TETON ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM. Ricks College Idaho State Historical Society History Department, Utah State University TETON DAM DISASTER. Mark G.

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1 TETON ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM Ricks College Idaho State Historical Society History Department, Utah State University TETON DAM DISASTER Mark G. Ricks Interviewed by Mary Ann Beck June 8, 1977 Project made possible by funds from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation Idaho State Legislature through the Idaho State Historical Society and National Endowment for the Humanities

2 UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY & COLLEGE HISTORY DEPARTMENTS COMMUNITY IMPROVEMENT THROUGH LOCAL HISTORY ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM INTERVIEWER AGREEMENT In view-of / the historical and scholarly value of the fo atio;kcoa n the interview with di -<.r le,,, I, ; S--._-_-<-: r-e-i-r-ft ZOF,--c (name, please print)! (intery ewer, print) knowingly and voluntarily permit the Milton R. Merrill Library at Utah State University, the David 0. McKay Library at Ricks College, and the Idaho State Historical Society at Boise, Idaho, the full tights and use of this information. --).---."-f---72-"7-"r":71 e e 1, t..-1 L_ 72...e. Al Interiewer's Signature.?\ 77 Date

3 'UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY & COLLEGE HISTORY DEPARTMENTS COMMUNITY IMPROVEMENT THROUGH LOCAL HISTORY ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM INTERVIEWEE AGREEMENT You have been interviewed in connection with a joint oral history program of the History Department, Utah State University, Ricks College, and the Idaho State Historical Society. The purpose of this oral history program is to gather and preserve information for historical and scholarly use. A tape recording of your interview has been made by the interviewer. A verbatim typescript of the tape will be made and a final typed and edited transcripts, together with the tape will be made and a final will then be filed in the Milton R. Merrill Library Special Collections, David 0. McKay Library at Ricks College, and the Idaho State Historical Society in Boise. This material will be made available according to each of the depositories' policies for research be scholars and by others for scholarly purposes. When the final transcript is completed, a personal copy will.be sent to you. * * * * * In view of th- his rical A" holarly value of this information, I, L&, do hereby assign full (please print full name) and all rights of this material to the Merrill Library at Utah State University, to the Library at Ricks College, and to the Idaho State Historical Society at Boise, Idaho, for scholarly purposes according to each of the institutions governing policies.

4 ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEWEE: Mark G. Ricks INTERVIEWER: Mary Ann Beck DATE: June 8, 1977 TETON DAM DISASTER B: Mr. Ricks, where were you born? R: I was born here in Rexburg. B: How long have you lived in Rexburg? R: I've lived here a lifetime. This has been home to me. B: Mr. Ricks, would you spell you name? R: Mark is spelled M-A-R-K and then George, my middle name, G-E-O-R-G-E Ticks R-I-C-K-S. B: How old are you? R: I was born in 1924 so that would make me coming on 53. I'm 52. B: Do you have a family? R: Yes, ma'am, we do. B: How many were living in your home at the time of the flood? R: We brought nine children into the world. One of them passed away and we only had two married children at the time of the flood. One boy was on a mission over in Japan and so he was not home, but the rest of the family were at home. B: What do you do for a livingj R: I'm a farmer by occupation and primarily raise potatoes and grain. B: What is your calling in the Stake? R: At the time of the flood I was serving as the Stake President of the Rexburg, Idaho Stake. I've since been released. I was released in October of 1976 and given an assignment as a Regional Representative of the Twelve.

5 MIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMEN -2- B: How long have you lived in this area? R: I've lived here all my life. The family home is just next door and I've lived in that all my lifetime till I got married and then my wife and I located in the home where we are p.resently living. We've added to it and enlarged upon it. B: Do you, did you support or oppose the construction of the Teton Dam? R: I was strongly in favor of it and I still am. I'd like to see it be rebuilt. Water is the life blood of this community and agriculture, of course, is our main industry. I think that if we can rebuild that dam, I'm strongly in favor of it. B: Where were you and your family when the TetonDam broke? R: I was here at home, my wife and I were working in the yard and doing a little watering around the flowers and so on and one of the little neighbor boys was over here in the yard and I was just kinda foolin' and playin' with him a little bit. His big sister came over about eleven o'clock looking for him and she said, "C'mon Kevin, we're going up to Teton Dam. The Teton Dam's breaking." And I just kinda snickered at that. I didn't think she knew what she was talking about. This young lady is about eleven or twelve years of age. I learned later her mother had received a phone call from a neighbor lady who's husband worked at the dam. He is the one that called home and told his wife that the Teton Dam was going to break. And if she wanted to see a dam break, she better hurry up there. That's why she called my neighbor and the two of them were taking their families up there. That's how I learned about it. B: What was your first reaction when you heard that the dam actually had failed? R: I didn't believe it. I didn't think there was a chance. I said to my wife, "There isn't a chance for that dam to break." I didn't believe it, I couldn't believe it even after I saw the floodwaters started through the valley.

6 -3- I walked in the house about a half hold- after this girl had come to pick up her little brother that I referred to earlier. Don Ellis, our local radio announcer, was a talking on the rakio and he says, "The Teton Dam had broken." He said the dam had actually broken. So I went out and told my wife and we decided we'd get in the car, take our family and so we picked' up the family members that were here at home and we decided we'd go uptown and see if we could learn what was a going on. And when we got up there, we saw a blockade. They'd already started blocking the highway traffic and stopping cars from going north on Highway 191. B: Did you see the flood? R: Yes, ma'am, I sure did. B: Would you like to describe it? R: The first thing that we did was to go up on the hill then afterwards we went down to help a widow lady that we knew would be involved in the flood. We helped her out. After that was over then we decided we'd come back home and check on our other boys. Two of our boys had gone up to St. Anthony to fly these radio controlled airplanes and we just wanted to check and see if they were back home. We found out that they'd made it back home alright and they'd had an unusual experience up at Teton. Someone had stopped them at the junction there at the highway that goes up Teton Basin and asked if they'd go up and help Hal Ricks clean his household goods out because he lived along the Teton River up in the near the city of Teton. So those boys had gone up there and helped him get his belongings out of the house and they were there close enough to where they saw that wall of water coming. It hit one house about a quarter of a mile from where they were and just disintegrated, they said, it just blew up. And so they had big stories to tell us. One boy, Merle, especially, his eyes were jsut so large when he was telling, he said "Dad, we're gonna get it." He says, "You better get

7 -4- things up; we better get things out of our tractors and thins up on the hill, and our trucks." He says, "We're gonna get it." B: In vacating the area where you live, did you help any families before the flood? R: Yes. After we'd gone uptown then we decided to drive on out and help a widow lady that we knew, a lady named Venla Wright that lived out along the river on the South Fork just before the river, Teton River, goes down into the Snake River and we were just quite sure that her home would be flooded because quite often it would get flooded from the spring runoff. And this was kind of interesting. When we got down there we saw two other people with pickups a helping her and so we decided we'd help also and I came back home and got a truck, I got a larger truck so we'd load more of her furniture in the truck. She got the things that she felt like were most valuable to her, excepting some of her appliances. We didn't think that they'd get flooded too bad. But she had a picture hanging on the wall that she said was a family heirloom and I said, "Ah, that's up there about five feet off of the floor. I don't think that will ever be bothered Don't worry about that picture." I felt kind of embarrassed when later on when we went back after the flood had gone through the valley, and all that was left of her place was the foundation. Her house had just absolutely floated away and everything that was in it was gone that we didn't load up. B: Did your home get flooded? R: No ma'am, my home was not involved in the floodwater itself. The flood came within a half a mile of our home but it never did get on our property. B: Did you have any unusual or miraculous experiences connected with the flood? R: Because of my Church assignment as what is know as the Area Welfare Leader, I then had the responsibility to correlate and coordinate the whole LDS Church effort as far as taking care of the needs of the people that were involved in the flood. And so after we had sat up on the hill for a while

8 MIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMENNIIIIMMUMMEN -5- and watched the floodwaters come into Rexburg and saw the damage that was done, I then made my way down to the college and found out that the County Commissioners and the Civil Defense people had set up headquarters in the Army Reserve Building there on the hill. I also located my counselors and found out that they had held a meeting, giving people instructions to go fill out some residence cards so that they could stay in the college dormitories. Ricks College made their facilities available to the people and so our people then were instructed what they could do for the evening. It was then that I went to the County Commissioners and asked if it would be possible to hitch a ride with one of the helicopters to Idaho Falls because the roads had been blocked off, all the telephone communications had been cut off and there was no calling out on the phone. I had to make a phone calle to Salt Lake Co the brethren in the Welfare Department. And so they provided a helicopter for me to fly down to the airport in Idaho Falls. I went in there and sat in the phone booth and made several phone calls--some to the local Church leaders in Idaho Falls and others to the brethren in Salt Lake. They had already heard about the flood. Someone in Idaho Falls had called down and let them know that the dam had broken. That floodwaters had gone through the valley so they had already started to load a welfare truck with supplies to come to Rexburg to take care of the needs of the people. But I had kind of an interesting experience while I was there. The pilot came to the phone booth after I'd been talking for about twenty minutes and I told him I wasn't ready yet. I had to make a few more phone calls and if he'd give me another half hour then he could come back and get me. After I got through making my phone calls I never did see him again. He never did come back and, in the meantime, a 737 flight had come to Idaho Falls from Salt Lake and Los Angeles area and on that plane were the CBS news fellows with their cameras. They had been sent here to

9 -6- cover the story for CBS news and they earned who I was and while their charter helicopter was coming in from Salt Lake, we visited and they asked me to fly with them. Of course, I was happy to do so because that gave me a chance to get a ride back home again, back to my responsibilities. We did fly over the whole area and by this time the floodwater had gone all out through Roberts. Roberts was all covered with flood. These Buttes west of Rexburg were surrou11 ded with water and we just followed up that stream on up through to Rexburg up to the dam itself. These newsmen wanted to see the dam and they wanted to shoot some pictures before it got dark, we didn't land up by the college until somewhere,between 10:00 and 10:30 that night. But they did stop at one place in Wilford where two ladies were in a trailer house. We stopped down there with the helicopter and gave them an opportunity to interview one of those ladies. This was quite interesting because the one lady they talked to had a new home along the river part way down the canyon and that home was the first one that was hit by the floodwaters. It just disintegrated, blew it all to pieces, and this lady had to tell us about it. B: Did you see any animals trying to escape the floodwaters while you were flying? R: The first night, no, I couldn't see any animals. I didn't get an opportunity to see any animals escaping the floodwater. In fact, as I looked from the helicopter, I looked for animals wherever I could and we just didn't see any signs of animals that first night. The water was awfully deep down here by the Buttes and we just supposed that hundreds of 'em had been drowned down in that area. The next morning we flew over the area again in a military helicopter about 5:00 a.m. (on Sunday morning) and we did see a few animals bunched up in one or two places out towards Parker area. We really didn't see a lot of animals either time. B: Did you have any flood victim familis staying with you the first two or three days?

10 -7- R: Yes, we had four families move in wire ds and we took care of them for the most part for about a week. My wife got out the old conventional washing machine and washed a lot of their clothes. They stayed right with us for about a week. B: Did you help with the cleaning up in organizing the cleaning up in Rexburg? R: Yes, because of my church calling, I had the total responsibility. But because of the fact that our communications was out and we didn't have access to telephones like we'd ought to have done, and because of the magnitude and the many hours that I was spending with other responsibilities we decided to have President Hillam in Idaho Falls organize the volunteer groups that were coming in from areas outside'of the Rexburg region. We kept them on an organized basis. He would come up here and meet with us every day to find out what our needs were and how many people we could handle and then we had him make the contact with stake presidents down in our neighboring stakes on south. They went as far south of Salt Lake. We had thousands come from the Salt Lake area. B: What cherished items do you think the flood victims lost, in your opinion? R: This was quite interesting. The majority of the people that I talked to had two items that they felt like that were of most worth. Number one; they felt bad about losing their genealogy records, and number two; their food storage. I would have to classify those two as the two that received the highest priority. B: What did you think about and how did you feel as you watched the floodwaters rolling through the area? R: I repeated several times to people that were standing around me'and also to my owne wife and family that were sitting there with us up on the hill that I just couldn't believe it. We sat there and watched it roll in and we still couldn't believe that it was a happening. It was just not possible

11 -8- for a flood to go through our communii. When the radio announcer first said there'd be five feet of water go through Main Street, I just laughed at him, I just wondered how he could confuse people so much or terrify them. That's foolishness to say things like that. I didn't believe it. B: How did you go about as a stake cleaning up Rexburg, in organizing it? -R: What we did was to call our bishops together daily. Sometimes we met with them twice a day to find out their needs. We decided that we would go ahead and use our own resources and our own church facilities to start the cleanup effort. We felt that by having people work that it was good therapy. They couldn't get to worrying and brooding over the things that they'd lost. They needed to keep themselves busy and occupied. So we encouraged them to go on back home and to start cleaning out their own residences, cleanin' up and muddin' out and do the best they could. And this went on locally for the first few days until we started having the volunteer groups come in from Rigby and Idaho Falls area. They were the first ones that came to our rescue and aid. But we found out the job was too big for just these stakes in our beighboring cities to handle and so we reached out and started bringing them in from further south. B:. Did you have a meeting that first Sunday in the auditorium? R: Yes, yes we did. We called a mass meeting for Sunday morning. I think it was at 10:00, I've forgotten the time now. The next day after the flood had gone through the community. And it was at that meeting that we tried to give them hope and encouragement. We tried to report to them what our present status was. We let them know that we'd been in contact with the General Welfare Committee in Salt Lake and that the welfare supplies were on the road and headin' up this way. And that we were going to provide for the people. We encouraged them right after the general meeting was held, to group together in their own wards and we asked the bishops in each of

12 -9- those who lived within the boundaries, whether they were members of the LDS Church or whether they were non members. We told him that we felt that he was responsible and one of the very first phings that we were anxious to find out was how many people lost their lives. And so on that Sunday a great effort was put forth to find out if everyone could be located. We had families identifying their own. We had a missing persons list up in Manwaring Center that we used-at the information desk as kind of a headquarters. As soon as people were reported missing, their names went on that list and when someone learned of their whereabouts then we'd take them off. That's how we were able to find out how many people were lost during this flood. We did learn this much, that not one single person in Madison County lost their life in that flood. There were a few in Fremont but none in Madison. B: When did the Bishop's Storehouse open? R: I can't remember the exact date that we opened that Bishop's Storehouse but those supplies came in on Sunday and I think the following day on Monday is hwen we actually opened up a temporary Bishop's Storehouse on Ricks College campus. They let us use one of the buildings up there and so the supplies came in. We got Brother Cleon Brown to be the storekeeper and to issue the supplies and I believe it was on Monday. B: When did the welfare open? R: The truck, the welfare truck came in on Sunday and, of course, we had to unload it. We asked President Tiny Grant to supervise that aspect of things and Brother Cleon Brown to serve as the Storehouse Coordinator and those trucks started to rollin' in. Altogether we had about 25 truckloads of commodities come up this way, large trucks, the big long trucks. B: What were some of the problems with which you were confronted, problems that gave you the most frustration as a stake president?

13 -10- R: That's awfully hard to say. I guess cis was a learning experience for all of us and the first time that we, any of us, had had any experience of this kind. So we were learning as we went along. Of course, we were anxious to be right there to reach the people and to be able to supply their needs. The government sent their agencies in here. The Federal Disaster Agency Administration Committee came in and they had different ones of their agency, the Small Business people, the Farm Home Administration, the Red Cross people, the HUD people, the things that were maybe just a little bit frustrating was that we were kinda going our own way as a church and we didn't know hardly how to use these governmental agenciesto help us. But I think we figured that out alright. We told them if they'd work through our LDS Church organization, that we could expedite their work. We learned for instance that HUD had the assignment to come in a provide temporary houseing for all the people that were'flood victims and in order to determine who had those needs, then it was necessary for them to make a survey of the whole community and all the people that were involved in the flood. We told them then if they would give us two of their verifiers for each ward, we would send them out with the Bishop or one of his representatives and they could go to every home and they would hlep him to make that appraisal. In other words, he had three different categories: number one was whether or not a person needed temporary housing; number two, whether the house was damaged to the degree that it would just require minor repairs or whether it would require major repairs or whether the home was completely destroyed. In some instances the homes were absolutely gone. They floated right away or broke up and os these men had to go through and make that determination before the HUD people knew what to do and how to use their resources and their people. We just had a whole myriad of problems. Some of the people that lived out in the valley were not on city water. One of our immediate concerns was,

14 is the water contaminated or is it safer? Can people drink it? And we had to use our department of health for the State of.idaho. Those people had to come in and take some samples of the water and run tests to find out whether or not the water was safe for people to drink. Some of these things you see, we tried to take a step at a time. Some we felt were more urgent and more necessary than others. But we were grateful that Ricks College campus was up high enough and their supply of water up on the hill was not involved in the flood. That water was safe to drink and we let the people know immediately that they could drink water from the campus. B: What were the conditions at the hospital? R: The hospital was not involved in the flood and they set up temporary quarters to administer relief to anybody. They called all the doctors and had them on standby in case there were a lot of people that came in injured and needed some help immediately as far as their health was concerned. We asked a man in town, Brother Lynn Smith, to coordinate and correlate the efforts of the hospital there with our committee so that we had some kind of an organization to work with. In addition to the hospital, we set up three other first aid stations. For instance, a person would go down and work in the homes in that mudded condition. If anyone got a cut on their arm, it was a safe thing to go and get a tetanus shot just to take precautions. We didn't know whether or not this flood would bring a lot of disease and there were some people who felt that everyone who was involved in the flood should have a diphtheria shot or typhoid fever shot. But we didn't feel like it was necessary unless some cases actually turned up. We made that decision after consulting with some of the local doctors. We felt unless people were coming in with those type illnesses that maybe giving people mass inoculation would make them more ill than if we maybe contracted one or two of the diseases.

15 -12-- B: Where were the other three first aid,tations? R: They were on Ricks College campus. I can't remember the exact locations in different ones of the buildings. We had one at the East Stake Center, one in Manwaring Center and the other one was in the Family Living Center building. B: How soon after the flood did the LDS volunteers come in to help clean up the flood in Rexburg? R: Mary Ann, as best I can remember, the first groups came in from Idaho Falls. We had some people actually come up here on Sunday but they didn't do a whole lot. Some of their leaders came up to find out what our needs were. But they started coming in on Monday and Tuesday that two or three days following the flood. B: When did the BOR come in? R: The Bureau, of Reclamation, without checking back in some of my records, I couldn't tell you the exact date. They were part of the governmental that were sent in here. We set up a federal disaster headquarters in the Hart PE Building and I've just forgotten the name of the two men that supervised that but we had tables set up in that turf area that housed different ones of these agencies and the Bureau of Reclamation people were among them. B: Have you had any uplifting experiences during the cleaning up operation? R: Well, there's been a lot of experiences I think have been miraculous. The ones that have really been thrilling to me was that the fact that I was working very closely with the church leadership and I made several phone calls to Salt Lake. Different ones of the brethern would call me up. Elder Boyd K. Packer, a member of the Council of the Twelve, talked to me two or three times. He was our area advisor representing the Council of the Twelve. President Kimball called up and was anxious to know the status of things and then as you know, he came up here on June the 13th just eight

16 -13- days following the flood and talked t(. the people in a mass meeting in the Hart Building. The governmental agencies and our elected officials-- Congressman Hansen, Senator McClure, Senator Church--those people would contact me because they knew that I had a responsibility with the Church. They soon decided that if they were going to make their resources available to us, they would go through the channels fo the Church and so I had a lot of rich experience of working with governmental agencies. This man named Kleppe who was the Bureau of Reclamation Director for the United States, was here and he came to see me. Whenever any of these dignitaries from Washington, D. C. would-come they would always make an appointment to see me and see what they could do because they felt like we were correlating things through the Church. B: What were the people's reaction on June 13th when President Kimball came to Rexburg? R: The people were thrilled, of course, to think that the Prophet had enough personal love and consideration for them that he would come all the way here taking time out of his busy schedule to come to Rexburg to give them encouragement, to build the people here and to strengthen them. The people were thrilled, President Kimball, while we were singing the opening song turned to Elder Packer and he said, "Well, I don't see any sad faces." That thrilled him, the Prophet, to think that the people were responding as good as they were, that the courage seemed to be high, their spirits were high and that they recognized the fact that they had had a disaster come through and yet they were willing to get in and to work themselves out of it. B: Do you think Rexburg suffered very much vandalism and lawlessness after the flood? R: Yes, there was, Mary Ann. Not an awfully lot because we put up a tight security and the Governor was very good. He came here on Tuesday, let's

17 -14- see, Saturday being the 5th--6th, 7th Ind 8th--on the 8th day of June, he--he actually flew over on Saturday and then he came back again on, I can't remember whether he came in on Sunday or whether it was Tuesday, but when the Governor came here and brought General Brooks, he assigned General Brooks, the Adjutant General for the State of Idaho, to be our liaison officer and he said, "Now anything you need, you let me know and I'll be glad to work with you." Now let's see, what was the question you just asked me? Now through his efforts then, he assigned seventy percent of all the State Highway Patrol people to come here and help us blockade the roads. So we set up a tight security-of all of the roads coming into this area and kept people out. We told them we didn't need them, there wasn't anything for them to do and we just felt like that for a few days anyway that we'd just keept a tight rein and not let anyone in. Very few people went out unless there was some who wanted to go and make phone calls from Rigby and contact relatives. Now we did learn, however, that during the middle of that following week that there was one group of fellows from the state of Missouri who came in when they heard about this dam breaking. They jumped in a car and drove right straight here to Idaho and somehow or another they got in. As they were leaving the area, the Patrolmen stopped them. They had loaded up their outfits with as many things as they could possibly steal. They were arrested. We did have some locally here that went downtown and pilfered the stores. Some of those were also arrested and some of them are serving jail sentences right now because of stealing in jewelry stores and these kind of things. Some of our merchants, however, went down and provided their own security the first night or two. Our local policemen and the Sheriff's office put on a lot of deputy sheriffs to help patrol the business district to make sure that there wasn't a lot of vandalism there.

18 -15- B: How many months was there a checkpoint at Lorenzo? R: It didn't go in months. We kept that checkpoint up until about the 4th of July, about one month, at Lorenzo. We were routing all of the traffic and all the tourists around Madison County. They had to take other routes in order to go on up to Yellowstone Park. Now West Yellowstone suffered tremendously during that month. The business district practically closed up. People had to take other routes to go up to Yellowstone Park. B: Did the Red Cross help? R: The Red Cross was very, very good. They were among the first to come in. I've never forgotten this. The National Director for the Red Cross organization, a man named Art Cross, came to see me and he also sent a regional man, a fellow by the name of Rowe, from Oakland. Hw eas one of the first ones representing National Red Cross to come in here and find out what they could do to help us. A lot of our Red Cross workers that gave people assistance the first two or three days were people that were from Idaho Falls. The Red Cross had asked them to come up and to render service. B: How long was Red Cross in the area? R: We didn't keep the Red Cross here more than about two weeks. I've just forgotten the exact time. I've never forgotten, however, because our people are so church oriented through their LDS Church they really didn't have need for the welfare supplies of the Red Cross as much as Red Cross thought they would. For instance, we were providing meals for our people and were giving them sandwiches for those that were out there working at the homes and wanted to eat sandwiches during the noon. But Red Cross had also made that same provision. They were going around and they couldn't find people in some instances that would take their sandwiches and so they finally got to where they was leaving them on the doorstep. They had a lot

19 -16- of supplies that they'd shipped in he,: for this relief emergency. They didn't know what to do with them so they were just taking them around and depositing them on the doorsteps of homes before they left in order to get rid of 'em. B: How long did Ricks College provide food for the flood victims? R: We actually cut off the food service about the 10th of August. By the 10th of August there weren't very many families that were using the food services. Our biggest need and our biggest usage of food services was the first two weeks. I believe about around the 10th or 12th of June was the largest number of meals served;- we served right near 30,000 one day. I've forgotten now, it seemed like around 30,000. I've got a record of it. B: What government agencies did you as a Stake Presidency deal with during the recovery? R: We dealt with all the governmental agencies. They all worked right close. For the first few days and weeks the HUD people were the ones that we worked with the closest because they were the ones who had to come in here and determine what temporary housing was needed. We had our people living in the college facilities and in the dormitories and student quarters and we knew that before summer was over the people had to move out and get into something else. HUD had to know how many trailers they needed to bring in the community to provide temporary housing for our people. This was a very coordinated effort and they worked very, very closely with the Church. They were the first ones, but like I say, we worked with all the governmental agencies really close, every one of them as they came along. B: Did you as a Stake Presidency have any dealings with the State and County authorities and law enforcements officers? R: Right to begin with, we set up what we called a Command Post up at the Army Reserve Building where the Civil Defense people were located. It was

20 -17- with the cooperation of those people that we decided that we would have Keith Walker, who is the Chairman or the County Commissioners, serve as the Chairman of our committee and in that committee we had representation both from the County administration, the Civil Defense. The Mayors of Rexburg and Sugar City met there regularly. The local LDS Stake Presidents were always involved in those meetings and then we would bring others in. Now Burggraf had a lot of heavy equipment both at the north end of the county and also at the south end and so their representative, a man by the name of Hugh Ireland, was meeting with us daily. We had the Health Department people meet in that meeting with us daily. we had the Health Department people meet in that meeting with us daily so that we could determine what our needs were there and helping as far as the water is concerned. We were concerned about the contamination of the water and about the health of our people. Those people were running tests. They set up a temporary facility up by the hospital to test water. They gave out little vessels so that people could take samples up there and have their water tested. We asked Gray Clawson to correlate all of the security efforts and the Highway Patrolmen. Mr. Clawson met in that meeting. He would correlate the efforts of all of that from that standpoint there in that meeting. We had what we felt was a wonderful organization there to work everything through. Through that meeting we would invite different ones of these government agencies to come down and sit in those meetings with us so that we could take care of the problems immediately, the ones that were the most pressing of that day. We were holding that meeting every morning at 7:00. We also had meetings at 1:00 in the afternoon so that we could take care of the needs of the community. Through those meetings and uniting our efforts, then, you see, we'd give directions from there. In addition to those meetings, then our Stake Presidents were meeting with their Bishops in

21 -18-- separate meetings during the day so Hitt we could determine what the needs were and pass on information to the Bishops that could be relayed on to the ward. They, in turn, the Bishops, were asked to hold a meeting once a day with ward members and have at least one from each family, so that we could determine from that meeting the needs of the people. B: How long did that go, how long was that in existence? R: We kept those meetings going as long as we felt like that there was a need. Now, for instance, when people were mudding out and cleaning out then that was some of the first things that we were doing in trying to determine how many volunteer helpers that they could use. And so the Bishops were using that meeting, you see, to just kind of correlate their efforts together there. They were using that meeting also to relay information to families and to people--the information that they needed to know. B: Do you feel that nay who assisted in recovery operations took advantage of the people or the government, especially in getting a lot of money without really earning it? R: We had some, yes. And I could name some of those because I worked right close there with the County Commissioners and we had some people coming in here that were taking advantage of the situation. Some of them brought heavy equipment in here and they come in here we thought, that just was volunteering their equipment and their efforts to clean up those logs. You remember seeing a lot of big logs scattered through town from the sawmill. B: There were some at my place. R: Yes. And we found out to begin with, that that outfit was picking those logs up during the day and by night they was sending 'em on trucks and taking 'em out of the valley and so we had to finally put a stop to that. And I don't want to mention any names but I could tell you the business firm of those that were doing those kind of things. We also had another situation

22 -19- where we'd learned where someone had leaded up a tractor one night, one of these backhoe loaders or tractor outfits and they got through security somehow and we come to find out that somebody was a stealin' that tractor. They recovered it over in Wyoming. We did have some of these outfits come in here, yes, that were taking advantage of the government and some of them got a lot of big money out of the government. B: Without divulging names, do you know of anyone who filed fradulent flood claims? R: That's awfully hard. Some people came to me and talked to me before filing their claims. I actually helped some file their own claims, not too many, but I did some. I can,- yes I can tell you some that I felt like filed fraudulent claims. However, I worked awfully close from my position. I worked very, very close with the people who were the claims officers here. The chief claims officer, Frank Dimmick, was the first one to come and then he was replaced by someone else, I've forgotten his name. The Neil Stessman came in and then Bill Shaffer came in and I've visited with those people many, many times and, of course, Mr. Dimmick was more concerned about people to begin with who were not making enough requests. I appreciated him coming to the Church leaders and telling us that he couldn't, as a government official come and say to someone, "Well, now look, you're not filing for enough." But he could come and talk to we Church leaders and say, "Well maybe you'd ought to sit down with so and so. Here's a widow lady and she really is not requesting maybe all of her belongings. Maybe she needs to be couseled and talked to a little bit." And So right to begin with, that seemed to be more of the cry than to have people filing fraudulent claims. But we have had them this last six months and maybe even later, yes within the last six months we've had some people filing fraudulent claims. But I would have to say that percentage wise it was somewhere below ten percent. And I get this information in talking to these chief claims officers.

23 -20- B: Do you feel that the flood was divine ;unishment or a man-made disaster? R: Oh, I definitely feel like that it was just the fallacy of men. I don't feel like that the Lord inflicted that upon us at all. No doubt we were tested as a result of it, but as far as it being "an act of God," I don't believe that at all. I believe it's just a fallacy of men, that it was a weakness in design, and it just happened and so we accepted it as such. I've come to that conclusion partly because the United States government would not accept liability and yet they felt like that they had some responsibility because it was a governmental project. They constructed the dam, and they were willing to appropriate money to pay for the losses that people suffered through this dam. And I might say here too, that this was the first, as far as we know, in the history of the United States that the government has come in here with appropriations to actually restore people's losses. Most of the disasters that take place as a result of heavy rains or maybe a typhoon or some other type disaster that goes through a community, the governmental agencies will go in and they'll assist people temporarily, but they will not pay for their damages and their losses. But they are doing that with this Teton flood dam disaster. B: Would you like to tell us about the meeting you had with President Ford? R: Yes, I thought that was an interesting experience. The legislation finally got around to appropriating the money to pay for the people's losses. The appropriation, of course, had to go through legislature. Anytime any money is spent in the nation, the legislature must approve it. And so when the bill was passed and it was ready for the President's signature, I received a telephone call from the White House inviting me to go back and be present when the President signed that legislation. B: Did the Idaho elected officials come to the Teton Dam Disaster's aid?

24 -21- R: Yes. Of course, they were very much c(qtcerned. Now Congressman Hansen, for instance, was out at Challis on that Saturday and he heard about the dam breaking and so he immediately, being in a chartered airplane, flew over the area to see what was going on and what he could do. He offered his resources and made himself available right from the start from his office of whatever he could do to assist and help out. And, of course, Senator McClure came in immediately. Senator Frank Church at that particular time had aspired for President of the United States and he was doing some campaigning in some of the other states. But he did make some phone calls. He didn't come right out immediately on Saturday like the other officials did, but he did make some phone calls and stated his interest and his concern. He did set up an office in Idaho Falls and he had some staff there that stayed in the office. They offered their services and anything they could do form his office to help us here. But I do want to say this much, Mary Ann. I think one of the very key things that the government did for us in this community was when Senator Frank Church was making an appearance here to Ricks College. Some of his assistants had called me up previously and asked if I would be present when he arrived. He was going to go to President Eyring's office at Ricks College and when he arrived there he wanted me to come over. And so I told him yes, I could do that. My phone rang one evening about 5 o'clock. I had an office in Manwaring Center that the school had made available for me to use as an office so that I could correlate and administer the programs from there. And just after I hung up the phone, I saw two helicopters land out there in the parking lot just south of Manwaring Center. I thought well, I'll just watch a minute and see who might be coming in because we'd had many dignitaries and this was along about the 12th or 15th of June, I've just forgotten which day it was. And I noticed that Congressman Hansen had climbed out of one of those helicopters and he brought

25 -22- that group of people in. Well our food line was just forming in Manwaring Center, you know it started serving along about 5 o'clock and I thought, well, I'll just wait and shake hands and meet Senator Church. And so Congressman Hansen, George Hansen, came in and I greeted him in a friendly way. He introduced the other gentlemen that were with him. He had with him Congressman Goody and Congressman Ryan, one of the gentlemen was from California and the other was from Maryland. They headed one of the committees that was a very important committee as far as this Teton Dam was concerned. Congressman Hansen brought them out here to see the destruction that had taken place in his home state. And So I asked those gentlemen if they'd like to have a tour of Rexburg while they were here and they says, yes that they would. And so I picked up two or three men out of the chow line that were just going through to eat their supper and asked them if they'd be willing to take their car and take these distinguished guests through Rexburg. And, of course, they had a lot of others with them. I mention only these three but there were several people in the two helicopters. And I ended up with the Chairman of the Committee and I didn't know who I had. I just didn't know who it was when he climbed in my car. And so I took him around through town. They didn't have a lot of time, but they wanted to see as much as possible. As we was going down on East Main Street and he saw a lady out there in her yard with a hose and she was a scrubbin' down some of her belongings, muddin' 'em out and washin' 'em down. "Will you stop?" he says, "I want to go over and talk to that lady." And I don't believe that I could have picked a lady in this whole community that would've done more good as far as that man was concerned because she just really bent his ear for about a half hour telling him what, all of their losses and the severity of the flood. She just gave him a real earful. In fact, I got a real charge out of it. I just kinda had to laugh. One of the other

26 -23- cars came and caught up to us and so this other Congressman, he got in on the discussion also. But it was the result of that meeting when those two men, Congressman Ryan and Congressman Goody, went back they wrote one of the finest letters to the President of the United States telling him what the situation was out here. You see, they weren't even from Idaho, those two men, and that letter was a very key things in the President's decision as far as providing and appropriating that first $200 million to restore people the damages and the losses that they'd suffered. I thought that was just a choice occasion. And that was as a result of Congressman George Hamsen's efforts in bringing those men out here to see what had happened. B: Could you tell us what states they were from? R: Yes. Congressman Ryan is from Maryland and Goddy is from California. B: Do you feel the dam should be rebuilt? R: Yes, I do. I really favor rebuilding the dam. And I would vote for it if they put it up to a vote. If anyone asked my opinion, yes, I would like to see it rebuilt. And I really feel like that the dam can be rebuilt and it can be rebuilt so that it'll be safe. It was just an error in some design work there among the architects and I think that they can design that dam so that it'll be safe. B: Should it be built in the same location? R: I think they could easy build it in the same location or if they felt like it'd be better to move it a little ways either up or down the canyon. I'm not concerned too much. I really think they can build a safe dam, even in the same locatoin. B: Did the government bring a lot of psychiatrists in here? R: They called up one day and wanted to know if we need them. In fact, the Governor himself called me up. They'd contacted him first and they wanted to bring a lot of psychiatrists in and so he called me up and wanted to know

27 -24- how I felt about it. I told him, no, that we had people within our own ranks, within our own church, that could handle the emotional trauma of the people involved here. And we did bring our group in from the LDS Social Services the first few days. We had six professional people here, trained psychologists and psychiatrists. We had provided an office for them in Manwaring Center. They said, there isn't anything for us to do, nobody's come to us with any problems. And so they finally had to go back to Idaho Falls. They'd come here for three or four days and didn't help out anyone. We just didn't have any need for these governmental psychiatrists and we told them so. The Govei-nor told 'em not to let them come in, also told whoever it was above him not to send them hero. B: How long and when did the Mennonites come in? R: The Mennonites were among the first to come in. This man, Dockstetter from Pennsylvania, I've forgotten his first name, but he was one of the first ones to come in after the dam had broken. And they do have an organization, the Mennonite Disaster Agency, that goes all over the country and does this kind of thing and renders service and helps people. They've got a regular group. And so he came and met with me along about Monday following the breaking of the dam, Monday or Tuesday, I've forgotten the day. And he wanted to know if it would be alright if the Mennonites came in and helped us. And I says well, I don't know too much about your group and so he told me about them and I says yes, it will be alright. I says we can't provide lodging for them because we don't have any commercial lodging available here in Rexburg. They may have to stay in Rigby or Idaho Falls. But he says, well, there'll only be about 20 or 25 come in and so I says well, we'll see if we can work things out on that. And we did put them in the Lincoln School and they stayed there for the first several days. B: Are they still in Rexburg?

28 -25- R: Mary Ann, I don't know whether they'r, still here or not. I don't know. B: When did the Interfaith come in? R: I can't remembef the exact day, but it seems to me like that it was about three weeks after the flood had gone through the valley. They were not among the first to come in. B: What were their activities to the flood victims? R: Well, the first thing they wanted to know what they could do to assist and they called a meeting in Idaho Falls and asked us to have a representative come down to that meeting. And I remember we asked Brother Jay Risenmay to represent our local community and serve on,a committee down there. They were wanting to set up what they called the Teton Dam Interfaith and they wanted it to be comprised of people from all religions. Well, we just really never felt like as an LDS Church that we needed to get too involved with them because we had our own program and we've got provision within the LDS Church to take care of all the needs of the people. And so we never did get really strong on that organization. In fact, I wrote one of the ladies a real nice letter and thanked them for their offer and told them that we had provisions within the Church to take care of the needs of our own people and that the very few nonmembers who were in our valley that we'd asked our local Bishops, our LDS Bishops, to look after their needs just as they were doing with the members of the Church. And so we felt like that we didn't really need the Teton Interfaith people, and yet they did function. I understood they did function and they provided a service here. But they would keep coming back to us, too. They'd want to run a survey on this or they'd want to run a survey on that and so they'd keep coming back to the LDS Church and wanting us to run a sruvey with this group or with that group or someone else and, to try so that they could finally learn the needs of the people. Well, we already knew what the needs of the people