Galveston —
A Texas Lady in the Rough
travel memoir
by Gregory E. Larson
The drive along
the big, flat, multi-lane highway from Houston to Galveston on a gray afternoon
in February 2015 was pretty boring. The view was the basic hum-drum frontage
road establishments sprinkled with blue collar communities. I had trouble
picturing our vacation in Galveston where we had booked a bed and breakfast inn,
one that was within a historic district of stately houses and quaint bungalows.
The refineries of Texas City gave a bleak, industrial feel to the area, and the
Galveston harbor with its barges and oil tankers added to the grayness.
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| Oil tanker arriving in Galveston Harbor |
Why had I
picked Galveston as a vacation spot? It was winter, and my wife, Gretta, and I
wanted to go to a warmer place than Kansas City. I had read the historical
account of the 1900 Hurricane, specifically Erik Larson’s book titled Isaac’s Storm. It piqued my interest to
see what Galveston looked like today. The
hurricane was one of the worst to hit the United States, a calamity of massive
proportions causing an estimated 6,000 deaths, almost wiping out the entire
city. It survived and rebuilt, but it would never be the same bustling city.
We drove
over the long bridge to Galveston Island, and then curved onto Broadway to find
our path to Avenue M and The Coppersmith Inn. I specifically picked the bed and breakfast house because it was located right on the edge of the area that
was completely wiped out by the hurricane. I pulled the rental car to the curb
and we viewed the stunning Victorian-style mansion, with massive porch columns
and intricate cut-outs, railings and trim.
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| Greg & Gretta check in to the Coppersmith Inn |
I glanced at
the twelve-foot ceilings on the first floor, and walked over to put my hand on
one of the tall doors to the parlor. The oak door and jamb were solid as a
rock, straight and plumb. They don’t make houses like this anymore.
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| The Coppersmith Inn, Galveston, Texas |
“When the
city was raised after the hurricane, this house was put on jacks and lifted five
feet above the ground and set on a new foundation. The engineers designed a
system of pipes to pump sand slurry over several blocks at a time to
permanently raise the ground level.
She told us there
weren’t any written accounts of how many people were in the house at the time
of the hurricane. Several houses of this size had as many as fifty people on
the upper floor during the height of the storm, which had winds exceeding 130
miles per hour. In the devastated areas, smaller houses were blown to pieces
while masses of people huddled in the attics or upstairs.
Galveston
had a significant harbor in the late 1800s, and thousands of European immigrants
came through the city on their way to a new life. Cotton and lumber were the
exports of the region, and the proud citizens believed they — not Houston — were
on their way to becoming a major U.S. port city like Philadelphia or San
Francisco. Although some of the houses of the financiers and cotton barons were
built of stone and brick, most of the new construction was built of relatively
cheap yellow pine, which was readily available from eastern Texas or Louisiana.
Ellen smiled.
“Did y’all come for Mardi Gras?”
Gretta and I
felt like deer in the headlights. If we’d known the city was celebrating Mardi gras,
we probably wouldn’t have come on the weekend in early February.
“Galveston
celebrates Mardi Gras in a big way. We’re like New Orleans, and celebrate it
for two weekends before Fat Tuesday. If you want a good seafood meal, you’ll
want to go downtown tonight, because tomorrow is Friday and it will get wild
down there. They block off the streets on the weekend and charge admission to
get into downtown. If you aren’t into the partying, but would like to see a
parade, they have a really big one during the day on Saturday, and I’ll give
you directions for good places to watch.”
We noted her
recommendations for a good seafood restaurant and continued to look around the
parlor. Standing there, it was hard to imagine the powerful storm that filled
the first floor of the house with seawater, and then blasted it with wind and
debris.
In 1900,
Galveston was a hurricane disaster waiting to happen. There were many factors
which caused it to be horrific. Weather forecasting at the turn of the century
was part science, part mumbo-jumbo speculation. Communication was limited to
wires used on land for Morse code. The radio was not yet fully invented or used
by seamen. There was also a false belief that hurricanes rarely had the
strength to travel west across the Gulf of Mexico, all the way to Texas. If the
storms did make it to the Texas coast, it was believed they would be too weak
to cause much damage.
When the
hurricane hit Cuba, it was growing and full of energy. The U.S. Weather Service
erroneously “guessed” it was turning north towards the Florida panhandle and
would travel up the east coast. That was the forecast which was tapped out
through the wires to the weather offices around the country. Isaac Cline, in charge of the weather office
in Galveston had a storm warning flag raised at the Galveston station on
September 8, 1900, but he had no idea of the magnitude of the disaster that was
about to unfold. By early afternoon, the storm surge had filled the streets,
and the winds increased above fifty miles per hour. In late afternoon, the
water began to pour into the first floor of the buildings and houses in town,
and residents scurried to be with neighbors and ride out the storm on the upper
floor of the larger houses. Water and wind became so strong the houses began to
float off the foundations and the 130 mile-per-hour wind tore apart the houses
which were already weakened by the storm surge.
We climbed
the curved wooden stairway to the second floor. Ellen gave us a tour of our
room and then handed me the skeleton key to the door. As we settled into the
room, we admired the large windows and the balcony. The room had a ten-foot
ceiling, and the bed and mattress were so high I thought Gretta might need a
step ladder to climb into bed. I peered into the bathroom which revealed a big,
freestanding bathtub with claw feet.
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| Stepladder anyone? |
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| Taking a break on the generous balcony |
Ellen told
us to look near the door of each house to determine if the Galveston Historical
Society had identified it as a 1900 Hurricane survivor. She showed us the diamond-shaped
medallion by the front door of the Inn, designating it as a pre-1900 structure.
She encouraged us to walk around Galveston and look for the medallions. As we
strolled through the neighborhoods around the Coppersmith Inn, we could still
see the effects of the storm which occurred 115 years ago. The houses seemed to
have survived in small groupings, creating enclaves of mansions and bungalows
with large trees, palms and gardens. Between these groupings were newer,
smaller and more nondescript houses. We learned that if we took the time to
look deeper, the bland appearance of a blue-collar town revealed a richer
existence of neatly trimmed bungalows and stately homes. I called them the ‘red-velvet
cake’ areas of Galveston. On many blocks we heard the noise of contractors
rebuilding the interiors of the old homes, including the house across the
street from the Coppersmith Inn, the one that had floated to the front yard during the hurricane. |
| A well-detailed home on M Street |
We opened
our eyes on Saturday morning to golden patches of sunlight streaming into the
room through lace curtains. Ellen told us at breakfast that it was the first
warm weather day of the winter, which was unusual. The sunshine and Mardi Gras
created an infectious atmosphere in which everyone was ready to celebrate. People
were excited and friendly wherever we walked. Many houses were decorated with
the Mardi gras colors of green, gold and purple, decked out with arrangements
of beads, door wreaths and ribbons.
On the
parade route, we watched the party get in full swing. Residents were grilling
in their front yards, drinking beer and listening to loud music emanating from
inside the houses. In one yard, a group of men had strung lights, and were
hanging small umbrellas for decorations. They hurried to get the umbrellas hung
before the arrival of the parade.
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| Decorations for Mardi Gras |
Finally, the
police motorcycles led a mile-long procession of marching bands, double-decker
floats, drum corps, dancers and party-goers. Some floats had kids, others had a
full working bar, some had Mardi Gras royalty and others had senior citizens
who sat in chairs and threw beads to the crowd.
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| The parade marches through Galveston. |
“Shake it
for me!” screamed one of the bead-throwing float ladies. I did a little boogie
and we got showered with beads. Every float threw us beads. We had so many
draped around our necks that I started decorating shrubs and fences along the
street. It was one of those days where the sun kept shining and we didn’t want
to go inside. After quesadillas and beer at a family-run Mexican food
establishment we sat out on our balcony at the Coppersmith Inn. Folks were on
the sidewalks all over town, a part of the celebration atmosphere.
Before the
sun went down, we wandered the neighborhoods, inspecting the decorations on the
ornate railings and porches. As we walked closer to downtown, we passed a
church with historical plaques mounted near the sidewalk. The church, which had
survived the 1900 Hurricane, had been the first German-speaking Catholic Church
in Texas. On this night, a wedding was about to begin. The procession lined up
at the front steps and we noticed the bride and her father standing together in
an alleyway on the side of the church, anxiously anticipating the start of the
big occasion.
With the sun
going down, I looked at the well-lit church full of people. The streets were
busy and the crowds walked by on their way to more Mardi gras celebrations.
Galveston appeared vibrant once again, ready for future generations to live and
thrive. The citizens are resourceful, persistent and full of energy. They’ve
survived many hurricanes including Ike, a vicious storm in 2008 that left
several feet of water standing across the city. I think they’ll continue to
celebrate their city on the gulf and handle whatever is dealt to them by Mother
Nature.
