I remember Agnes. I was 11.
Spent 2 days sleeping on a hay wagon, while our house had 4 feet of water in it.
I live in the Appalachian foothills now.
I was 11 years old too at the time and living in Baltimore when Agnes came through.
We were supposed to have our 6th grade graduation and end of the school year picnic that day and I was so excited.
There were supposed to be all sorts of games, carnival games and prizes and a dunking booth with my favorite teacher inside, crafts for sale, and my mom even bought me a couple of cans of Coca Cola that she put in the fridge and wrapped in aluminum foil to keep them cold, to pack with my lunch which was a real treat as she rarely bought or allowed me to have soda.
And yes, she packed me lunch as she did any other school day, but when my dad found out, he slipped me a fiver which was a lot of money back then, for spending money.
FWIW, the picnic included grilled hot dogs and burgers made by the teachers and chips, but my mother thought I’d be happier with the bologna sandwich on the two heels of stale Wonder bread like she usually packed for my lunch most days except for the egg salad sandwich days, which I planned to ditch. LOL!
And back then the 6th grade was the end of elementary school, so it was to me, really a graduation of sorts.
I don’t remember why it took place so late in June, perhaps a lot of snow days earlier in the year? I really don’t remember.
But anyway, I woke up late and rushed to tell my mother she let me oversleep and I was going to miss the picnic and she told me, “there’s not going to be any picnic today, look outside, we’re having a hurricane”.
Agnes really wasn’t a hurricane at that point, but I do remember the torrential rain, hours and hours, sheets and sheets of pouring rain.
Keep in mind that back then there was no cable TV, no 24-7 news channels, no Weather Channel and even the local TV stations only occasionally broke in between commercials for the daytime game shows or soaps for only the most urgent of bulletins.
So my mother turned into the AM news station in Baltimore – WBAL and we were just close enough that she could dial into WHP in Harrisburg to get anything close to live coverage of the flooding.