The Story of Johnstown
Its Early Settlement, Rise and Progress, Industrial Growth, and Appalling Flood on May 31st, 1889
J. J. McLaurin
The Story of Johnstown
Its Early Settlement, Rise and Progress, Industrial Growth, and Appalling Flood on May 31st, 1889
J. J. McLaurin
The Story of Johnstown, published just a year after the devastating Johnstown flood of May 1889, is considered by many to be one of the best contemporary journalistic accounts of the flood. J. J. McLaurin, who was working as a journalist for the Harrisburg Telegram, witnessed the flood firsthand and survived to write about it. His detailed account is illustrated with moving photographs of the flood’s wreckage and aftermath. It is also accompanied by a history of the area from the colonial period, which looks at the town’s early settlement and development, the Cambria Iron Company, and the construction of the ill-fated South Fork Dam on the Conemaugh River. McLaurin’s direct, poignant account of the tragic Johnstown flood and its wake is a testament not only to the historic events but also to the people affected by the disaster—both those who perished and those who survived to rebuild their community.
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An Open Access edition of The Story of Johnstown is available through PSU Press Unlocked. To access this free electronic edition click here. Print editions are also available.
The Story of Johnstown, published just a year after the devastating Johnstown flood of May 1889, is considered by many to be one of the best contemporary journalistic accounts of the flood. J. J. McLaurin, who was working as a journalist for the Harrisburg Telegram, witnessed the flood firsthand and survived to write about it. His detailed account is illustrated with moving photographs of the flood’s wreckage and aftermath. It is also accompanied by a history of the area from the colonial period, which looks at the town’s early settlement and development, the Cambria Iron Company, and the construction of the ill-fated South Fork Dam on the Conemaugh River. McLaurin’s direct, poignant account of the tragic Johnstown flood and its wake is a testament not only to the historic events but also to the people affected by the disaster—both those who perished and those who survived to rebuild their community.
J. J. McLaurin (1841–1923) was a journalist and editor of the Harrisburg Telegram, one of the largest weekly newspapers in Pennsylvania in the late nineteenth century.
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