ST. LOUIS — Historic rainfall totals fell on St. Louis Monday night into Tuesday morning, breaking a 100-year record to set a new all-time daily rainfall record for St. Louis.
The extreme rainfall occurred early Tuesday morning with St. Louis-Lambert International Airport receiving a daily total of 8.63 inches of rain, shattering the old daily rainfall record of 6.85 inches set back on Aug. 20, 1915.
As of 3 p.m., St. Louis area rainfall totals ranged from five to 12 inches, with the most rain falling over St. Charles county. In fact, the Missouri cities of Wentzville, O'Fallon and St. Paul all saw rainfall totals near 12 inches.
If you or someone you know needs help with the impacts of flooding, call the United Way at 211 or click here for more information.
When that record was set in 1915, St. Louis, and the rest of the world, looked much different.
Photos: 1915 Flooding
The Missouri Historical Society compiled local news coverage from the time which detailed the devastating impact of torrential rains.
"1025 FAMILIES MADE HOMELESS BY ST. LOUIS FLOOD" and "FIVE BELIEVED LOST; DAMAGE $1,000,000; HUNDREDS RESCUED" were the headlines splashed across the St. Louis Globe-Democrat the day after the storm. The St. Louis Republic reported stories like "SEVERAL PERSONS REPORTED DEAD IN ST. LOUIS FLOOD" and "RIVER DES PERES MILE WIDE".
A story from the Globe-Democrat described the lengths firemen, policemen and citizen volunteers went to rescue their neighbors from their homes.
"The story of the rescuing of hundreds of persons imperiled by the flood is one of individual acts of heroism, of thrilling escapes and of long hours of devoted effort by police, firemen, soldiers and citizen volunteers," the story began.
The story goes on to tell of volunteers and first responders scooping people out of second-story windows and off roofs.
The massive rainfall totals in 1915 were part of a much different storm system than what St. Louis saw on Tuesday. The 1915 storm was part of a tropical storm that continued into the Midwest, or as one headline from the Globe-Democrat put it "Tropical Storm, Sweeping from Gulf, Takes on New Life in Missouri".
With World War I raging, the flooding was far from the only story making headlines at the time. Both papers wrote of the sinking of the Arabic, a British passenger liner that was torpedoed by a German U-boat.
