Environmental Factors in Natural and Man-Made Catastrophes: Galveston and the Great Storm of 1900

      After the Great Storm of 1900, Galveston’s wealthiest businessmen decided to rebuild and strengthen the city despite the threat of future damaging storms to protect their investments in the city’s business community. Galveston was not prepared to survive a storm of such magnitude. The elite businessmen who ran the city behind the scenes moved to the forefront to be in charge of possible solutions. The Great Storm of 1900 remains the deadliest natural disaster in American History; rebuilding and improving the city became a triumph of technology over the environment, with new city leadership recommending a seawall and raising the city’s grade. My purpose was to determine why citizens rebuilt the city despite the continuing danger of future storms. I began my research with a book by Al Roker, the third of a collection of books about the Great Storm. I read the earlier books by Erik Larson and John Weems; then I searched for articles on EBSCO and JSTOR. I made a note of resources used repeatedly and found as many of those as were available. I also compared the Bibliographies of articles and books to find more information. I concluded that after the Civil War, as the city was becoming more important economically, an oligarch of wealthy businessmen came into power. The elders passed down their wealth and power to their eldest sons. Galveston business became closed off to any outsiders; newcomers were discouraged from entering the business community. Although securing their wealth was the oligarch’s main objective, they wanted to make the city safer. After establishing a new form of city government, they hired three experienced engineers to design new infrastructure to protect the city. The commission form of municipal government was a critical reform of the Progressive Era adopted by many cities throughout the United States.