By allowing ads to appear on this site, you support the local businesses who, in turn, support great journalism.
Tornado of '36 memories still strong
Residents remember tragic day 78 years ago; Pants factory marker planned to mark site of fire
0406tornado3
Tom McGee remembers arriving in Gainesville and seeing the damage the weekend after a tornado had ravaged the city on April 6, 1936.
Soon after Mary Louise Hulsey arrived in Gainesville in 1945, she got a quick history lesson whenever dark clouds started to fill the sky. Local residents, especially survivors of the deadly 1936 tornado, “would all start getting panicky,” said Hulsey, who today lives at The Holbrook, a retirement community in North Hall County. The storm killed more than 200 and is still on record as one of the deadliest in U.S. history.