...a man came up into the [telegraph] tower [at South Fork] "very much excited."
"Notify Johnstown right away about the dam. It's raising very fast and there's danger of the reservoir breaking."
South Fork telegraph operator Emma Ehrenfeld,
was not quite sure how much to believe of [the man's] story. She thought his name was Wertzengreist, but was not sure. At any rate,"He is a man that people generally don't have much confidence in, and for that reason, I scarcely knew what to do..."
Miss Ehrenfeld telegraphed the operator at Mineral Point, W.H. Pickerell, what he thought should be done. Pickerell said,
"It was a thing that there oughtn't to be any risks taken on" and wrote the message himself.
SOUTH FORK DAM IS LIABLE TO BREAK: NOTIFY THE PEOPLE OF JOHNSTOWN TO PREPARE FOR THE WORST.-Operator
(Ibid 87)
That is a reasonably clear, and if Johnstowners had received this "notification" within a minute or so of it being sent, they would have had enough time to do what they thought they should consistent with preparation for "THE WORST." But it was not received in Johnstown, much less disseminated to the citizenry, until it was too late to do anything about.
