That storm

It was the worst natural disaster in U.S. history. It's easy to see how vulnerable this barrier island is: yesterday I drove on a road along the water where I seemed to be looking up at the surf. So when the 14-foot storm surge hit in 1900, a third of the city was flattened, practically within moments.

Another way Galveston is vulnerable is access. In 1900, there was only two ways off the island: by boat, obviously not a good idea in a hurricane, and by a single train bridge (no cars yet). Even today, there's only one bridge up to Houston, though by now it's a six-lane highway. And there's a ferry at one end of the island and a narrow bridge on the other.

So thousands of people were trapped, and the loss of life was horrific: somewhere around 8000 people died, to say nothing of the injured, orphaned, and otherwise damaged (for comparison, 1800 people died in Katrina). Tour guides tell you that one of the biggest and worst problems was disposing of the bodies. The water table was too high for burial. They tried to do mass sea burials, but they floated back (just imagine!). Finally, and reluctantly, they had to resort to funeral pyres.

But the city promptly rebuilt itself. When we were in what was then Yugoslavia, we marveled at the folks who rebuilt wrecked houses, right on top of faults, right after an earthquake. Why didn't they run away? But Galveston was at the height of its prosperity, and these spirited citizens weren't running away.

Instead, in a mind-boggling feat of engineering, they regraded half the city, elevating a couple of thousand remaining houses and somehow putting down massive layers of fill. Then they built a 3-mile, 17-foot seawall. And a better bridge.

 

Later they extended the seawall to its present ten mile length, and that's where I am today: on top of the regrade, which is topped by a broad sidewalk and street. Behind the building the land slopes sharply down those 17 feet. Just amazing.