TEXAS, GALVESTON, PART 2 -- A SEGWAY TOUR, GOOD FOOD, AND WINDOW SHOPPING

 November 27-28, 2021

One thing I should mention is that Galveston is an island of about 212 square miles and with a population of around 355,000. It's a popular tourist destination and had about 7 million visitors last year. I can understand why. I had a lot of fun there! And while it didn't have any bird sanctuaries, I think Bob enjoyed it as well.

1. SEGWAY TOUR

We had scheduled a Segway tour for the 27th, but a storm had moved in and we had to reschedule for the next day. We met our guide at 9:00 AM and discovered that we were the only people on the tour!  We chose our helmets, had a quick training session on how to operate our Segways, and were off! We spent the next 2 1/2 hours rolling around Galveston and learning all about the city. It was a blast.

We learned that before the 1900 hurricane, Galveston was the financial center of the United States. It was the main entry/trade port in the United States, and it had the most millionaires of any city in America. After the city was wiped out by the hurricane, however, the financial center moved north (and far away from hurricanes) to New York City.

The last vestiges of those days are the incredible number of well-preserved or restored elaborate Victorian homes. We live in a town full of similar Victorian homes of the same era, so it was really fun to roll around and look at dozens of them. I wonder how many of them were built or rebuilt post-hurricane and how many actually survived the hurricane? I'm sure our guide told us, but I can't remember.

TEXAS: GALVESTON, PART I -- A MOVIE, A BOOK, AND TWO MUSEUMS

November 27, 2021

I have to confess that whenever I hear "Galveston," the first thing that comes to mind is this song by Glen Campbell:

The next thing I think of is the book Isaac's Storm by Erik Larson, one of my favorite authors. This book tells the story of the monster hurricane that hit Galveston on September 8, 1900. It was the deadliest natural disaster in United States history. (More on the hurricane later.)

The book tells the story of Isaac Cline, the meteorologist who severely underestimated the power of the approaching storm. His wife Cora, who was pregnant with their fourth child, died in the disaster, and Cline himself and his other three children barely escaped alive.

On our first day in Galveston, we went to a small movie theater at Pier 21 that shows a documentary entitled The Great Storm. In addition to this book, the film was a great way to be introduced to the event that completely altered the history of this city, which prior to 1900 was the Wall Street/financial center of the United States.

We also discovered "Old Galveston," the beautiful historic homes and buildings that survived the storm or were rebuilt/restored. Our first exposure to these homes was the Dealey Children's Home, built by a local businessman in 1894-1895 as an orphanage. Sadly, it was destroyed in the storm of 1900. However, newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst hosted a charity bazaar at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York City to raise funds for rebuilding, and the current building was completed in 1902. It now houses the Bryan Museum of Texas history.