Not only that, but it rang churchbells in Boston and woke up Thomas Jefferson. There's a chapter on this in a book called "Big Muddy," that came out 10-15 years ago. It was a hellish situation. Fortunately, there were not a lot of people in the area at the time. About 10 years ago, a scientist predicted that a quake would occur on the Monday after Thanksgiving. I was visting the St. Louis area at the time, and a lot of the folks around there expected it to happen. Some kept their kids home from school.
Iben Browning predicted a earthquake of magnitude 7 would strike the area of the New Madrid Fault Zone on December 3, 1990. It was all the rage here in Southern Illinois. And you are right about the school situation. Tons of kids were kept out of school that day (with no penalty for missing), people stocked up on water and canned foods. Kind of a "test run" for the Y2K madness a few years later.
The full editorial mentions New Madrid...that's why I included the Missouri :-)
The Professor was Iben Browning. He did it partialy as a stunt to highlight the venerability of the area.
Don't know how much is in place, but the state of Iowa has a few plans at the DOT for the "big one". Basically they put up a lot of signs for a better way around the interstate systems, because they figured every over pass would be out.
If New Madrid hits, we will have a situation like what we are seeing on the Gulf all over the Midwest. Difference is you can walk out of most Midwestern cities.