take long especially if there were several people working at it.
She planned to take them home, soak them for a bit, then cook them up for when our Grandpa came home from work later that afternoon.
It seemed to be a win, situation for everyone.
I am sure she was just trying to keep us happy, but knew she would make her appointment on time, so everyone was content.
It was a beautiful day as I remember.
It was unusually warm for it being early April.
The sun was shining brightly, and there wasn't a cloud in the sky.
The trees were starting to bud out, and of course the spring flowers had bloomed beautifully that year.
The area where we were next to the greenhouses was where roses were grown.
We could pick the greens, take a little break and peer inside to see the amazing flowers that were grown there.
It truly was a beautiful afternoon.
It wasn't long that my Grandmother said it was time to go.
"We were a few minutes late and she didn't want to disappoint Louis as she was a nice lady and a good customer", she said.
As we piled everything into the 66 Chevy Impala, I noticed that Grandma had stopped abruptly and was looking up at the sky.
Sometimes she did that because she would say a prayer so at first we really didn't pay much attention.
She said "Lord God Almighty, what has happened to our town"? I remember looking up and all I could see was a huge cloud of black smoke billowing in the sky.
It almost looked like a mushroom cloud, and against the bright blue sky looked so menacing I will never forget how scared I became just from seeing it.
She hurried us into the car.
It was at this point I believe all of us must have thought it was the "end of the world".
She told us to calm down, that she needed to get us home safely so we could find out what had happened.
Soon we were safe and sound back on SW F Street.
We could hear sirens screaming all over town.
We couldn't tell it was the sounds of police, fire trucks or ambulances, But somehow we knew whatever had happened was horrible All the sounds blended together into one loud scream.
After arriving at their house, we soon realized that the phones were down.
There was no way to call our parents.
There was no way we could let them know that we were okay.
There was no way that we could tell them that we were not downtown.
The city officials had all of the bridges and access to the downtown area blocked off, so since we lived on the other side of town there was no way to get us safely home to our parents.
After a few hours we were able to communicate with our parents.
I am not sure how they found out that we were okay.
My dad and brother went downtown to help try to rescue people, hoping to find us there safe and sound.
They didn't know we had already arrived back home.
The things they witnessed while down there were terrible.
There were people lying all over the place.
Some of them were alive, but many of them were dead.
The worse part of the experience was that there were parts of people laying places.
I can't imagine what went through their minds when they thought that they might find one of us laying there.
The explosion had two parts.
The first one started in a gas line near Marting Arms.
The second one was actually the Marting Arms building as they stored gunpowder in the basement area for refilling gun shells and for other reasons.
Louis Marting's body was never found.
The explosions killed 41 people and injured over 150.
It took over a year to clear the wreckage and several building and city blocks were condemned.
The Governor declared Richmond a disaster area.
Robert Kennedy, who was campaigning for President that year visited.
It was one of the last stops he made before he was shot and killed in Los Angeles in June of the same year.
I know that if my sisters and I had not been so insisting on rerouting our plans that day, I would not be alive to tell this story.
I know if my Grandmother had not been the loving, beautiful, and patient person that she was; the turn of events would have killed 4 family members.
I also know that there are two generations that would not be alive today if that Saturday had gone any other way than how it did.
Was it fate that we escaped death that day? Was it just a lucky call and we happened to win? We might never know the answer to those questions.
The following September my oldest sister was married and the four of us were there to share the celebration.
We have all gone one to live productive lives, and of course as mentioned before what fate has in store is still in question.
Together, we have produced 10 children.
Three of which have served our country in two wars.
There are now 11 great grandchildren and counting.
There is no way to know what the future holds for any of us, however, I am surely looking forward to telling them the story of a Saturday that will never be forgotten.
I hope when I retell the story, they will believe that their life surely has a purpose and they will be inspired to pass this inspiration down to those that are yet to follow.
There was one Saturday afternoon that I will never forget as long as I live.
I have heard many stories about the explosion that rocked Richmond, Indiana on April 6, 1968 at 1:47 pm, but not many people have ever heard my accounts of the things that took place on that day in my life and the lives of my family members.
I have become a believer in fate because of the memory, and I am hoping after hearing my story you will be inspired to believe that everyone's life has a purpose, but sometimes fate helps you to find it.
My grandmother was a wonderful woman.
She and my Grandfather lived on SW F Street, in Richmond just behind the Richmond High School at the time.
There were five of us, and during those times it wasn't unusual for grandparents to take care of the grandchildren while the parents worked.
This particular Saturday was just that case.
Mom and Dad worked for Belden Corporation and worked most Saturday's.
My two older siblings didn't need attention as they had jobs already or were old enough to take care of things themselves.
My two younger sisters and I however, usually spent Saturdays with my Grandmother.
On this particular afternoon she had errands to run, as she was a part time Fuller Brush lady.
She had a delivery to make at around 2 pm at a downtown location, Marting Arms to be exact as Louis Marting had placed an order a few weeks ago, which was now ready to be delivered.
I remember us whining and complaining about not wanting to go there.
We wanted to do something fun! "Let's go green picking" we all screamed in unison.
Green picking was a task that involved much skill, I state jokingly.
Simply put, it was taking a small knife, cutting a dandelion green at the base and then throwing it into a paper bag! Great fun for three little girls on a Saturday right! Wrong, to this day none of us can remember why we would even have wanted to do that.
I mean the greens were amazing after she cooked them, but who wanted to go out and dig them up? She agreed to take us green picking if we would agree not to whine when it was time to leave to deliver her order.
Of course we all said yes, we got our way.
It wasn't unusual as most people who knew us, knew that she spoiled us rotten.
We arrived at the greenhouses on Peacock Road, shortly after 1 pm.
Now once you got started, picking greens didn't take long especially if there were several people working at it.
She planned to take them home, soak them for a bit, then cook them up for when our Grandpa came home from work later that afternoon.
It seemed to be a win, situation for everyone.
I am sure she was just trying to keep us happy, but knew she would make her appointment on time, so everyone was content.
It was a beautiful day as I remember.
It was unusually warm for it being early April.
The sun was shining brightly, and there wasn't a cloud in the sky.
The trees were starting to bud out, and of course the spring flowers had bloomed beautifully that year.
The area where we were next to the greenhouses was where roses were grown.
We could pick the greens, take a little break and peer inside to see the amazing flowers that were grown there.
It truly was a beautiful afternoon.
It wasn't long that my Grandmother said it was time to go.
"We were a few minutes late and she didn't want to disappoint Louis as she was a nice lady and a good customer", she said.
As we piled everything into the 66 Chevy Impala, I noticed that Grandma had stopped abruptly and was looking up at the sky.
Sometimes she did that because she would say a prayer so at first we really didn't pay much attention.
She said "Lord God Almighty, what has happened to our town"? I remember looking up and all I could see was a huge cloud of black smoke billowing in the sky.
It almost looked like a mushroom cloud, and against the bright blue sky looked so menacing I will never forget how scared I became just from seeing it.
She hurried us into the car.
It was at this point I believe all of us must have thought it was the "end of the world".
She told us to calm down, that she needed to get us home safely so we could find out what had happened.
Soon we were safe and sound back on SW F Street.
We could hear sirens screaming all over town.
We couldn't tell it was the sounds of police, fire trucks or ambulances, But somehow we knew whatever had happened was horrible All the sounds blended together into one loud scream.
After arriving at their house, we soon realized that the phones were down.
There was no way to call our parents.
There was no way we could let them know that we were okay.
There was no way that we could tell them that we were not downtown.
The city officials had all of the bridges and access to the downtown area blocked off, so since we lived on the other side of town there was no way to get us safely home to our parents.
After a few hours we were able to communicate with our parents.
I am not sure how they found out that we were okay.
My dad and brother went downtown to help try to rescue people, hoping to find us there safe and sound.
They didn't know we had already arrived back home.
The things they witnessed while down there were terrible.
There were people lying all over the place.
Some of them were alive, but many of them were dead.
The worse part of the experience was that there were parts of people laying places.
I can't imagine what went through their minds when they thought that they might find one of us laying there.
The explosion had two parts.
The first one started in a gas line near Marting Arms.
The second one was actually the Marting Arms building as they stored gunpowder in the basement area for refilling gun shells and for other reasons.
Louis Marting's body was never found.
The explosions killed 41 people and injured over 150.
It took over a year to clear the wreckage and several building and city blocks were condemned.
The Governor declared Richmond a disaster area.
Robert Kennedy, who was campaigning for President that year visited.
It was one of the last stops he made before he was shot and killed in Los Angeles in June of the same year.
I know that if my sisters and I had not been so insisting on rerouting our plans that day, I would not be alive to tell this story.
I know if my Grandmother had not been the loving, beautiful, and patient person that she was; the turn of events would have killed 4 family members.
I also know that there are two generations that would not be alive today if that Saturday had gone any other way than how it did.
Was it fate that we escaped death that day? Was it just a lucky call and we happened to win? We might never know the answer to those questions.
The following September my oldest sister was married and the four of us were there to share the celebration.
We have all gone one to live productive lives, and of course as mentioned before what fate has in store is still in question.
Together, we have produced 10 children.
Three of which have served our country in two wars.
There are now 11 great grandchildren and counting.
There is no way to know what the future holds for any of us, however, I am surely looking forward to telling them the story of a Saturday that will never be forgotten.
I hope when I retell the story, they will believe that their life surely has a purpose and they will be inspired to pass this inspiration down to those that are yet to follow.
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