CENTRE —  Everyone showed up, and then some.

In the long days after the monster tornado ripped through parts of Cherokee County a year ago this week, county leaders and volunteers rushed to help those injured and those who lost homes.

“In working with other counties, you hear them talk about their elected officials not being there, but we had tremendous support. They were here,” said Beverly Daniel, director of the Emergency Management Agency in Cherokee County, as she looked around the EMA office where she monitors threatening weather.

On a day like April 27, Daniel frequently talks with the state EMA and the National Weather Service in Birmingham.

“All day, they were telling us it was going to be bad. We did have good warnings,” she said.

It started early that Wednesday, a couple of hours before sunrise, and continued throughout the day. Straight-line winds damaged some areas of the county in the morning as tornadoes pummeled the state, but the worst was yet to come. Daniel kept in touch with first responders by radio and monitored the recovery from the first wave of storms. The tornadoes kept coming.

Late in the afternoon, the same super cell that generated the tornado that killed 43 people in Tuscaloosa and destroyed 1,257 houses there spawned another tornado, almost as deadly, Tornado No. 51. It touched down at 6:28 p.m. in Jefferson County, then roared across St. Clair, Etowah and Calhoun counties before crossing the southern end of Cherokee County about dusk and moving into Georgia, leaving behind 71.3 miles of destruction. Winds of up to 180 mph ripped houses apart and twisted trees as if they were twigs.

According to county damage reports on the winds that morning and the tornado that evening, four people were hurt. One woman suffered severe, debilitating head injuries from which she is still recovering.

Seventeen houses were destroyed; 19 were damaged. Thirteen mobile homes were destroyed; eight were damaged. The Piedmont Seventh-day Adventist Church was destroyed; four other churches received damage.

The destruction was over in minutes, and just as quickly, first responders and volunteers were ready to move.

Sheriff Jeff Shaver used his office's mobile crime scene unit as a temporary disaster command center, and set up at Ellisville Fire Department No. 2, which was demolished by the tornado. He assigned deputies to patrol storm-ravaged areas to discourage gawkers who could hinder recovery efforts.

Hundreds of volunteers came to help. People like Kelly Taylor got involved.

Taylor, who works in Revenue Commissioner Johnny Roberts' office, said she decided she had to help, so she cooked all the food she had in her home and took it to the disaster center. Several of the people affected by the tornados were her friends.

She came back day after day and helped organize meals and deliveries to families affected by the tornado. She cooked, she drove hundreds of miles to deliver meals, she ran errands. She helped manage the donation center. She did whatever she could to help the tornado victims.

The Sunday after the tornado, the county closed the temporary mobile command post and moved disaster operations to the Family Life Center at Goshen United Methodist Church in Piedmont, where Taylor, Tammy Young and Rene Turner continued to serve three meals a day. Everyone helped. The Red Cross helped. Churches helped. Gadsden State students helped. One family drove from Pennsylvania to bring a truckload of supplies.

“You wouldn't believe what people brought to us. We got shipments from all over the world,” Taylor said.

People who didn't have a lot to give gave what they could. On a list of donations, Taylor had one for 52 cents. That's all the money the man had in his pocket, but he wanted to give.

Charlie Hincy and a host of volunteers led the charge to establish a donation center at the old Centre Middle School gymnasium. WEIS Radio started a fund for tornado victims. The giving didn't stop.

“What touched me most was the outpouring of love,” Taylor said. “People would drive by the disaster center and stop and ask what they could do to help.”

The kitchen that helped feed tornado victims and recovery workers closed in mid-June and the emergency center closed in July, but the work continues.

After April 27, Cherokee County formed the Long Term Recovery Committee to help those who still have needs.

“If they didn't have insurance or get assistance from FEMA, we try to help,” said Taylor, a member of the committee and a case manager for those affected by the tornados.

The group, which meets monthly, also is preparing for the next time. During the recovery from April 27, it saw a need for more disaster center command posts and it is encouraging fire departments across the county to designate a building such as a church or school gym in their community for a command center, which will speed recovery operations when disasters occur, Taylor said.

At a class Taylor took on disaster recovery, the teacher told participants how best to help disaster victims and advised workers not to get too involved with the people they are helping, not to “get into their space.”

Taylor laughed. That's not the way she operates. If you need her help, you will probably get a hug and a nice chat, and you will definitely get a good dose of cheering up.

But she said it's those she has helped who have shown her what is best in people. Some of the Cherokee County residents who lost the most were the ones worried about someone else, she said.

“They would say, 'there may be someone who needs this more than I do,'” she said. “That's the kind of people I met. Out of this tragedy, I was blessed.”