40 years have past since the Oak Lawn tornado

On April 21, 1967, a tornado ripped through Oak Lawn (read memorial set up by the Oak Lawn library.) It first touched down in Palos Hills at 105th and Kean Avenue, lifted up, and then came down again at the old Starlite Drive-in theater at 6400 W. 95th Street. The tornadoes' winds swept through the village at 600 MPH, claiming 18 lives when it left.

What is amazing that almost half the populatio of Oak Lawn wasn't even born. (According to the 2000 Census, 21 percent of Oak Lawn's residents are under the age of 18.) Forty years later, it's just a distant memory. And that's the scary part. The Oak Lawn tornado of April 21, 1967 sounds like it happened in our lifetime, but it was in a past lifetime for many. And that means that a tragedy of that magnitude could happen again.