WITNESSES DESCRIBED the cloud as “cup-shaped” as it approached Glencoe (Photo courtesy of Roland Jordahl)

GLENCOE — Kenneth Kuhlman raked through the debris on the mobile home lot where he once lived; he spotted an orange book.

The book was Rod McKuen’s “Listen to the Warm,” and inside the cover was a notation of the date the book was given as a gift.

“It came from over there,” he said, motioning toward the south.”Tornadoes go counterclockwise; everything I’m finding here comes from over there.”

SO GOES the cleanup procedure at Glen Knoll mobile home park on Glencoe’s west edge. Most of the twisted steel and heaps of debris resulting from last Wednesday’s tornado that ripped through the court and caused about $1 million damage still remains.

The owner of the court, Willard Haukos says most of the tenants have settled on their mobile home insurance claims which must be concluded before belongings can be salvaged.

Below: The TORNADO cut through the heart of the mobile home park. (Photo courtesy of Hector Mirror)

Of the 62 homes in the court, only 10 were left undamaged. Of the 52homes that were damaged, 33 were considered total losses.

Haukos says only one tenant definitely has no insurance; and two others “have a problem,” with their insurance, he said.

By Tuesday, power had been restored to two areas of the court and telephone lines were being reconnected.

In several locations, owners of totaled homes were beginning their own salvage operations with the aid of friends or relatives.

KUHLMAN was being helped by a young Glencoe farmer named Doug Stuewe, whose neighbor, Jerome Beneke, lost every outbuilding he had when the tornado advanced to the northeast after going through the mobile home court.

As Kuhlman looked through the rubble on his lot, his home was nowhere to be seen. It had been moved 30 feet to the west, on the other side of one that flipped top down onto a corner of his lot.

Kuhlman recalls the funnel cloud that he saw that afternoon while painting a house three miles south-west of Glencoe:

“There was no funnel but you could see a whole bunch of dark clouds and one big white one with a bunch of little ones going around it and the dirt kicking up on the ground. It gave me a feeling of fear and awe and mercy.”

KUHLMAN’S RESPECT for the phenomenon that destroyed his home may have been the reason he was in good spirits while salvaging his belongings; or it may have been because nobody was killed or injured.

“The big thing I lost was my Japanese Yamaha piano,” he said.”I just couldn’t take it to the junkyard, but that’s all that was left…junk.

“I put it in a nice dry place,”‘ he smiled.

The piano was a big part of Kuhlmans’ life. The instrument was “just a spinet but had the tone of a grand,” he said. He would play for his friends at the mobile home court.

But the piano was uninsured. Kuhlman admitted it would be a long time before it could be replaced.

The mobile home will be replaced, however.

“A whole home goes for four or five thousand,” he said,”so a guy can replace one pretty easily.”

Haukos said “an awful lot” of the tenants have told him they will be coming back to the trailer court again.

MR. AND MRS. Steve Jakobitz, whose mobile home was destroyed, say their plans are indefinite.

Mrs. Jakobitz said one of their primary concerns is the future availability of emergency shelters at the court.

“They have a laundry house but there’s not enough room to get everyone in the park in there,” she said. “We love trailer living but we’ve got to have a place to go if it would happen again.”

The laundry house is located squarely in the middle of the park and is not nearly large enough to accommodate the park’s 157 residents.

Haukos says the laundry house is extremely well constructed with a double block wall, steel doors and safety glass.

The laundry house remained standing in the midst of a pile of wreckage.

AT LEAST four people stayed in the laundry building during the storm, according to Haukos.

The owner said a storm shelter is being considered for future construction at his mobile home park.

“It was our neglect that there wasn’t one up,” Haukos said. “We do have information on file on storm shelters.”

The Jakobitzes had vacated their home about five minutes before the tornado struck, they recall. They said they didn’t hear the city tornado siren until they were driving away and the funnel cloud was closing in on the court.

HAUKOS SAID he and his son,Kim,had headed west on Hwy. 22 in two vehicles and followed the tornado in.

Meanwhile, an employee of his at Haukos Brothers Implement, adjoining the mobile home park, went to the park and alerted the tenants.

“I was positive we’d be picking up bodies,” Haukos recalls. “‘This whole court was in the air at one time, just like slow motion.”

THE TORNADO struck at 3 p.m. when many of the owners were at their jobs.

One was Roger Schuth who had lived at the park for a little more than a year and is employed at Bongards Creamery at Bongards.

“A couple other guys from work live at the court and their wives called,” he said.

Schuth estimated his loss at about $8,000, all covered by insurance.

However, he may start farming in the fall and likely will not buy another mobile home. Now he is living with his parents at Plato.

HAUKOS SAYS he can’t predict when the clean-up will be completed because it depends on completion of insurance claim settlements.

“In my opinion the only reason the cleanup is being delayed is because of one insurance company,”‘he said.

The insurance company is not local and has between 10 and 15policy holders at the mobile home park, he estimated.

New Ulm Daily Journal

June 11, 1975