Twenty Thousand Persons are Now Homeless in Kansas City, Kansas----

The first reliable information from Kansas City, Kan., was just received. In that district 20,000 persons are homeless. A number have been drowned, and the property loss has been heavy. The situation there is no better and no worse.

There is no great probability that there will be further loss of life. All through the wholesale district and in the east and west bottoms there are people still in houses. The police have done wonders in rescuing people and have probably brought 250 persons to the high ground in 12 hours. Twenty persons were taken from the Martin school and 30 from O'Brien's lodging house in the east bottoms. The rest of them were brought in singly or in small numbers. In the east and west bottoms a number of obstinate people are still clinging to their homes, although the police have run boats beneath their windows and offered to save them. They refuse to leave and will take their chances for another day.

It is impossible to form any estimate of the number of dead in Kansas City. There have been manifold stories of how boats laden with people have been seen to sink. There have been reports without end of bodies seen floating by on wreckage, of men woh[sic] have tried to drive wagons laden with their household effects against certain death in the swift current and gone down in the flood. Most of these stories lack confirmation, however, and even if true the proof may never be had. There is no way of securing the names of the dead, and no chance for forming any estimate that can confidently be termed accurate.

Sandusky Evening Star, Sandusky, OH 2 Jun 1903
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Transcribed by Linda Horton. Thank you, Linda!