This most destructive windstorm hit Omaha about six o'clock in the evening, Easter Sunday, March 23, 1913.

     To the eye it had the distinctive funnel-shaped twisting character of the typical tornado, sweeping along at a furious rate of speed.

     To the ear it conveyed the sound of crashing din and a mighty rush of water.

     It was accompanied by a lurid brass-yellow luminous atmosphere followed immediately by dense darkness and a heavy downpour of rain lasting nearly an hour.

     It came from the southwest crossing the city diagonally striking the most densely populated residence districts, the poorer dwellings in the lowlands, and the most beautiful homes on the hills.

     Its passage was almost without warning except a sharp fall of the barometer and temperature; it came and went within a few seconds, giving people scarcely time to get to their cellars.

     The path of the tornado through the city is from two to six blocks wide and four and a half miles long.

     Its distinctiveness is not uniform, being most noticeable at intervals indicating an undulating movement of the storm cloud, rising and falling each time it struck with full force.

     The damage done and the desolation left in its wake are clearly portrayed by the photographs taken the next day, and by those taken the second day after a slight snowfall.