The rumbling came from the southwest and sounded to residents of Annabella “as if a band of wild horses” was descending on their village. Like thunder from the hooves of 100 animals, a rushing noise accompanied the quake as it struck and fanned out across the region.

The day was Wednesday, Nov. 13, 1901. The time, a little past 9:30 p.m. People frantically stumbled out of their domiciles into the chilly darkness and hurriedly gathered in the open streets. Even livestock was set in commotion, one observer noting that “cattle and horses were greatly frightened and bellowed and snorted piteously.”

Dogs howled and chickens cackled into the early hours of the next morning. Richfield and surrounding communities located in the Sevier Valley were near the epicenter of a great earthquake.

It would be reported that the quake was felt as far south as St. George and other places in Utah’s Dixie. The shock waves extended into eastern Nevada. People living at Grand Junction, CO; and Moab, reported they too experienced the earth’s shaking where they lived.

In Salt Lake City, guests staying on the second and third floors of hotels were particularly unnerved as they felt the buildings sway during the initial temblor. People residing in Sanpete County also felt the earthquake with reports coming in from Mt. Pleasant, Ephraim and Manti.

Residents of North Sanpete felt the “severe jolting” lasting for about 10 seconds and noticed “upper stories of buildings rocked and swayed.” In Ephraim, bottles on the shelves at H. P. Larsen’s drug store at the town’s saloons “danced a jig.”

Most reports from areas not located near the quake’s epicenter indicated that three distinct shock waves were felt. Places located immediately around Richfield, southward in Piute County and across the Tushar Mountains at Beaver, reported lighter tremors continued at the rate of about 20 per-hour, keeping many people up all night.

Modern seismologists believe the Utah earthquake of 1901would have registered at least 6.5 in magnitude on the Richter scale.

Residents of Sevier and Piute counties reported their houses were shaken “from the very foundations.” Cupboards and shelves were thrown down, tables overturned and chimneys collapsed. Many people abandoned their brick and rock homes and resorted to spending the night in the frame and log dwellings of friends.

In Richfield, considerable damage was done, especially to large public and commercial buildings. Remarkably, no lives were lost in the quake as accounts describe structures having collapsed on some individuals. The city’s council was meeting in the town hall when the quake struck.

“The first shock brought down the ceiling upon the heads of the councilors; they fled in disorder, leaving the building in almost a complete wreck.” Miraculously, two babies in the Salisbury household survived falling debris when a gable end of the house fell near them. Their bed was covered with brick, adobe and mortar, but the children were found amidst the rubble without “a scratch.”

By contrast, in Monroe, certain individuals who had been in choir practice at the meetinghouse were reportedly cut by glass as they jumped out of broken windows. Elsinore also reported extensive damage with “few whole houses left” in the town.

The gable ends of many houses had fallen, chimneys were down, the new school house, a hotel and other larger buildings badly damaged.

Some of the buildings at that place were deemed irreparable. Merchandise on store shelves and dishes in homes were broken. A trivial but common complaint throughout the region reflecting daily life of the era, was that milk pans and water pails were largely emptied by the quake.

Early estimates of costs due to property damage in Sevier County came in right around $100,000. Considerable damage was also observed in Beaver, where the initial cost estimates for damaged buildings reached $15,000. Substantial sums for the day.

James Long, superintendent of the June Bug group of mining properties in Piute County’s “Gold Mountain” country was at Kimberly mining town when the quake hit. “It was a regular upheaval,” he said. “And had the houses been of brick they could not have stood.” Long related he had been engaged in a game of hearts in the back room of a saloon at the time of the first temblor.

“The game was adjourned and we all ran out. I admit that I ran and I ran hard. I would have run farther, but I did not know where to run to.” The earthquake survivor went on to relate a similar scene in Monroe.

Long said he had it on good authority that four men playing poker there were so overcome by the tumultuous shaking that their gathering was instantly transformed “into the most enthusiastic prayer meeting ever held in southern Utah. Later they resumed the game.”