Forty-one years ago this March, the citizens of Fort Wayne, Indiana, were in a desperate battle against rising floodwaters threatening to utterly engulf their city.
And they were losing.
Mountains of piled-up, heavy winter snow—81 inches had fallen that season—combined with an unseasonably warm March thaw, had swollen the St. Joseph, St. Marys, and Maumee Rivers to historic and cataclysmic levels. Already, after four days of struggle, much of the city was under water and evacuations were underway. Before leaving their homes and businesses, citizens piled furniture high in their living rooms and hung bags of belongings from ceiling fixtures. Rising floodwaters were sweeping in the front doors and slushing out the back. All around the city, levees became so waterlogged they started to leak; 69-year-old dikes were failing. …