First Light on Joplin

On May 22, 2011, the sun rose over Joplin, Missouri, and revealed a mile-wide scar. An EF5 tornado had carved through the city the evening before, killing 158 people and leveling entire neighborhoods. St. John's Regional Medical Center lay in ruins. Houses were reduced to concrete slabs.

That morning, Mark and Lisa Lindquist drove back toward their home on South Connecticut Avenue. Lisa gripped the dashboard and wept. They had fled with nothing but their dog and a photo album. Every report said their street was gone. They were driving toward a grave.

But when they turned the corner, their house — battered, roofless, leaning — was standing. And on the front porch, a neighbor named Dale Rankins had already nailed a blue tarp over the exposed beams. He had dragged fallen branches off the driveway. He looked up and said four words: "It's still here. Come see."

Lisa fell to her knees on the lawn. She had come expecting to mourn. Instead, she found someone had arrived before her and already begun the work of restoration.