Hemingway's Hurricane (Paperback)

by Phil Scott (Author) "Joseph Fecteau drove his Chevy pickup truck north along the dusty highway from Camp 5 to his home on Upper Matecumbe Key, where he and..." (more)
Key Phrases: water tank car, relief train, tropical disturbance, Key West, Snake Creek, Weather Bureau (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

THE FINAL BLOW

They were the forgotten members of the Lost Generation, traumatized veterans of the Great War who grasped for one last chance at redemption under Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal. Six hundred of them were shuffled off to the Florida Keys to build a highway to Key West. On Labor Day weekend 1935, the most intense hurricane ever to strike the U.S. took aim on their flimsy shacks, and the two men responsible for evacuating the veterans from harm’s way waited too long.

After the storm, Ernest Hemingway took his boat from his home in Key West to aid the veterans in the Upper Keys but he found few survivors on the wreckage. His public cries of outrage bound him forever to the storm. quotes

“Brilliantly and compellingly captures the events surrounding the 1935 storm, showing how human factors compounded the awful force of sky and sea.”—from the Foreword by John Rennie, Editor in Chief, Scientific American

“Hemingway’s Hurricane describes a scenario tragically similar to the one surrounding Hurricane Katrina . . . little preparedness and no timely rescue for victims.”—The Sacramento Bee

“Phil Scott does a favor with this book, reminding [us] that deadly storms aren’t a new event.”—Chicago Tribune

“A timely topic and a compelling read.”—The Indianapolis Star

From the Publisher
A powerful late summer hurricane is tracked for several days before it makes landfall on a southern U.S. coastline. Inexplicably, government officials fail to set an evacuation plan in motion until it is too late. Those who are able escape, but the have-nots are left behind. Roaring ashore with 200 mph winds and a 22-foot storm surge, the storm overwhelms low-lying areas. Hundreds die.

You might think I’m describing Hurricane Katrina, but I’m not. I’m talking about the Labor Day hurricane of 1935 that struck the Florida Keys seventy years to the week before Katrina. More than 250 of the 400-plus victims of that earlier storm were World War I veterans who had been sent to the Keys by the Roosevelt administration to build a highway to Key West. A relief train stood by in Miami to evacuate the men in the event of a hurricane’s approach, but by the time government officials called for it, it was too late.

Outraged by the needless deaths, novelist and Key West resident Ernest Hemingway initiated a public outcry that led ultimately to Congressional hearings, which were widely condemned as a whitewash. Hemingway published a vehement protest essay in New Masses, a communist journal, and it was one factor landing him on the FBI’s watch list years later.

The tragedy had one redeeming consequence: The public’s revulsion over the abandonment of so many World War I veterans helped to build support for the GI Bill, which Roosevelt signed into law in 1944. Can any redemption be wrested from Katrina? --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: International Marine/Ragged Mountain Press; 1 edition (August 1, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0071479104
• ISBN-13: 978-0071479103
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.8 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #343,665 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Most intense storm in US history..............., May 28, 2006

By	jeanne-scott (Asan, Guam) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

This review is from: Hemingway's Hurricane (Hardcover)

The hurricane that hit the Florida Keys in 1935 is still listed as the most intense hurricane to make landfall in the US. It is estimated to have had 200 mph winds and although it's eye was not large, the power of this storm surpassed anything imagined.
The victims numbered 423 known dead, 259 of them were veterans of World War I. These men had been "employed" to build a highway connecting the Keys all the way through to Key West. It was a "make work" program seemingly designed to remove the veterans from the spotlight in Washington D.C., like a splinter in the FDR political eye. The veterans had been marching on Washington and camping there demanding pay bonuses that had been promised to them. Many were in desperate situations with the Depression in full form. Sending them far away to the Keys to work and make money must have seemed like the answer to everyone's desires. Tragedy was to unfold.
In September of 1935, as the veterans labored on, the Weather Bureau was tracking a tropical storm that would become the most intense hurricane in US history. Due to a lack of coverage in many areas, the path of the storm had to be projected, leaving room for error. Even so, warnings were put out to the Keys and while locals begin to make preparations, the veterans had no prior experience with hurricanes. They depended on their camp director and other in charge to make the evacuation decisions, which was to include sending a train to remove them from the path of danger. Decisions were either made to late or not made at all and the train would not arrive in time. The train itself, would be washed off the tracks and nearly washed out to sea. 259 veterans would loose their lives.
While there are amazing parallels between this storm of 1935 and Katrina, there are also striking differences. The forecasters urgently warned about Katrina, a more direct and well broadcast warning than in 1935. In both storms people waited to be evacuated by others for a variety of reasons. While the reasons are varied, the reality is that government is not all powerful nor is it capable of dealing with huge scale evacuations. When individuals give up their personal responsibility, the results will be haphazard and even deadly as is proven true in both these hurricanes. When those directly in charge fail to take reasonable steps to protect the very lives they are charged with protecting, the result will be disastrous. In this case the camp director in 1935 and the Mayor of New Orleans seem to have a lot in common.
This is a vivid account of the 1935 hurricane. The stories of the victims and survivors as their island is virtually swept clean, inundated by the storm surge is intense and electrifying. These are stories that have a depth of emotion that was not expected from men who had become inured to hardship and death in WWI. The attempted downplaying of the disaster for political reasons is stunning. While the role of Ernest Hemingway seems nearly minute, he did draw attention to the plight of the veterans.
Phil Scott has written a clear and vivid account of a disaster in the making and the lives that were battered and destroyed. The politics and the human faces of the intrepid veterans combine to form a story well worth the reading.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good story, ironic twist, January 27, 2006

By	Jon Hunt "musician, teacher" (Old Greenwich, Ct. USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Hemingway's Hurricane (Hardcover)

Phil Scott's book, "Hemingway's Hurricane" is a quick and good read about the century's most powerful hurricane....the category 5 storm that smashed into the Florida Keys over Labor Day weekend in 1935. Finished before Hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana, Scott's book takes on a narrative with some unintended consequences and supreme ironies.

Set as a timeline, the author briefs the reader well with his background of the Bonus Army of World War I veterans, their 1932 march on Washington D.C. and the veterans' subsequent detour to the Florida Keys, courtesy of Franklin D. Roosevelt, to give them low-paying jobs. "Hemingway's Hurricane" centers around these hundreds of veterans, their work in the Keys (much of it building roads) and the misfortune they had at being directly in the path of the hurricane. Scott relates all of this in a nicely paced way. Yet two things stand out in his book....there's very little to do with Ernest Hemingway....he makes not much more than a minor appearance at the beginning and at the end, so the title of the book is confusing. The author also provides too many cameo appearances by others who were part of the storm and the recovery. Fewer characters with more time spent with them would have increased my enjoyment of Scott's work.

Yet it is the comparison to Katrina, not mentioned in "Hemingway's Hurricane" that makes for the unintended attraction. The 1935 storm had its own version of FEMA (FERA) and a major player, Fred Ghent, the director of the veteran's camps, who was the Michael Brown of his day. His decision not to get a relief train down in time to evacuate the veterans was one of the worst miscalculations of the storm. It's almost as if we can hear FDR saying, "Ghentie, you're doin' a heckuva job!" Perhaps the oddest and saddest comparison is that Katrina, hitting Louisiana almost seventy years to the day after the Keys hurricane, underscores that government hasn't come all that far in preparedness, rescue and recovery.

"Hemingway's Hurricane" is a good book but not a great one. However, Scott's attention to detail make it worth the read and the story is one that has needed to be told.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Scott made me care, December 22, 2005

By	Kevin Gray - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Hemingway's Hurricane (Hardcover)

I've never had an interest in visiting the Florida Keys, nor truly understood the plight of post World War I veterans -- even though my grandfather had been one -- but with the publishing of Hemingway's Hurricane by Phil Scott, I found myself caring. I now want to visit the Keys and explore, where this amazing tragedy took place, and to see first-hand just what it meant to span approximately 130 miles of water and islands by both train track and roadway. Scott's book provides both the necessary exposition to pave the way, while building suspense for the pending storm, much like those of us in television land find ourselves checking cable channels for updates on where and when storms will hit in the present day. From the building of a rail line as early as 1912 (the year the Titanic sank), known as Flagler's Folly, all the way to Key West to the semi-permanent Hooverville encampments and Bonus Marches near the White House during the Depression years, which encompasses public dissatisfaction with the federal government
(long before the Civil Rights Movement and Vietnam Anti-War activities occupied our nation's attention), this book truly prepares the reader for nature's destructive force. Scott also manages to draw the reader in long before Ernest Hemingway enters the picture, but the Hemingway angle helps make a timely connection between gross
negligence in 1935 and the equally unexpected results of 2005's Hurricane Katrina
and the combined slow response from today's federal, state, and local governments.
I always expect my high school English and journalism students to "extend the text" to seek connections and meaning outside of the printed pages. For this reason, I highly recommend this book to anyone who cares about how our government operates. There are lessons to be learned here, even if the events took place 70 years ago. And although the book moves quickly, I find myself stopping to check one or both of the two maps detailing both the Florida Keys and placement of the work camps, plus I find myself delving into the internet to pursue further inquiry. I do this because Scott's narrative and depth of information has given me reason to care and explore further this fascinating true story.