Tuesday, June 30, 2020

Tornado Damaged Fifth and Hamilton – Then & Now

I thought I had done every possible "Then & Now" photo of homes damaged by the 1924 Lorain Tornado, but every so often I come up with another one.

The postcard view above is of West Fifth Street (east of Oberlin Avenue), looking towards Hamilton Avenue (barely visible at the far right of the photo).

And here’s the recent “now" view.

As a bonus, here’s a Google Maps street view circa July 2019 (below). Gee, those lawns look parched.

With so many of the homes in the 1924 view having been torn down, it’s not much of a Then & Now. It’s more of a lesson in how the tornado changed the look of Lorain’s streets forever by eliminating so many of what now be century homes. 
However, the one house in both views is the beautiful, historic one at 440 Hamilton (below). Here are two recent shots.
Local historian Loraine Ritchey has featured this home on her blog, noting that it was built for the well-known Wickens family of Lorain.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I've always heard that the 440 Hamilton house has a dumbwaiter in it.Must've been pretty ritzy back in the day.

Tim Burton said...

My Dad was born two months before the tornado hit. I do know that he and my grandparents were living on 26th St, between Lexington and Reid. Have no idea how that neighborhood faired but do faintly remember some of the stories of the storm from my Dad that were obviously passed-down to him. - Tim Burton

Dennis Thompson said...

Nice looking house but how do you get onto that porch on top of the turret?

Anonymous said...

It's probably just for looks.Although there could've been an entrance in years past....It would've been a small one at that though.The closer you look you can see some of the siding is pretty rotted up...Unless it's an older photo....Still alot of nooks and crannies were built into this house.