Level of Lake Raised 6 Feet by Great Wave

Evanston was slapped yesterday by one of the highest and freakiest waves that Lake Michigan has dished up since the so-called miniature tidal wave of 1860.
This wave was between five and six feet high. At some places it was like a froth-tipped wall of water that came asore in the lap of a gale at fifty miles an hour, smashing its way up the beaches with the force of a battering ram. At other points, notably along the Evanston shore, it rolled up the shingle with the caressing gentleness of a purling brook.
At some points the high water lasted for only half an hour, at others one hour and at still others almost two hours.

Cause unknown
Authorities differed as to the character of this peculiar wave. Deep sea mariners called it a tidal wave, but students of weather conditions on the lakes scoffed at this.
"It struck Evanston about 1:30," said Capt. Peter Jensen of the Evanston Life Saving Station. "We could see it coming in, so high it was. The water just gradually raised. I reached its highest about 2 o'clock and receded about 3 o'clock. We have had them here before, but I don't believe they have ever before been so pronounced. I think it was due to the heavy storms we have been having."

Might Have Been an Earthquake
Prof. Rollin D. Salisbury, head of the department of geography and Dean of the Ogden school of science at the University of Chicago, said it might have been dur to a small earthquake at the bottom of the lake.
"I am inclined to believe that the wave was due chiefly to a sudden shifting of the high wind," said Prof. Salisbury. "It is ridiculous to call it a tidal wave."
"More than likely a sudden vacuum in the air out on the lake somewhere caused the formation of this wave," was the comment of a lake captain. "It it was an earthquake, why didn't we feel it ashore?"
One curious feature of the wave was that, despite the force with which it struck the shore at some points, very little damage was caused anywhere.
In Chicago one or two boats were wrenched loose, the locker rooms at the Columbia and Chicago Yacht clubs were flooded, and at one or two points along the Lake Shore Drive the water drove over the grass plots and approached passing autoists.

Freight Handlers in Panic
Along the Chicago River freight handlers were frightened almost to the point of panic when the boats they were unloading suddenly heaved upward five or six feet. [illegible] lines strained and some of them [illegible] with loud reports.
At Jackson park the six foot gasoline yacht, Yarrow, owned by George Robinson, and the sloop rigged yacht Nymph snapped their moorings in the lagoon and made several erratic trips into the lake and back before the life savers could reach them.In that effort Hans Friis and Captain Hanson who were trying to board the Nymph from a yawl, were upset and carried into the lake. The life saving men rescued them in the surf boat.
Captain Shannigen of the [illegible] park life savers said there were six or eight waves there. "The first wave was five feet high," said the captain, "the second four feet, and the others gradually smaller."