Excerpts from an article by Bill Wilson
Auburn Sentinel, April 1, 1994
. . .At 5:10 o’clock in the morning on Wednesday, April 18, 1906, the Auburn area was rattled when the ground shook, light fixtures swayed, and a scattering of bricks tumbled from fireplaces. The residents knew it was an earthquake, but what they didn’t know was how greatly it would affect the town and its residents.
The City of San Francisco had been devastated by the early morning temblor, and what brought the disaster to the forefront locally was that there were many residents of Auburn visiting there. A great number of relatives of local citizens also resided in the Bay city, and some of Auburn’s leading businessmen had much of their financial interests there. Although there were no deaths of local citizens immediately reported, there were injuries suffered by Placer County residents. . . .the most difficult consequences for local citizens to bear was that there were no communications left to find out the fate of those there.
. . .Dozens of Auburn residents. . .rushed to the Bay Area only to find that martial law had been declared and no one could enter the city.
. . .When the refugees found their way to Auburn, compassionate local women rallied to give them sandwiches and milk and offer them kind words. But the residents were warned about housing the displaced persons when two cases of smallpox infecting several transients were reported at the county hospital.
It took several days before the news of the fate of those in the city reached Auburn, but most of it was good news. Dr. R. F. Rooney, H. H. Bisbee, M. D. Lininger and D. W. Lubeck were in the city attending the Grand Chapter of Royal Arch Masons when the quake hit. . . .Rooney, who was president of the State Medical Society, also had a meeting with board members. . .the terrible earthquake did not keep him away, but when he showed up for the meeting among crumbling walls and falling plaster, only the secretary was there. . . .F. H. Rood, superintendent of the Buckeye Mine at Foresthill, had not heard from his wife who was in San Francisco. . .He did not find out that his daughter was seriously injured by a falling building until his wife managed to reach Sacramento. . .
Mr. And Mrs. George W. Towle arrived in Auburn two days after the quake and checked in at the Freeman Hotel and told friends that their San Francisco home was damaged and their cook trapped in the basement until freed by Towle. . . .
In Auburn, a group of women headed by Mrs. Fred P. Tuttle met to organize a relief society to assist the homeless in San Francisco. She. . .advised authorities in Oakland that Auburn could house 50 refugees.
. . .It had been a tough experience for many of the local citizens, but the consolation for them was that they could bounce back from the stress and anxiety from the country’s most devastating earthquake. . . .whatever they may have suffered would heal, while there were thousands of their San Francisco friends and neighbors who would never recover.