Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Hurricanes: Past and Present

In light of Hurricane Ike's impending visit to the Texas Gulf Coast, I'm reminded of Erik Larson's wonderful book about the hurricane that hit Galveston on September 8, 1900: Isaac's Storm: A Man, a Time, and the Deadliest Hurricane in History. For those of you not familiar with Texas history, this is the hurricane that turned one of the nation's most important cities and ports into the small, inconsequential town it is today. The Galveston storm remains the worst natural disaster ever to strike the U.S., its death toll eclipsing the combined carnage of the Johnstown Flood of 1889 and the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906. Larson's book vividly captures the tragedy and is perhaps the best storm book ever written.

To see pictures of the damage from the 1900 storm, go here. It's a slide show, so keep clicking 'next' to veiw all the pictures.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I love Erik Larson's books!

I'm trying to remember the name of a book I read about a (real) snowstorm in the midwest in which many children died (they were sent to school in the morning, the storm came out of nowhere, and they couldn't get home).

Sorry I can't come up with the name now ... but it's a great book (maybe another reader knows ...?)