F4-F5 tornadoes between 1880-1949

[Hoosier]

Hopefully this is the proper forum for this as it's not an individual storm from the past, but rather 70 years worth of data.

As severe weather aficionados know, Tom Grazulis is the authority on tornadoes prior to the official period of record, as he attempted to catalog every significant tornado going back many years.  I've seen some NWS offices make maps of the pre-1950 tornadoes in their respective cwa's, but as far as I know, nobody has broadened it out into a regional effort.  So I decided to take the info from Grazulis and make a regional map.  However, my map is just the violent F4-F5 tornadoes, not weaker ones.

Below are the approximate tracks for all the F4-F5 tornadoes from 1880-1949, as rated by Grazulis.  I also included fatality numbers for each tornado, located beside each track.  There are 167 tornadoes on the map, and these 167 tornadoes produced 2,989 fatalities (actual count may be a bit higher as follow-up reports of fatalities were not always published back in those days).  Only about 10 tornadoes did not produce deaths.  It's gotten better nowadays with more awareness, advanced warning, etc. but clearly F4-F5 tornadoes still pose a disproportionate threat to life.

Some of these tornadoes were likely tornado families, especially the longer tracks.