The winter of 1936 was a famous one in Pennsylvania history. It brought ice to the rivers, then later followed with record rainfall all over the state. All that water had nowhere to go, except for the streets and basements of thousands of homes and buildings. But earlier that winter, things had started out on a more positive note.
The 1936 Ice Carnival
February 1936 was an especially cold one. It would happen every four or five years or so. And likewise, every four or five years when the Susquehanna would freeze solid, Goldsboro would throw an Ice Carnival.
These ice carnivals were famous at the time, and featured car races on the ice, motorcycle races and all kinds of entertainment. Thousands of spectators would walk and drive out on the ice to watch the spectacle.
If your’e wondering how thick that ice must have been to be strong enough for all those people and cars, the answer is 24 inches in the middle of the river, and up to four feet by the shoreline, basically freezing all the way to the river bottom! They would monitor the ice thickness during the cold, and if it got thick enough then they would hold the races.
They would even give airplane rides, taking off and landing on the ice.
There was a catch with all that ice… it would have to melt at some point. And depending on how it melted and flowed downstream, it could cause some problems.
Ice melt, then rain
Ice was nothing new on the Susquehanna. But when the river would freeze solid, then start to break up, that usually got people a little worried because of disasters that had happened in the past. They would watch the river very closely.
One of the issues was that as the ice breaks up, it could float down river and could pile on top of one another, creating what were called ice gorges. These huge ice chunks were like concrete, and with the force of the river pushing on these giant slabs they could cause some real damage to bridges or buildings along the riverbanks. Early in March they began to watch for the February ice to break up.
Another issue is that as the ice breaks up, sometimes it could jam up and create a natural dam. When that would happen, the Susquehanna could get backed up with water, then the water would rise and spill over the banks.
With an increase in temperatures, the ice began to break up. But with these temperature rises, the next storms that came through Pennsylvania didn’t bring snow with them, they brought rain… a lot of rain. By mid March there had already been rain in the north part of the state, upstream, and in central PA by Harrisburg. Small and mid-sized creeks were already filling up and beginning to overflow.
Friday the 13th
The rain didn’t stop. Any remaining snowpack was melting and flowing down the creeks and into the rivers. The Susquehanna kept rising, and by Friday the 13th had begun to challenge high water marks from previous floods, like 1889 and 1904.
The 1904 ice gorge and flood was a famous one. The ice sheets had damaged the buildings on Shelley’s Island, and destroyed the brand new York Haven Power Plant.
The ice also made dams across the river, making the water rise and get backed up into the small creeks.
This next photo from 1904 shows Fishing Creek overflowing into present day Lee Fishel Park in Goldsboro. In the left side of the photo you can see two men in a boat along the fence line. Then just above them you can see the metal bridge going over Fishing Creek. Today this bridge is the one made of concrete and is near Antonio’s Restaurant.
With the flood of 1904 only being 30 years before, there were plenty of people still around to remember it and all the damage it caused. But in 1936, it was worse.
The river level was rising very quickly. According to the USGS, the Susquehanna at Harrisburg is considered at action stage at 11 feet. Then it is a minor flood at 17 feet. On the morning of March 12 the river was at 15.6 feet. Then by 9:30pm that evening, the river was at 20.1 feet. According to the same USGS chart, the Susquehanna at Harrisburg is considered at moderate flood stage once it clears 20 feet.
Downstream in Goldsboro, all the houses and cottages along the Susquehanna were flooded.
These river cottages were part of what brought tourists to Goldsboro, and now they were under threat of serious damage, or being destroyed.
The Rain Kept coming
If Friday the 13th was bad, what was worse is the rain didn’t stop. In Harrisburg, when the Susquehanna clears 23 feet it is considered a major flood. The previous week got up to around 20 feet on Friday the 13th. Now, they were predicting it to clear 30 feet.
Harrisburg took on a lot of water. Many of the bridges were underwater on the banks, and islands like City Island were also flooded.
It didn’t get quite as high as the newspaper predicted. The official high water mark in Harrisburg was 29.23 feet on March 19, 1936, and all that water continued to flow downstream.
The Yellow Breeches in New Cumberland had overflowed, with nowhere to go since the Susquehanna was already beyond full.
Different parts of the river are deeper and wider, so they have their different measurements that determine their flood stages. However, at this point, the entire Susquehanna River was at major flood stage, no matter how you measured.
All of the Goldsboro cottages along the Susquehanna had flooded, again. All these beautiful summer homes and fishing lodges were now home to the fishes themselves.
Every house along the railroad tracks close to the river flooded. There was just no stopping it.
Remember the photo above from 1904 showing Fishing Creek flooded by the park? It looked almost exactly the same in 1936, except with more water. This next photo shows a similar view as the earlier view from 1904. You can see the same white house as in the 1904 photo.
At the end of South York Street, near where it intersects 1st Ave, is right by the bridge going over Fishing Creek. The creek had backed up and flooded these houses. These three houses in this next photo are still standing today.
In the same spot, a photo taken from a different family shows a couple men in their boat. It would have been the easiest way to get around at this point since the streets were all flooded in this part of town by Fishing Creek.
All along the river, and Fishing Creek, the water had nowhere to go. It took a while for the waters to recede and basements to dry out. This wider view below shows from the railroad tracks near Water St, and shows where Antonio’s Restaurant would be today, all flooded and muddy.
One for the History books
Although this article was mainly focused on Goldsboro and the section of the Susquehanna River, the fact is that many of the rivers and creeks in the entire state had flooded.
Cities from Pittsburgh, to Wilkes-Barre, to Philadelphia all had flooding. Johnstown which famously had major flooding and devastation in 1889 also was hit hard again in 1936. And of course the capitol of Harrisburg seemed to be completely underwater as well.
The flood of 1936 went down as a record-breaker on the Susquehanna, and that record wouldn’t be broken for another 36 years, until the next state-wide weather related disaster: Tropical Storm Agnes in 1972.
