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HomeMy WebLinkAboutProclamation - Frances Mae Duffy Day<img src=http://www.mailtribune.com/graphicslmenus/arrowbl.gif width=8 height=9 bor... Page 1 of 3 April 17, 2006 Shaken, then stirred Rogue Valley residents who survfved San Francisco earthquake of 1906 will be honored today by the city By PAUL FArriG Mail Tribune Frances Mae Duffy doesn't remember a thing about the historic event whose legacy keeps the centenarian hopping these days. The sprightly Central Point resident, who turns 101 on April 30, was just shy of a year old when she survived the nation's worst earthquake, which devastated San Francisco on April 18, 1906. "It's a wonderful thing to see how they renewed the whole city," she said. "It was such a terrible thing, that earthquake." But the retired retail worker shrugs off her celebrity status as a survivor of the famous quake. "I'm just an ordinary person doing my thing," she said. O Franeest Moe Duffy of Central Point was less than a year old when she survived the San Francisco earthquake of 1906. Among the ceremonies she's attended this yearwas the season opener for the San Francisco Giants, where she threw out a first pitch. Mail Tribune /Bob Pennell Her thing included throwing out the ball for the April 6 season opener between host San Francisco Giants and the visiting Atlanta Braves before 42,500 fans. Seven other 1906 earthquake survivors joined her, including former Medford resident Violet Lyman, 102, now of Yuma, Ariz. Lyman's daughter and son-in-law Ken and Betty Mak live in Medford. The quake survivors' presence was apparently a good omen: the Glants carried the day, beating the Braves 6-4. Duffy, who moved to the Rogue Valley six years ago to be near her daughter and son-in-law, Claire and Clayton Wight of Medford, was also featured in an article on the 1906 natural disaster in this month's Smithsonian magazine. A century after the natural disaster, it remains the most devastating earthquake in the nation's history, killing some 3,000 and leaving scores homeless. While the earthquake estimated to have registered 8.3 on the Richter scale was horrific enough, the fire it sparked burned for three days. The blaze nearly gutted the city of some 350,000 before firefighters, hampered by the loss of the city's water system, finally stopped the fire by using dynamite to create a fire break. When the smoke cleared, nearly 500 blocks were leveled by the destruction caused by dynamite, fire and quake. The city will host the survivors beginning today at the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco. They will http://www.mailtribune.com/cgi-bin/p/psafe/psafe.pl 4/20/2006 <img src=http://www.mailtribune.com/graphics/menus/arrowbl.gif width=8 height=9 bor... Page 2 of 3 meet in the hotel lobby at 4 a.m. Tuesday, then be driven in vintage vehicles to Lotta's Fountain on Market and Kearney streets to gather at 5:12 a.m., precisely the time the quake struck. The historic fountain served as the message center in the hectic days following the earthquake. "This is very meaningful to our whole family, not only to mom," said Claire Wight, a retired college professor who was reared in the Bay Area. Duffy's extended family will be there for the memorial, Wight said. "There is a very strong connection for us," she added. "It's wonderful to go back to mom's origins." Lyman's family members from Medford will be with her at the 100th anniversary of the giant quake. "Her body's a little tired but she's doing great," Betty Mak said of her mother, a retired bookkeeper and librarian who will be 103 on July 30. "But the only thing vivid about the earthquake in mom's mind is a cow running up California Street with its tail straight up in the air," she said. Duffy and Lyman typify many of the survivors, said event organizer Taren Sapienza, a publicist in California. For the past 30 years, she has been organizing the reunion which was started by her father Leo Sapienza and his now defunct club known as the South of Market Boys. "Frances and Violet are wonderful, lively characters - I love them all," Taren Sapienza told the Mail Tribune. "These survivors are incredible, irrevocably amazing people." She estimates 12 to 15 survivors will attend the memorial, although she believes there are more than 50 still alive scattered throughout the country. The oldest known survivor is 108, she said. Like the city, the survivors have a special will to live, she observed. "San Francisco rebuilt itself in three years -that shows the determination, strength and tenacity of its people," she said. Jackson County lost one 1906 earthquake survivor in late 2000 when longtime Ashland resident Don Lowe died at the age of 103. He and his father, a horse trader from Ukiah, Calif., were on the third floor of the Palace Hotel when the earthquake hit, he said in an April 18, 2000, interview for the Mail Tribune. "I can still remember the streets of Frisco terribly broken up and dead bodies and stuff laying around," he said at the time. Although Duffy's parents Joseph and Henrietta didn't like to talk about the disaster, she recalled stories about its aftermath. "Right after my mother and dad decided to move to San Francisco, there was the big earthquake," she said. "Everything was gone." Including her mother's wedding ring which she had apparently left near the kitchen sink after washing the dishes, she said. "My mother tried to get back to our house to look for her wedding ring," she added. "But that's not all. She was also looking for some diapers, too." http://www.mailtribune.com/cgi-bin/p/psafe/psafe.pl 4/20/2006 <img src=http://www.mailtribune.com/graphics/menus/arrowbl.gifvidth=8 height=9 bor... Page 3 of 3 Although her mother managed to get close to the ruins of their home by working her way through the rubble, she was turned back by the local militia, Duffy said. Her parents told her about living with thousands of other survivors in a tent city set up in a park. "It was quite a gathering," she said. "I do remember my parents saying the Salvation Army was wonderfui. They served meals. People went all out to help." Her family would move to Oakland, where her father worked in a clothing store. However, most of her formative years were in Alameda where she was born. "lust think, it's been a hundred years since that all happened," she said of the time gone by since the earth shook the City by the Bay. "You just can't imagine," she added. "It's a whole other world now." Reach reporter Pau! Fattig at 776-4496 or a-mall hlm et pfatt/g@mailtCbune_. com. You can find this story online at: http i[/www. rriaf (tribune. com/a rch ye/2006/_0417/loca_ I/stories/O1_lota I.h_tm Copyright ©Mail Tribune, Inc. All rights reserved. http://www.mailtribune.com/cgi-bin/p/psafe/psafe.pl 4/20/2006