37 years ago today.

[Hoss]

Where were you if you were alive back then?

I was 7 and at my uncle's house at 49th and Rockford.  About as close as you could be and not get hit.  I remember watching the tornadoes as we went outside to look in the empty lot.  First time I ever saw one.

[AquaMan]

That's funny. I was just thinking today what I was doing on June 8th, 1974 and how no one probably even remembers. Heck, I barely remember. We were hiding under a mattress, in a closet with our dog in the Admiral and Harvard area plotting the path according to KRMG. My brother was in a small van on Lewis near ORU trying to get out of the mobile home park he lived in. The van stalled in high water and he swears a tornado passed over him, his wife and new baby.

My wife, who hails from Wisconsin and shows no fear of tornadoes, was in the parking lot of Place One apartments on Riverside looking for the funnel. It passed overhead and took out a big part of Brookside IIRC.

It was tre' cool.

[heironymouspasparagus]

First kid had been baking for a little over a month (36 now).  Sitting in Pagoda Restaurant at Peoria exit of I-44 eating dinner.  Sirens, wind, not much rain.  The big sign on south side of building, right on exit road was swaying back and forth about 7 or 8 feet at top.  Ended up badly bent over, some damage, but not completely destroyed.

Was sitting next to one of the big picture windows on south side.  Staff came and pulled the heavy curtains to shield the interior.  Patrons all moved to the inside wall, adjacent to the kitchen.  After a few minutes, the windows all blew out - every single one, including at the door.  A little later, after all the noise and commotion died down, went outside to look.

Walked across the parking lot toward Peoria - but not too close.  Looked south and north.  Every power pole in both directions for about 200 feet was broken over and laying on the ground.  From that point on, the poles were all laying over at an angle.  The further away in both directions, the smaller the angle, until several hundred feet more in both directions, they were all standing upright.

Some small damage on some of the buildings within sight, but no total destruction.  Funnel must have been still up in the clouds a little bit.  Lots of limbs, and some debris from some of the building damage.  Lots of damage around town.

Butterfly shrimp was dinner.  Didn't get to finish it.

Still....everyone involved got puckered up pretty good!

[azbadpuppy]

My family lived near 81st & Harvard, right behind ORU. There were two tornadoes back to back. We had just finished dinner, and me, my brother and sister were watching TV. I think my Mom was doing dishes or something. My dad was out mowing the lawn, and suddenly came running in the house, yelling at all of us to get into the hallway. He grew up in OK so he knew tornado weather and claimed he could tell by the sky that a storm was coming. We heard the sirens going off as we all huddled together with a blanket over us. This was the tornado that hit the Brookside area. No sooner did that storm pass by, then a second tornado came through. This time the tornado struck our neighborhood, badly damaging many houses. I remember hearing what sounded like huge boulders slamming into the house, with glass breaking and everything shaking.

Afterwards, walking out into the street, it looked like a bomb had gone off. The house directly across from us only had interior walls standing, and I can remember looking into their house with all the furniture exposed to the outside, like a dollhouse. There were pieces of ORU buildings in our front yard. Our house had part of the roof torn off, and many windows broken, but we were lucky compared to some of the neighbors.

I was only 4 years old, and I can't believe how vividly I can still remember that evening. I have been obsessed with tornadoes ever since...

[sauerkraut]

I was living in Warren, Michigan at the time. I had just got out of high school. Hard to believe that's 37 years ago.

[swake]

My grandparents lived at 36th and Utica and the tornado went through their back yard, the house was fine but it ripped up their fruit trees.

[dbacks fan]

I was 11 at the time, and we lived just west of the MA-HU mansion, my dad had gotten home about a half hour before after officiating Pony/Colt baseball games at Reed Park. They had actually suspended the games with the storms moiving in. I believe that after it hit Brookside, it lifted went over our part of town before hitting the 21st and Garnett area. The two things I remember is the pea green sky, and then the flooding in our neighbor hood later that evening, and the fact I think KRMG, KAKC, and KMOD were the only stations on the air afterwards.

[Breadburner]

Lol..."Open the Windows"...Seems funny now but that was the thing to do at the time.....

[GG]

I had been married for about two weeks and living/working in Stillwater, OK.

Still have the same wife.   

[custosnox]

my older brother had just barely been conceived by this point in time.  Glad you guys are around to make me feel younger.

[TheArtist]

   I was about 8.  We lived in a culdesac in a new neighborhood between 51st and 61st off Memorial south of the cemetery (went exploring there and one day found a mountain of plastic flowers,,, who knew? lol).  But anyway I remember a couple of us kids climbing up on the roof and watching the tornadoes.  It was cloudy where we were but you could see the horizon all across the city under that dark cloud layer for it wasn't raining in most places. Then you would see the tornadoes drop.  I think we counted around 9 or 11 of them?  Sometimes we would see several all at the same time.  2 or 3 off to your right, then one behind you. I remember also seeing a bigger one that kept having these two small ones right next to it that would swirl around the big one.  It was really a sight, before the neighbors friends mom, the leader of our cub scout group, ruined it all and made us come down from the roof and then shoved us into a closet and piled mattresses and blankets on top of us lol.