No Place of Safety by L. A. S.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jun 28, 1906

No Place of Safety

By L. A. S.

FROM the magnitude of the disaster which it occasioned, the impression has no doubt been left in many minds that the California earthquake of April last was the most severe that ever occurred in this country. Such an impression would be quite erroneous. Mr. Charles F. Lummis, editor of a Western magazine, calls attention to the fact that a seismic convulsion of much greater severity occurred here in the early part of the last century, but failed to occasion a memorable disaster because the region affected had at the time but few inhabitants. He says:—

As to earthquakes, North America has never known but one of “the first magnitude” in the terminology of science. This occurred Dec. 16, 1811, in the central Mississippi basin,—about the geographic center of this continent. It lasted fifty-four days. No loss of life was recorded, as the region was thinly settled. Had the same convulsion occurred in New York, probably not a soul would have escaped. Square miles of the earth’s surface dropped from thirty to fifty feet. This was the only earthquake in North America comparable with the historic ones which have made

the temblor a name of terror. Every other earthquake within our national boundaries, including the recent one in San Francisco, has been of not higher than the third magnitude. The Charleston, S. C., quake (Aug. 31, 1886) was of the same third class.

The central Mississippi valley is not in any “earthquake belt,” no noted previous or subsequent disturbance of the kind being on record. Yet the one convulsion which did occur there was of the first magnitude. The next quake of the first magnitude may occur in a region supposedly free from liability to such visitations. Men can at most but scratch the surface of the earth in their efforts to investigate subterranean affairs. Of conditions and forces concealed beneath that surface they have no real knowledge at all. Nor can it be said that one part of the country is particularly liable to disaster above others. What with storm and flood, earthquake, fire, and pestilence, there is no place where life and property have an assurance of safety. The only safety is in the protection of the Almighty. L. A. S.