I don't remember Dad being scared

As a kid, and as a special treat after we had changed into our jammies, Mom used to pop up a couple of big bags of popcorn and Dad would take us all to Buck Night at The Starlight Drive-in on North Broadway next to Hector Field in Fargo. This photo taken by Channel 6 Weatherman Dewey Bergquist seems to have been taken off US Highway 81 looking back southwest across The Starlight as the F5 tornado was ripping up Golden Ridge.

At the time this photo was taken I was about a mile further east in North Moorhead in the direct path of the twister. My Dad was up working on the roof of the breezeway of our house on 14th Street. I was helping as best a seven year old son could. Mom came running out of the house saying that a tornado was on the ground in North Fargo. From up on the roof it was easy to see. Mom remembers that we did like the neighbors and got in our '52 Buick and fled north on US Highway 75.

I was in the backseat behind Dad, my little sisters next to me obediently on the floor. I kept my head up looking out the window to the west as the twister hit the Red River, turned white and started to move north, the same direction we were going. I remember now, fifty years later, how ugly an F5 tornado is, how loud, how ferocious, how utterly frightening. How happy we were to return home to see our house still standing. How we basically went on a treasure hunt around our neighborhood of North Moorhead picking up the tiny pieces of North Fargo, some driven into the siding of our house. Finally, going over to the neighbor's house for Popsicle Treats to calm us kids down. Fifty years ago tonight was one of those explicit memories I will never forget.

I have a vivid memory of the 1957 tornado

Gerry Haukebo Pelican Rapids, Minnesota

I have a vivid memory of the 1957 tornado, an account of a trying experience had by my brother-in-law Dewey Bergquist, who was the weatherman for WDAY-TV. On that day, Dewey, learning of the possible tornado, wanted to get photographs of the funnel. He drove north of Fargo on U.S. Hwy 81 so that he would have unobstructed vision. The funnel did develop, of course, and he took a series of shots. Then, he realized the funnel was south of him, in town, and perhaps very close to his north Fargo home. This panicked him and he began to drive home. Some streets were covered by storm debris and he said he had to drive on some boulevards to wind his way home.
When he got to his house, the yard was littered and he raced into his home. His wife, Frances (my sister), two sons and a daughter had all been in the basement after hearing the warning. All were safe. Later, the photos he had taken – photos that were subsequently used by Encyclopedia Britannica – represented an excellent sequence series of tornado formation.