I Survived the Galveston Hurricane, 1900

  For Katie Woehr

  CONTENTS

  TITLE PAGE

  DEDICATION

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  KEEP READING!

  WRITING ABOUT THE GALVESTON HURRICANE

  THE GALVESTON HURRICANE BY THE NUMBERS

  MORE FACTS

  HOW TO STAY SAFE IN A HURRICANE

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  COPYRIGHT

  Nooooooooo!

  A powerful blast of wind grabbed hold of eleven-year-old Charlie Miller and threw him into the raging flood. He screamed for his parents and his little sister as the churning waters swept him away.

  Charlie was caught in the jaws of the deadliest natural disaster ever to hit the United States. A vicious hurricane was destroying the beautiful city of Galveston, Texas. Winds tore apart houses and buildings. Towering waves crashed over streets. Thousands of people were already dead. And now the screaming winds and drowning waters had come for Charlie.

  Charlie sputtered and gasped as he struggled to keep his head above the waves. But the water was filled with wreckage. Every second something smacked him, scraped him, stabbed him. A chunk of roof. A wagon wheel. Hunks of wood and glass. All that was left of houses and shops he’d known all his life.

  Charlie managed to grab hold of a floating door and climb on top. But now he faced the killer wind, which had turned bricks and tiles into cannonballs. Charlie flattened himself against the cold, wet wood, squeezing his eyes shut. Even the pouring rain couldn’t wash away his tears.

  Charlie had never felt so terrified, or alone.

  Just that morning, none of this had seemed possible. Galveston was one of the most important cities in Texas. Nobody believed a big hurricane could strike here.

  But then came the monstrous waves.

  Ba-room!

  The wind that blasted with shrieking gusts.

  Whoo-eeeeeesh! Whoo-eeeeeesh! Who-eeeeeesh!

  The sky turned black and split apart. Rain gushed down. But most shocking was when the usually peaceful Gulf of Mexico suddenly rose up — higher, higher, higher — and swallowed the city.

  Galveston was doomed.

  Charlie looked frantically around him. Where were Mama and Papa and his little sister, Lulu? Were they somewhere out here, too?

  Lightning flashed, each bolt lighting up a new horror floating by.

  Flash!

  A house on its side.

  Flash!

  A woman clinging to a pile of wood.

  Flash!

  A huge wooden pole, speeding through the water.

  Heading right for Charlie.

  It was a hot and sticky afternoon, and Charlie was alone in his room. His two-year-old sister, Lulu, was supposed to be napping. But she was singing away in her bed across the hall. “La, la, la … La, la, la.”

  Mama and Papa’s sunny voices drifted from the kitchen.

  Busy city sounds rose up from the streets — the clop, clop, clop of horses, the squeaks and rumbles of wagons, boys whooping as they played marbles in the alley.

  But Charlie barely heard. He was busy practicing his magic.

  One by one Charlie went through his tricks — the disappearing coin, the vanishing balls, the floating card. He’d been practicing all summer. His best friend, Sarah, said he should try out for the talent show at school. But there was no way Charlie would do that. That was something Sarah would do, not Charlie.

  As for magic, he’d barely thought about it until a few months ago, when Mama and Papa took him to see a magician named Antonio Meraki. Charlie had heard of him, of course — he was practically as famous as President McKinley. And the moment Meraki stepped onto the stage, Charlie understood why.

  Whoosh! Meraki threw a card into the air, and suddenly it was a yellow bird, fluttering around the theater.

  Presto! He took a stick, waved his hands, and the stick magically turned into a tree covered with big white flowers.

  He made a lady float up into the air, turn somersaults near the ceiling, and gently float back down.

  But the best came near the end. Meraki asked a lady from the audience if he could borrow her ring. He put it into a pouch and smashed it with a hammer. He sprinkled the sparkling crumbs into the barrel of a gun.

  Pow! Meraki shot the gun at a box hanging at the edge of the stage. He opened the box — and there was the ring, good as new.

  The crowd went wild.

  Charlie just sat there in shock.

  That’s impossible! he thought.

  And of course he knew it was. None of those things had really happened. That’s what a magic trick was — a trick. Behind each one was some secret — a special prop or cleverly built box, a hidden mirror or trapdoor, wires or ropes the audience couldn’t see.

  A magician made impossible things look … possible.

  Charlie wanted to be a magician!

  He bought himself a beginner’s magic kit and Meraki’s book, The Secrets of Magic.

  He tried doing some basic tricks. But he stank! He could barely shuffle a deck of cards. Coins clattered noisily to the floor. The vanishing balls got stuck in their jars.

  So Charlie put the kit away.

  But then a few weeks later, he picked up Meraki’s book. The magician’s picture was on the cover — a bald man with a thick brown mustache and bright blue eyes. The book was long, but definitely not boring. It turned out that Meraki’s life was as exciting as his show.

  He was born on a farm with nothing, lived with his mean uncle, and ran away from home when he was ten. By fifteen, he was performing in circus shows. By twenty, he’d traveled the world. Since then, he’d survived cobra bites, storms at sea, and enemies willing to kill him to steal his tricks.

  In his chapter about how to do magic, Meraki wrote:

  The road to fame wasn’t easy. I was a failure at magic at first. But I practiced. And that is the first secret that every young magician must learn: to practice.

  Practice? Charlie had thought. Practice was for boring stuff, like the piano. He’d stunk at that, too — and quit.

  But Meraki was right. Charlie practiced his magic tricks, and he got better. And there was something else. Doing his magic tricks gave Charlie a feeling — a bright and strong feeling — that he was more than just the shy boy afraid to talk to kids at school.

  And speaking of school, it was starting in just two weeks. He hoped Sarah was in his class. But then Charlie thought of another kid at school — Gordon Potts. His stomach twisted. His cards slipped from his hand. Would Gordon start picking on Charlie again?

  Charlie sat down on his bed and pictured Gordon — an overgrown goon with shadowy eyes and a puffed-up chest. Gordon was always making some poor chump’s life miserable. And toward the end of last school year, that miserable chump was Charlie.

  Gordon had started tormenting Charlie last spring, and it went on until the last day of school. Happily, Gordon had been gone all summer. His family was rich and had a mansion in the mountains somewhere. But what would happen when Gordon got back?

  Charlie bent down to pick up his cards. If only magic were real. He’d make Gordon disappear. Or turn him into a frog — no, a fly. A fly on the rear end of a big sweaty horse.

&nb
sp; Feeling better, Charlie took a breath and stood up. He shuffled the cards — they seemed to purr in his hands.

  Charlie looked into the mirror. His familiar freckled face stared back at him. He imagined he was on a stage, lit up by glittering lights.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, in barely a whisper. “I am Charles the Great …”

  Boom!

  A clap of thunder exploded through the air.

  Charlie put down his cards and ran to the open window. Sure enough, thick gray clouds swarmed the sky. Wind blasted Charlie’s face. And here came the pouring rain. Charlie shut his window so the floor wouldn’t get soaked.

  Boom! Boom! More thunder shook the house.

  And then, from across the hall, came the bone-chilling screams.

  “Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!”

  Charlie rushed to his little sister’s room. He found Lulu under the bed, wailing in fear.

  This was what Charlie hated about these storms — poor Lulu always got so scared!

  Charlie never used to care about bad weather. Sure, it could be annoying when a storm suddenly swept in. Sometimes when it rained hard, the streets would flood. That’s why almost all the houses and stores in Galveston were built up off the ground. Water would rush underneath, without wrecking what was inside. The wooden sidewalks were built up, too, two feet higher than the streets.

  Storms were just a part of life here in Galveston. Charlie knew that. But lately the sight of gray clouds filled Charlie with dread. Because the slightest rumble of thunder sent his little sister into these fits of terror.

  “Chowie!” she wailed from her hiding place.

  That’s what she called him. Chowie.

  “The cloud monster!” she cried. “Ahhhhhhhhh!The cloud monster!”

  Lulu thought a bloodthirsty beast lived in the clouds and that every crack and boom of thunder was its ferocious roar.

  Charlie gently slid Lulu out from under the bed. He scooped her up and held her. Mama and Papa came in. Mama put her hand on Lulu’s sweaty head, and Papa patted her back.

  “I’ll take care of her,” Charlie said to his parents.

  “Are you sure?” Mama asked.

  Charlie nodded — he usually managed to calm Lulu down.

  Mama and Papa left, and Charlie tried singing Lulu a song.

  “The itsy, bitsy spider …”

  “Cloud monster!”

  “Mary had a little lamb …”

  “Cloud monster!”

  Nothing was working.

  Charlie thought of the magician Meraki. One of Charlie’s favorite chapters in Meraki’s book was when Meraki was on a big ship, heading back to America from India.

  The ship sailed into a giant storm. Massive waves rose up and crashed over the ship’s deck. The passengers huddled below, terrified. And what did Meraki do? He put on a magic show, of course, distracting the audience with his dazzling tricks.

  Charlie’s tricks weren’t very dazzling. Then again, Lulu got all excited when she saw a ladybug.

  “Lulu!” he said. “Can you help me find my magic coin?”

  Sniff. “The cloud —”

  “My magic coin, Lulu! I think you have it!”

  Lulu loosened her iron grip. She wiped her runny nose on Charlie’s shirt.

  “Where the coin, Chowie?” she asked.

  Charlie’s idea was working! But it also could be that the storm was already losing strength. The booms had turned to low rumbles.

  Charlie gently plopped Lulu down so she was sitting at the edge of the bed.

  “Is my coin inside your mouth?” he asked, brushing away her tears. “Open up.”

  She opened her gummy mouth and sent a puff of milky breath up Charlie’s nose.

  “Could it be here?” he said, checking between her fat little toes.

  “How about here?” he asked, peeking under her chin, then inside her slimy nose.

  “Hmmmmm,” Charlie said.

  Lulu’s eyes were getting brighter. She pressed her lips together. She was trying not to giggle.

  “Check under your pillow. I bet it’s there,” Charlie said.

  Lulu turned and lifted up her pillow.

  Charlie quickly reached into his pocket for the coin he always carried with him. He pushed it firmly into the flat part of his palm, locking it into place. He whipped his hand out of his pocket and put it up near Lulu’s ear. Flicking his hand slightly, he made the coin drop into his fingertips. This magic move was known as the French drop, and it was one of the first tricks a beginner magician learned.

  “Ah-ha!” Charlie said, holding the coin out to Lulu.

  Lulu’s eyes widened and she broke into a grin.

  “Do again!” she said. “Do again!”

  Charlie felt like taking a bow.

  Ten minutes later, Charlie walked into the kitchen.

  “Where’s Lulu?” Mama asked.

  “Asleep,” Charlie said.

  “How’d you do that?” Papa said.

  “Magic trick,” Charlie said. He shrugged.

  Mama came over and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “When you’re a famous magician, I’ll be first in line for your autograph.”

  “I’ll be second,” Papa said.

  “And look,” Mama said. “The sun is out. The storm’s over.”

  Charlie peered out the window. The sky was bright blue.

  He wasn’t fooled, though. This was Galveston.

  There would always be another storm.

  A few minutes later, there was a knock on the door. Charlie answered it and found his best friend, Sarah, standing on his porch in her red-and-white-striped bathing costume. She was carrying a beat-up metal washtub.

  “Come on!” Sarah said, flashing her very large front teeth. “I heard there’s an amazing overflow.”

  “I’m coming!” Charlie said.

  An overflow was a special kind of Galveston flood. Not from pouring rain — from the Gulf. Galveston sat on a small island. When Charlie saw the island on a map, he always thought of the noodles Mama made for their soup — long, skinny, and very flat. Their noodle island was twenty-seven miles long and only a mile wide in places. It sat on the Gulf of Mexico, about two miles from the main part of Texas.

  There was water all around them — the Gulf to the south and Galveston Bay to the north.

  Sometimes during storms and high tides, water from the Gulf overflowed and filled the streets near the beach.

  There was nothing better than an overflow, especially in the steamy summer.

  In a flash, Charlie had changed into his bathing shorts and tank top. He quickly peeped in on Lulu — still fast asleep — and waved goodbye to Mama and Papa.

  “Have fun!” Papa said. He’d loved playing in the overflows when he was a kid.

  “Let’s go this way,” Sarah said, taking the lead as they headed out from Charlie’s house. Sarah had strong opinions about everything. Like back in kindergarten, when she announced that she and Charlie would be best friends forever. She could be pushy. But that didn’t bother Charlie. He didn’t have to think too hard when he was around Sarah.

  The street was busy — clogged with all kinds of wagons and carriages and buggies. But Charlie was used to it. Every street in Galveston was busy these days — it was the fastest-growing city in all of the south. Papa had told Charlie that. He was always bragging about how great Galveston was.

  Last night at dinner, Papa had looked up from his stew and said, “You know what I just heard? There are more millionaires in Galveston than in almost any other small city in the world.”

  Mama had waved her hand over her faded apron.

  “Oh, indeed,” she said in a fake fancy voice. “We millionaires love Galveston!”

  That cracked them all up.

  But Charlie got why Papa was proud. Who wouldn’t want to live in Galveston? It was a city that had everything — restaurants and stores and theaters. They had their port, with big ships coming from all over the world.

  And the beach
, of course — miles and miles of the prettiest beach in Texas. That’s what everyone said about the beach, which was on the Gulf side of the island. There were hotels and shops along the beach, and even big bathhouses where you could dry off after swimming, change, and buy a snack.

  The biggest and best bathhouse was the Pagoda, which Charlie could see now, in the distance. It was built out over the water of the Gulf, maybe thirty feet from the beach. You walked on a long, skinny raised walkway to get to it.

  Charlie liked to imagine it was a floating palace.

  “We should have brought Lulu,” Sarah said, snapping Charlie out of his thoughts.

  “She’s napping,” Charlie said. “The storm scared her. She thinks there’s a monster in the sky.” Charlie shook his head as her wails echoed through his mind. “It’s really sad.”

  “It makes perfect sense to me,” Sarah said, blowing a hunk of her thick brown hair out of her eyes. “Lulu doesn’t understand what a thunderstorm is. And if you didn’t understand the weather, a thunderstorm would be pretty terrifying — all that noise, and the clouds, and the lightning …”

  Sarah was right. As usual.

  “Think about it,” Sarah said — she started half her sentences with those three words — think about it. “A long time ago, even the smartest people thought gods and goddesses controlled everything, including the weather.”

  “Gods like Poseidon,” Charlie said, remembering the book of Greek myths Grandpa used to read to him.

  “Exactly,” Sarah said.

  Charlie’s heart cracked a little as he thought of his grandfather, who’d died last year. He was a hero of the Texas Revolution — he was always telling stories about the battles he’d fought in. They all missed him.

  Sarah grabbed Charlie’s arm and let out a happy cry. “Look!”

  The entire beach was covered with water, which had also crept up onto the streets. The water looked like it was three feet deep in places. It was like a gigantic swimming pool.

  “Let’s go!” Charlie shouted.

  It seemed every kid in Galveston was in the water — swimming, splashing, floating on a raft or tub, racing a toy boat. Charlie and Sarah waded to the middle of the street, where the water came halfway up Charlie’s thighs.