Through the past century and a half, storms and hurricanes – their wind and their water – have wreaked havoc on the Houston area. No storm has had a bigger long-term effect on Houston than the Great Storm of 1900, a hurricane still considered America’s deadliest natural disaster.
Houston wasn’t even the primary target of that hurricane – it would be a Category 4 under today’s Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale rating system. Its 145 mph winds caused untold damage on Galveston Island, destroying thousands of homes and buildings, leaving 8,000 people dead and 10,000 homeless.
That time was Galveston’s Golden Era, its financial district on The Strand was dubbed the “Wall Street of the Southwest.” Its deep-water shipping port was considered more important than Houston’s, and its population was booming, having grown 30 percent in the prior decade…