Chapter I: The Cyclone

Dorothy lived in the midst of the great Kansasprairies, with Uncle Henry, who was a farmer,and Aunt Em, who was the farmer’s wife. Theirhouse was small, for the lumber to build it hadto be carried by wagon many miles. There werefour walls, a floor and a roof, which made oneroom; and this room contained a rusty lookingcookstove, a cupboard for the dishes, a table, three or four chairs, and the beds. Uncle Henryand Aunt Em had a big bed in one corner, andDorothy a little bed in another corner. Therewas no garret at all, and no cellar—except asmall hole dug in the ground, called a cyclonecellar, where the family could go in case one ofthose great whirlwinds arose, mighty enough tocrush any building in its path. It was reachedby a trap door in the middle of the floor, fromwhich a ladder led down into the small, dark hole.
When Dorothy stood in the doorway andlooked around, she could see nothing but thegreat gray prairie on every side. Not a tree nora house broke the broad sweep of flat countrythat reached to the edge of the sky in alldirections. The sun had baked the plowed landinto a gray mass, with little cracks runningthrough it. Even the grass was not green, forthe sun had burned the tops of the long blades until they were the same gray color to be seeneverywhere. Once the house had been painted,but the sun blistered the paint and the rainswashed it away, and now the house was as dulland gray as everything else.