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The Hurricane of 1900 in Galveston

Galveston is a midsized city located in the state of Texas. It has a quite colorful history. Sometime before the 1700s, the area was claimed for the French crown by Robert Cavelier La Salle, but within about a hundred years it was reclaimed for the Spanish crown by Spanish explorer Jose de Evia. In the early 1800’s Galveston was claimed one more – this time by notorious pirate Jean Lafitte. After some more tug of war about the city, it finally became a United States holding, and as such the city experienced a huge upswing and actually become somewhat of a trendsetter. For example, did you know that Galveston had the very first insurance company established in 1854? Several other such records were also credited to the city and it seemed like Galveston was unbeatable and well on its way to become the booming metropolis of Texas.

Yet on September 8, 1900 all this changed and the proud city was ravaged by a highly destructive hurricane. It is estimated that the hurricane fell into the kind of storms that are classified as a category four. Wind speeds were estimated to run anywhere from 131 to 155 miles per hour. The storm surge was seen at 13 to 18 feet. With the gale forces in Galveston being the first recorded notion of such a category four hurricane, it was another one of those occasions, where the city set a record – albeit a sad one.

The residents of Galveston at one time were vigilant about hurricanes. After all, the smaller town of Indianola – which was located close by – was hit twice by hurricanes and finally abandoned by the surviving inhabitants. For this reason a seawall was to be erected so as to defend the inland portion from pounding waves and possible flooding, such as it is seen in the wake of hurricanes. Tragically, popular support for this measure was limited, and even the governmental entities argued against the necessity of such a seawall. Quite possibly the most vociferous opponent of a seawall was Isaac Cline who was also a highly renowned meteorologist in Galveston. In his mind, the possibility of hurricane damage to Galveston was considered a delusional notion, which doubtlessly he based at least in part on the long-standing history of the city that shows that so far storms were weathered with ease, and nothing that was more destructive had ever hit the shores.

The first inkling Mr. Cline received that he might be proven wrong came as early as September 4, 1900. Galveston received governmental warning about a tropical storm that was possibly headed their way. By September 7, it was clear that this storm had a great magnitude and it was doing a lot of damage on the coast of the United States. Yet due to the fact that most of the communication was still done by telegraph – and because many telegraph lines were damaged – it is unclear whether a precise warning ever reaching Galveston. The odds are good that if the city was made aware, it was only to the most rudimentary information and that the extent of the damage and the strength of the storm were largely unknown.

When the waters cleared and clean up was ready to begin, it was obvious that Mr. Cline had sorely misjudged the vulnerability of Galveston and in many ways contributed to the loss of life and property during this hurricane. A brief glimpse into the big storm of 1900 shows that somewhere between 8,000 and 12,000 people lost their lives - thus making it the third deadliest hurricane on record - either during the disaster or shortly thereafter.

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by SolveYourProblem.com : 2007

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