Reflections on a Flood
This week marks an important anniversary for Denver, and for me personally. As you’ve probably heard, the devastating South Platte River flood was 50 years ago this week. And fifty years ago this week my family and I came to Denver.
Yes, we moved to Denver in June of 1965, just days before the big flood.
On the 15th and 16th of that month, the thin layer of saturated soil on mountain slopes west of Denver could no longer absorb the rain that had been falling for several days. When the soil reached its tipping point, run-off began filling small streams that flow into the Platte River, turning that normally placid stream into a deadly torrent. The Denver Post reports that normal flow for the river is 800 cubic feet per second, but on June 16, 1965 it was raging at 40,000 cubic feet per second!
The deluge swept through the countryside below the foothills washing away barns and farm animals. It roared through the suburbs, covering roads and flooding homes. And finally, it flowed right into the city itself, slamming debris into bridges, swamping railroad tracks, inundating warehouses and factories in the industrial area to the west of downtown. By the 17th the flood had caused millions of dollars of damage and taken the lives of 21 people.
My little family — just my parents, still in their 20’s, and me not yet five — had moved to Denver from a small town Minnesota only days before. My Dad landed a job selling men’s suits at the Squire Shop in the new Cherry Creek Mall, and we rented a little second story apartment just off west Alameda near the spot where another new mall – Villa Italia – was being built. Dad recalls that his new boss, Mr. Leventhall, seemed displeased when Dad called in to say he wouldn’t make it to work on the 17th because of the flooding. Maybe that’s why Bud put his four year old son in the back seat of our 1956 Chevy station wagon and went to see for himself that there really was no way to cross over to his new job on the east side of town.
My earliest memory of Denver – and one of the earliest of my life – is of looking out the window of that station wagon parked on a hillside (6th avenue?) looking down at a valley filled with muddy water flowing over the tops of cars and halfway up buildings. I know there was life before coming to Denver, before the station wagon, and before the flood. I just don’t remember it.
One of the buildings that we might have seen as we looked down at the flooded valley was the Spa Motor Inn, just south of 8th avenue and east of the Valley Highway. Of course, I couldn’t have known that this new motel built to accommodate cross country travelers and newcomers like my family would one day, after decades of neglect, become Joshua Station. To think that one day this would be one of the most important places that God would use to shape my life and show me the extent of God’s love for the poor.
To this day when I close my eyes to recall that primal scene, I can dimly picture just beyond the flood waters, glimmering ever so slightly from the rays of the sun just trying to break through after days of rain, the taller buildings of downtown Denver. My new home. The city where God would invite me to live, raise a family, and serve through my work at Mile High Ministries.
Happy anniversary!
