About this time of the year in 1962, the Ice Age seemingly returned to Douglas County.

For several bitterly cold days in January followed by a rapid warm-up into February of that year, a 6-mile-long ice jam caused flooding along the Kansas River near Lecompton and threatened to flood North Lawrence.

Fields of broken ice surround an unidentified man in this photo from the Kansas Collection at Kansas University's Spencer Research Library. A 6-mile-long ice jam 40 years ago caused flooding along the Kansas River near Lecompton and threatened to flood North Lawrence.

Massive chunks of ice crashed into the support columns of the Kaw River bridge in Eudora, bringing down two spans.

And Leo Mulvihill, who lived on a farm northwest of Lawrence, still remembers the night of Jan. 29, when the river went over its banks and flooded much of the land around him, carrying with it tons of huge ice chunks and depositing them in piles as high as 14 feet in the fields.

“We heard a rumbling noise and a loud explosion,” recalled Mulvihill, 72, Perry. “We didn’t know what it was at first. It came in awful fast chunks of ice half as big as a house.”

Mulvihill’s house was on high ground and not seriously threatened. He said he went to a nearby farm where Ken Gates and the late Clyde Husted were trying to save their cattle and sheep from the floodwaters.

Gates, Husted and several neighbors spent much of the night braving the high waters, dodging ice floes and trying to rescue their cattle and sheep.

“We were too busy to be scared,” said Gates, 70, who now lives in Perry.

Gates and Husted managed the 600-acre farm near Williamstown. The land was owned by James M. Kemper Jr., a Kansas City, Mo., and Lawrence banker.

Despite their efforts, Gates and Husted lost more than 300 sheep and 100 head of cattle.

“The water would get into a sheep’s wool and just weigh them down,” Mulvihill said. “They wouldn’t be able to move.”

Floodwaters from the Kansas River surround a farm and its many outbuildings northwest of Lawrence in this photo from the Kansas Collection at Kansas University's Spencer Research Library. The flooding was caused by an ice jam on the river during the winter of 1962.

Thoughts of ’51

More than 2,000 acres of farmland along the river was flooded in the Lawrence area. Most of the ice jam remained intact, however, until Feb. 1 when it completely broke.

From Jan. 29 through Feb. 1 there was talk of evacuating North Lawrence, according to Journal-World stories from the time. Civil Defense officials were on duty and the Lawrence Community Building was opened for anyone who wanted to stay there.

At one point, on what was probably the night of Feb. 1, police stopped traffic on the Massachusetts Street bridge for fear the ice chunks might bring it down, according to Tom Swearingen, 65, Lawrence.

Swearingen said he remembered waiting in line to drive north across the bridge to his home in rural Leavenworth County. Other people memories of the 1951 flood still fresh in their minds were leaving North Lawrence and taking along some of their belongings, Swearingen said.

“There were lights shining onto the water so they (officials) could watch the ice. I remember seeing a red fox just standing on one of the ice chunks as it floated under the bridge and I lost track of it. It might have made it, it might not,” said Swearingen, recently retired as exhibits director at Kansas University’s Natural History Museum.

Part of an ice floe that broke loose on the Kansas River destroyed the north section of the river bridge at Eudora, at left in photo.

One who didn’t panic was Fred Brown, a noted local river expert who worked at the Bowersock Dam Power Plant. By Jan. 31 he was convinced North Lawrence would not flood, according to Journal-World stories.

Elsewhere, seven miles west of Lawrence, the Santa Fe Railway fought to save its main rail line from being washed out. On Feb. 15, railroad officials said they had hauled nearly 20 railcars full of rock to the area to fill holes. They said they might need as many as 100 cars of rock to finish the job.

Low lows, high highs

There were several days in early and mid-January 1962 that saw high temperatures in the single digits or teens with nighttime lows near or below zero, according to Weather Data Inc. of Wichita. A story in the Feb. 3 Journal-World called that January the coldest month in Lawrence since 1918.

But by late January and early February, there also were several warm days that saw highs in 50s, 60s and even 70s, Weather Data meteorologist Steve Pryor said.

“The cold days and nights followed by that rapid of a warm-up could have caused the ice to form (on the river) and then melt,” Pryor said.

By this time in February, the water had receded but the strange event was not forgotten: The ice blocks didn’t completely melt until spring, leaving in their wake numerous downed trees, damaged farmland and animal carcasses.

“There were dead animals all over the place, and they had to be picked up,” Gates said.

Tommy Burns, Lawrence, remembered how he and a friend crawled through small cavities in the land-bound ice chunks looking for dead fish that had been frozen until the ice started melting.

“That was pretty dangerous,” said Burns, now 82, who has spent most of his life fishing on the river. “We were young and stupid, but the fish sure were good.”

A man walks through a field of logs and ice deposited on farm land after flood waters recede. Journal-World photo from late January - early February 1962

Photo taken late January-early February 1962 Farmers survey the piles of ice scattered on their fields and around their barns.

Journal-World file photo from late January - early February 1962. Part of an ice flow that broke loose on the Kansas River destroyed the north section of the river bridge at Eudora, at left in photo.

File from late January - early February 1962. Flood waters from the Kansas River surround a farm and its many outbuildings as hundreds of pieces of ice move down downstream.