From The Van Wert Times Bulletin (Van Wert, Ohio) 
April 25, 1967 

‘I was Terrified,’ Van Wert Woman Says
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Local Resident Caught in Illinois Twister

By Larry Joseph
Time-Bulletin Staff Writer
   “I was terrified, “ said Mrs. Robert Gilliland of 1035 W. Main St., as she told of her experiences with the Friday tornado that claimed 53 lives near Chicago.
   Mr. and Mrs. Gilliland were in Chicago to attend an open house of Inter Region Associates, with whom Gilliland is employed.
   When the tornado struck, Gilliland was at the office and Mrs. Gilliland was staying at the Holiday Inn near O’Hare Field, and about 15 miles from Oak Lawn which was nearly leveled by the twister.
   The tornado struck the motel and broke out about all the windows. A lumber yard across from the motel was practically destroyed, Mrs. Gilliland said.
   “I was in my motel room alone,” she said, “and didn’t realize what was happening. I heard all the windows go out and the building began to shake. I thought the building was going to crumble,” she said.
   Mrs. Gilliland at first thought that something had happened to an airplane from O’Hare Field. A man ran down the hall telling the people to go to the basement. “I couldn’t get my door open because of the suction,” she said. The man helped her open the door and led her to the basement.
   “I didn’t have any shoes on and received cuts from the broken glass,” she added.
   She said after all the people went to the basement firemen went through and said they would have to get out because there was a gas leak. After firemen checked out the building the motel guests were permitted to go to the first floor of the building.
   She said she and her husband and several other people stayed in the building that night. There was no heat nor lights in the building.
   Gilliland was stopped in heavy traffic when he learned that the motel had been hit by the tornado. She said when he arrived “he was shaking more than me.”

-- transcription by Kate Maynard, 2010