Volunteer poll workers drown on a flood-washed highway in rural Missouri on Election Day

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Chuck and Cathie Baldwin were driving in the dark early on Election Day to work a shift at their polling place in rural Missouri when floodwaters overtopped a creek and swept their vehicle off the road. The couple, married for more than half a century, were later found dead, clinging to a tree and to each other.

Wright County Sheriff Sonny Byerley said the Baldwins — who regularly volunteered to help in elections — tried to swim to dry ground but drowned, among at least five people killed Tuesday as torrential rains drenched the state.

“When I’d go to the polling locations, they were there and they were always happy to be a part of it,” said Byerley, who polices the county of about 19,000 residents, 210 miles (340 kilometers) southeast of Kansas City. “They did believe in the American republic and the polling system.”

The state’s highway patrol and the sheriff have not released their names, saying only that the man who died was 70 and the woman was 73. But the Baldwins’ daughter, Michelle Baldwin-Bostian, of North Carolina, confirmed their identities Wednesday.

News spread fast among the couple’s friends in tiny, tightknit unincorporated Manes, Missouri, where voters filled out their ballots in a music hall that regularly hosts performances by local artists.

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In this heavily Republican-leaning community, the Baldwins were rare Democrats, which is why they were tapped to join a bipartisan team working the polls, said 52-year-old Patty Squirell, who worked with Cathie Baldwin at a liquor store in nearby Mountain Grove.

“Cathie was an angel here on earth,” she said. “She was so nonjudgmental and so loving and so kind. And we’re all in deep mourning.”

Tanisha Ledford, who lived on the same dirt road as the couple for a decade, remembered how they watched her children when she was working three jobs, sometimes not getting home until 3 a.m.

“You couldn’t go wrong with either one of them,” Ledford said. “Chuck stood up for the innocent, and Cathie would feed the poor. She did. I watched her do it. No one went hungry around her.”

Lindsi Snyder, a teacher at Manes Elementary, said her parents were close to the Baldwins. She described how Chuck wasn’t even 18 when he met Cathie and that the besotted young couple decided very quickly that they wanted to marry.

In 2022, Cathie Baldwin marked their 52nd wedding anniversary with a Facebook post calling Chuck “the love of my life.”

The sheriff said the Baldwins were driving in the dark on a two-lane highway around 4:30 a.m. Tuesday when their car was suddenly swept away by floodwaters from the fast-rising Beaver Creek.

Three teenage boys in another car that was swept away at about the same time were able to swim to safety, and they knocked on the door of a nearby house to call 911. Byerley said the boys then returned to the surging water to try to reach the Baldwins.

“They were out of their car, clinging to a tree,” Byerley said of the couple.

But the current was too strong and the teens couldn’t get to them.

Byerley used a drone and spotted the hugging couple holding onto low-lying tree limbs, but rescuers were unable to reach them in time. Cathie and Chuck died in each other’s arms, the sheriff said.

Snyder arrived at the music hall later that morning. She recalled how she and Chuck always teased each other and that she had commented to her daughter that she couldn’t wait to see him at the polling place.

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After she voted, she asked an election worker where Chuck was.

“And they go: ‘Lindsi, you didn’t know?’”

Snyder said she immediately burst into tears. Her friends had drowned about 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) from the music hall.

“He would do anything for anybody,” she said of Chuck, a retired construction worker. “He was just a good person. They both were.”

More than 10 inches (25 centimeters) of rain has fallen on parts of the state since Sunday, and flooding has closed more than 100 roads and highways statewide. More rain is forecast for Saturday.

The fast-rising Meramec River threatened several homes and businesses on the outskirts of St. Louis, including in Pacific, Missouri, where city leaders encouraged many of its 7,500 residents to evacuate their homes. Officials canceled classes in schools in and around Pacific for the rest of the week.

The river is expected to crest Friday at a level that could lead to extensive flooding. The city was providing sand and bags for those who want to makeshift flood barriers. Authorities warned that the river could also swamp homes, and close roads and a state park in nearby Eureka, Missouri.

Missouri state Rep. Hannah Kelly, a Republican representing Wright County, said she knew the Baldwins and sometimes bumped into them at auctions.

“No matter what party line a person falls on today, no matter whether you’re sad or happy the morning after the election, I think we all can agree that it’s heart wrenching,” Kelly said.

Their former neighbor meanwhile pondered that the Baldwins died together while performing a service for the community.

“I wholeheartedly believe the Lord planned that one because neither one of them could have been without the other in any way, shape or form,” Ledford said. “They were actually made for each other. You know, people say that, but that actually happened with them.”