KNOWN DEAD NOW REACHES TWENTY.

STORMS IN WEST CONTINUE WITH GREAT DAMAGE IN MANY TOWNS.

Kansas City, Mo., June 2. -- At least twenty persons are known to have been killed and scores injured in a tornado which swept eastern Kansas, Western Missouri, and parts of Oklahoma and Arkansas last night. At Colgate and Drake, Oklahoma, fifteen deaths are reported. At Olathe, Kansas, three are dead, while more than thirty were seriously injured at Coffeeville and South Coffeeville, Kansas, near the storm center.
Coffeeville, where more than 200 residences were destroyed, was placed under martial law, immediately, a local company of national guards men and 150 civilians taking over the situation. There is no wire communication with the city.
Nine were injured at Seminole, Oklahoma, some perhaps fatally. At Drake, five members of the family of W. A. WILLIAMS were killed, while a sixth, a blind boy, escaped unharmed.
Mansfield, Ark., is believed to be entirely wiped out. The message came to Little Rock from a telegraph station at Bureau mountain.
The tornado was accompanied by a heavy downpour of rain and hail in some sections. Violent electrical storms followed. Damage estimated at a million dollars was caused by lightning striking oil tanks in the Healdton, Okla., field. All of eastern Kansas suffered severely.
Two deaths were reported at McCune and one at Montana, Kansas. Another is dead at Bartlesville, Okla.
The tornado missed Kansas City by a few miles but more than an inch of rain fell within an hour. The Missouri river rose rapidly to within one foot of flood stage.

The Sandusky Star Journal Ohio 1917-06-02
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Researched and Transcribed by Stu Beitler. Thank you, Stu!