Storm of the Century: The Labor Day Hurricane of 1935

This is the first book I have ever read on a natural disaster. It was a great story. It was rich in history and science, but not too overdone. I'm from the coast that does not have hurricanes and the description of the storm blew my socks off. Great props to the author even if you could tell what his political motivations were.

In the summer of 1935, hundreds of World War 1 Veterans were in the Florida Keys to build the bridges linking the islands tot the mainland.Many were curious and most unafraid when they heard a hurricane was coming. What was some wind and rain compared to bullets? Alas, the Labor Day Hurricane was perhaps the most powerful to ever assualt the U.S. mainland, moving across the Keys with 200-mph winds and a 20-foot storm surge.More than 400 people died, including many of the veterans in their makeshift work camps. Drye's well researched narrative provides not only an hour by hour account of the storm track, but also chronicles the political fallout in it's aftermath.

I've lived through 5 hurricanes and in 4 of them the eye passed over my home. Reading this book made me feel I was in another only this time Ernest Hemingway was there as well. A great read for anyone who has been through a hurricane or wondered what one is like.

We all think the weather is enormously important, at least as a topic of conversation and complaint. Huge resources are at work to show us satellite pictures of storms; many of us can't get by without taking a regular look at the Weather Channel. Long before such technology was in place, in 1935, it was clear to forecasters on Labor Day weekend that a storm was coming somewhere around Florida, but none of them could have predicted its course accurately, and none would have known it would quickly build into the most powerful storm ever to hit the US. _Storm of the Century: The Labor Day Hurricane of 1935_ (National Geographic Press) by Willie Drye tells the story of the storm, the havoc it caused, the surprisingly political outcome, and the fascinating lack of lessons learned. It is as exciting a book as one about the weather can be.The victims of the storm were largely veterans of WWI, "Forgotten Men" who were sent to the Florida Keys to build a highway linking the Keys and the mainland. (They were perhaps also sent there to keep them from protesting the effects of the depression on them.) The men reported to three oceanfront work camps, primitive plywood and canvass bivouacs where they did a lot of drinking and tried to outwit the mosquitoes. There were storm advisories for Labor Day; the Weather Bureau alerted the Keys to the possibility of danger, but no one could have predicted how much. Drye shows that the administrators of the veterans' program, through lack of experience with tropical weather, bad communication, and misplaced optimism, failed to take action until the storm was upon the camps and until the train sent to evacuate them was itself beaten off the tracks. That is only one of the horrors described here as the storm, and the surge of ocean that accompanied it, wrecked the islands and killed over 400 people. Politicians thereafter tried to pin blame on someone, but a clever congressional ally of Roosevelt kept the administration from being tarnished by tricky lawyerly tactics. It was nothing but an act of God.Drye's epilogue is called "Next Time It'll Be Worse," and he demonstrates that this is certainly so. The Keys have not seen their last monster storm, and since the one of 1935, there has been built a highway linking them all, and there has been a population and property boom, and tourism brings thousands during hurricane season. Hurricanes, even tracked by satellite, are unpredictable, and no one could foresee a similar storm so rapidly growing from a weak tropical disturbance to a gigantic killer. In 1935, a few well timed evacuation trains could have emptied the Keys, but now all the residents getting in their cars to head to the mainland would result in just a long traffic jam. Feasibility studies for making the road a two-lane northbound-only route merely show that cars would run out of gas if tanker trucks could not get south to fill the gas stations. The next storm is coming, and books will record it. Un

The story of the nameless 1935 hurricane is a real page-turner. Willie Drye expertly describes the down-and-out men who were sent to federal work camps in the Florida Keys and the terrible tragedy that befell them. Besides being one of the first histories I have found that discusses life in a depression-era work camp, the story of the hurricane, which was the strongest to ever hit the U.S., is terrifying. The hurricane literally swept everything in its path off the islands and is the most compelling description of a terrible storm that I have ever read. I would strongly recommend this book to anyone interested in deadly storms, Florida history, and U.S. history.