The Siren No One Believed

On May 22, 2011, the tornado sirens in Joplin, Missouri, began wailing at 5:11 p. m. Most residents barely looked up. The sirens had sounded twice already that month with nothing to show for it. Families kept eating dinner. Teenagers kept texting. A man named Mark Lindquist continued shelving books at the public library, glancing out the window at a sky that had turned the color of a bruise.…