Re: Recollecting the March 22, 1957 5.3 Earthquake

05/03/09 - posted by Ray Shanahan

Thanks paul, for the memories of St. Thomas and sister Madeline Marie. She was very sweet and kind as I remember. I was in the eighth grade and we were outside at recess and the basketball pole was swaying in the schoolyard, at least that is what I remembered.

We sometimes went home at lunch time, as we lived around the corner from the school on 40th avenue.
When I got home my mother was making lunch and their was a jar of mayonnaise that had fallen to the floor. My brother and I had tuna fish sandwiches served to us, in the backyard, by our mother as she didn't want us to stay in the house. We returned to school after lunch and I don't remember any after shocks until later that afternoon at home.

My older sister Vivienne, who was a junior at Mercy High, came home later that afternoon and described the damages to us that had occured there that day. Of course Mercy sat right near the fault line.