Floods

For two weeks, over many miles of the U.S., there had been almost ceaseless rain. (In Chicago, 16 days out of May's first 19 dripped.) The monstrously gorged rivers—the Mississippi, Missouri, Arkansas, Illinois, Wabash, Osage, White, many others—roared like millraces, rose until they overspread their banks and engulfed the land. From Illinois and Indiana south to Missouri, Arkansas and Oklahoma, hundreds of thousands of acres seeded with the food the world is waiting for lay under water. Swirling chaos enveloped many a valley town and city. In Oklahoma, Iowa and Kansas, tornadoes...