La Presse in Kentucky | The most beautiful of cities

(Dawson Springs, Ky.) Talon Lacy stands in the middle of his uncle’s living room, with no walls, no roof. Right in the middle of this city he has in his skin.

“I’ve traveled this country quite a bit, man, I’ve been to Florida and Wyoming, I’ve seen Washington before, and I’ll tell you, there was no place so beautiful. Any. All these uprooted trees, these branches, they were huge trees, oaks, hickory trees… Look at this pine, can you believe that it is 200 years old? It is the softest wood of all, and it survived, all by itself… ”

He stands in the middle of what remains of this house, between a thousand piles of debris and branches.

He stands in the midst of all this optimistic rebuilding talk. And don’t believe a word of it.

“There will be nothing left here. People have no money. Most of those I know don’t even have insurance. The people are amazing, but what are they going to do? As soon as you arrive, people adopt you in this city. At school, when newcomers arrived, nine times out of ten, they said their parents chose Dawson Springs because the houses were cheap. ”

This 26-year-old “handyman” shows me the social housing where he spent his teenage years, not far away. Collapsed.

Uncle Franklin Hunter was a coal miner for 21 years.

“You won’t meet anyone more reliable than a coal miner.” Even the guy you don’t like is your brother. ”

The mine has closed. He put his helmet, his boots, his belt in the pickup, and he changed cities.

He got a job at the plastics factory, not far from here. “We’re making cups for McDonald’s. The most I made at the mine was $ 24.17 an hour. Now I am making $ 15. But, hey, I could make $ 10, so I’m blessed. ”

He shows me around what remains of his house. Shows me the entrance to the basement, where he took refuge with his wife, relatives, neighbors. “There were nine people, six dogs… Not everyone has a basement, we’re lucky. ”

The day after the tornado, people in Illinois found a photo of a father feeding his baby. They put it on Facebook.

“It was my daughter and me! The photos were 75 miles from here… ”

They tell me about grandfather’s restaurant, Tom Country Kitchen, where the whole family worked. We served meatloaf and fried catfish.

In the midst of the silences, he takes stock of all that has disappeared and will not return.

“My wife, what pains her is having lost all her Christmas decorations… Every year, we bought a new, special one, we put the names of the people of the family on it… But everyone world survived, at least. ”

He was waiting for the insurance estimator, but he won’t come: he caught COVID-19. I ask him if people are vaccinated, according to him. “50-50,” his nephew tells me.

“I don’t believe in that. I had it, and I survived, and I have antibodies, ”says Franklin, 49.

While we are talking, police cars are closing the streets. Joe Biden has just arrived and the neighborhood is cordoned off. All non-residents must evacuate. I stay, to see …

A pick-up passes with the “Let’s go Brandon” sticker. The slogan has become a coded anti-Biden rallying cry, since a NASCAR race this fall. The crowd was shouting “fuck you Biden,” but one reporter believed (or claimed to hear) they were saying “Let’s go Brandon” to cheer on runner Brandon Brown.

“If Biden comes here, I’ll be polite as a Christian, but I’m a 100% Trump guy,” Franklin tells me.

” Take this. ”

He offers me a bottle of water.

Dawson Springs has been bearing this name since the discovery of a mineral water spring believed to have therapeutic virtues. At the beginning of the XX^e century, people came from all over the East Coast for an old-fashioned spa session. The medicinal virtues have turned out to be less magical, the grand hotel has been burnt down, and no one has come here for the waters for 60 years.

One-third of the people here live on state assistance, and the median income is one-third of the US national average.

Walking in the old historic center, we see that the old shops have been vacant since long before the tornado which just destroyed two thirds of this city of just under 3000 people.

One of these small towns already ravaged for 40 years by layoffs, deindustrialization and social changes.

“We say two-thirds for the moment, but perhaps 70% has been destroyed, the evaluation is not finished,” Amie Thomas, an employee of the City, told me.

In all, 17 people have died here, and more are being sought – 54, officially, but almost all are believed to be safe, simply unreported. The tornado killed 74 in Kentucky, around 15 in neighboring states.

So I was on this street when it suddenly found itself blocked by police cars. In the distance, microphones had been installed for Joe Biden and Governor Andy Beshear. Not having accreditation from the White House, I was turned away with the residents.

Not many Biden fans here. A very red little town in a red state.

But as we have never seen a president in town, about twenty disaster victims interrupted their cleaning to see what we could see, that is to say not much.

Even at 300 meters, we were all searched nicely by the Secret Service, of course, the president does not travel light.

“Because of him, the volunteers had to leave, they were putting up a canvas to protect what little remains of my entire life,” says Kimberly Parriet. And what remains is not much, a few photos, five, six pieces of furniture. The young neighbor came to bring her a pink handbag full of mud, found at her house.

” It’s yours ?

– Oh ! Thanks baby ! ”

She takes out the photo of her ex-husband, child… They are divorced, but she is attached to this photo. She holds back her tears. She takes me to her bedroom, open to the four winds, she wants to show me.

A black pillow saved her life, she told me: it blocked the headboard that was going to fall on her.

She shakes my hand.

“You should put on gloves, honey, your hands are cold.” Excuse me, a mother remains a mother… ”

Women often call you “honey” in Kentucky.

Beverly Linville and her son Shawn told me about their house which was blown up across the street to fit into the neighbor’s. Nobody died, not even the dog, but “they must have given him painkillers, poor man.”

M^me Parriet told me about this lady, whose body was thrown 50 meters from her house.

There are also these two sisters, Marsha and Carole, who were found dead in the rubble. “At least they died together, as they lived. ”

They all told me about that inky night, without electricity, without a telephone, where you could hear screams coming from everywhere.

Many have told me that they will rebuild. Many have told me that they don’t know. Everyone has told me that it will be very long.

Talon told me that for him, his city died on Friday, and with it, his whole childhood wiped off the map. And it was the most beautiful of cities.