Many people travel to Valdez and expect to see old Alaska. The main problem with that is that in 1964 almost the entire town was destroyed and had to be moved. A very interesting trip to the museums in town are very informative. There were at least 2 native villages in Prince William Sound that had to be relocated completely. Parts of the sound are still not mapped out to correct the upheaval of the quake.
The Great Earthquake Rememberd
By Lee Revis
Star Reporter
VALDEZ - It was Good Friday, 1964. Folks went about their daily business in the early evening. Easter was just around the corner and many had enjoyed a day off from the usual routine.
The SS Chena was offloading cargo on the dock. Longshoremen were hard at work and a group of children assembled on the scene as they are wont to do.
People were settling in. The women of the Dorcas Club, a Christian women's club, had spent part of the day boiling 45 dozen eggs for an Easter Egg Hunt scheduled for the next day. The car of Katherine Kennedy was loaded down with eggs ready to be colored.
The late Dorothy Clifton reported that she had just settled down to read the Valdez News, when she first felt her house begin to move. "I wonder what earthshaking news Walter and Gloria (Day) have put in the paper this week," she joked to her husband when she felt the fist movements.
The late Phyllis Irish told a reporter in 1984 that she was working at the Harborview Nursing home when she felt the first tentative movements. "I said to myself at last I have felt an earthquake," she said. "But before the thought left my mind the tiles on the floor came right up."
Soon wave like tremors rippled across the land and water. Buildings began to fall apart and huge fissures appeared in the roads as the earth itself unleashed a violent fury seldom experienced in this world.
In a matter of seconds the violent shaking loosened the unstable sediments upon which the dock was built. Almost 100 million cubic yards of rock and sediment let go and cruelly plunged into the sea. All 27 people on the dock were washed away when the dock disappeared into the turbulent waters. The Chena rode a rush of water, estimated at 30 feet, went up into the air and then came down to rest were the dock and 27 people just stood.
People abandoned cars, searched for children as panic ensued when the movement would not stop.
The entire village of Chenega flattened as people scattered, trying to find their children as homes collapsed and water filled the island. Twenty-three villagers, men, women and children, lost their lives that day.
The Coast Guard Cutter Storis, on patrol outside of Dutch Harbor received the first radio traffic from the Chena. "MAY DAY! MAY DAY! MAY DAY! THIS ISÂ….." before static took over. It did not take long to find out what was happening.
The North Pacific Search & Rescue began receiving reports from Kodiak SAR "Ham radio operator reports Valdez damage due to earthquake and tidal wave."
The Fishing Vessel Marpet reported "The village of Chenega is completely wiped out by a tidal wave. There are many injuriesÂ….there is only one house left standing."
The Chena, which survived the initial "tidal wave" reported "The town of Valdez, Alaska just burst into flames. The whole dock is afire and the tanks at Union and the other docks have started to burn. We are anchored one half mile from shore."
The news kept getting worse. Yukataga Civil Air Patrol reported to Kodiak SAR "Chenega desperate."
There was no time to mourn. The townsfolk of Valdez sought shelter up the road when and where they could, in Glennallen, Fairbanks, even the Tsaina Lodge, which was owned by one Josephine Johnson at the time. Homes along the Richardson Highway posted signs, "Can take three" "Room for two."
Those who stayed behind tried to put the pieces back together amid the aftershocks and rubble. Giant waves periodically overtook the town, which in parts was two and a half feet under water by midnight.
Governor Bill Egan, a Valdez resident, came from Juneau to assess the damage. He later told reporters that to his amazement, the town was already trying to put itself back together on Easter Sunday. He said he saw John Kelsey and Owen Johnson hauling gravel to fill holes and fissures on walkways and the former road to the dock.
However, plans to rebuild the town at it's former site were not to be. The Army Core of Engineers determined the land that was formerly home to so many was too unstable to risk ever building on again.
Some thirty odd buildings that survived the quake were later relocated five miles east, onto what was known as the Hazelet and Meals property. The spirit of those who rebuilt lives on today, as those who survived, their descendants and many a newcomer live in this vibrant little town, Valdez.
