Events in Texas History - presented by Texas Genealogy Trails

Galveston Hurricane of 1900
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia The Galveston Hurricane of 1900 made landfall on the city of Galveston, Texas, on September 8, 1900. It had estimated winds of 135 miles per hour (215 km/h) at landfall, making it a Category 4 storm on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale. More people were killed in this single storm than have been killed in the over three hundred hurricanes that have struck the United States since, combined, as of 2006. The Galveston Hurricane of 1900 is the deadliest natural disaster in U.S. history
The hurricane caused great loss of life. The death toll has been estimated to be between 6,000 and 12,000 individuals, depending on whether one counts casualties from the city of Galveston itself, the larger island, or the region as a whole. The number most cited in official reports is 8,000. The hurricane has no official name, and as such, it is referred to under various descriptive, unofficial names. Common names for the storm include the Galveston Hurricane of 1900, the Great Galveston Hurricane, and—in older documentation—the Galveston Flood. It is often locally known in the Galveston area as The Great Storm or The 1900 Storm. The city of Galveston at the end of the 19th century was a booming metropolis with a population of 42,000. Its position on the natural harbor of Galveston Bay along the Gulf of Mexico made it the center of trade and the biggest city in the state of Texas. With this prosperity came a sense of complacency. At the time of the 1900 storm, the highest point in the city of Galveston was only 8.7 feet (2.7 m) above sea level. The hurricane had brought with it a storm surge of over 15 feet (4.6 m), which washed over the entire island. The surge knocked buildings off their foundations, and the surf pounded them to pieces. Over 3,600 homes were destroyed, and a wall of debris faced the ocean. The few buildings which survived, mostly solidly-built mansions and houses along the Strand District, are today maintained as tourist attractions. The story of the Saint Mary's Orphan Asylum run by the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word became an integral part of the story of the Galveston Hurricane of 1900 (and indeed, a part of Texas history). The orphanage housed at that time 93 children (ages 2 to 13) and 10 sisters. The hurricane arrived quietly on September 7, 1900. The full force of the Galvestion Hurricane of 1900 would not be felt until the next day, September 8. The story of the hurricane and of what happened at the orphanage remains a central story of the hurricane itself. On September 8, 1900, the hurricane eventually began to erode away the sand dunes that surrounded St. Mary's Orphanage. The sisters in charge decided to move the children into the girl's dormitory, as it was newer and stronger (and thus potentially safer) than the boy's dormitory. The sisters led the children in singing (in English) the old French hymn, Queen of the Waves. Eventually, the boy's dormitory failed and collapsed into the sea. When the waters started to fill the first floor of the girl's dormitory, the sisters moved the children to the second floor, and again led in singing Queen of the Waves. The sisters put clothes line around their waists and connected themselves to six to eight children each in an attempt to save the children. Three of the children (older teens) were left loose. Finally, the girl's dormitory collapsed and killed all ten sisters and ninety children. Only the three teenaged boys survived: William Murney, Frank Madera and Albert Campbell. To prevent future storms from causing destruction like that of the 1900 hurricane, many improvements to the island were made. The first three miles (4.8 km) of the 17-foot-high (5.2 m) Galveston Seawall were built beginning in 1902 under the direction of Henry Martyn Robert. An all-weather bridge was constructed to the mainland to replace the ones destroyed in the storm. The most dramatic effort to protect the city was its raising. Dredged sand was used to raise the city of Galveston by as much as 17 feet (5.2 m) above its previous elevation. Over 2,100 buildings were raised in the process, including the 3,000-ton St. Patrick’s Church. The seawall and raising of the island were jointly named a National Historical Civil Engineering Landmark by the American Society of Civil Engineers in 2001. The last reported survivor of the Galveston Hurricane of 1900, Mrs. Maude Conic of Wharton, Texas, died November 14, 2004, at the claimed age of 116. (Census records indicate she was younger than that.)