The 100 Year Anniversary of The Great Tri-State Tornado

revised 2025 first published May 2011

Seeing the footage, videos and photos of splintered trees, the rubble of homes, first responders and devastated people — and hearing of the rising tolls of the injured, missing and dead and imagining the immense pain of all the fractured families — especially in Tuscaloosa, Alabama and in Joplin, Missouri — it is all the more remarkable to me that my great grandmother, Mable Agnes Brantley, then just one day shy of her 18th birthday, and her soon-to-be husband, Harry T. Ruble, survived the 1925 “Tri-State” tornado.

That tornado devastated the town of Murphysboro in Jackson County in Southern Illinois. It remains the DEADLIEST tornado in U.S. history to date: an F5 on the Fujita Scale — nearly 700 people died — but it is also infamous for its duration, sustained speed, length and breadth!

Mable Brantley would go on to have a full life, to raise children during the Great Depression, to work outside the home before and during the War Effort and for decades after — and more importantly, to help to raise her grandchildren, great grandchildren, and great, great grandchildren. Continue reading “My Great Grandmother Survived “The Great Tri-State Tornado” of 1925 – the deadliest tornado in U.S. history” →