Attorney and pioneer legal weblogger Ernie ("the Attorney") Svenson fled New Orleans and has returned, posting his personal observations and some of the messages flooding to him from his readership and friends. He compares the Katrina Flood of 2005 to the Mississippi River Flood of 1927, which altered America in ways we are still comprehending. Ernie The Attorney: Coming to grips with the catastrophe
He recommends John M. Barry's book "Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How It Changed America (1998). From Library Journal, as found on the Amazon page for the book:
"In the spring of 1927, America witnessed perhaps its greatest natural disaster: a flood that profoundly changed race relations, government, and society in the Mississippi River valley region. Barry (The Transformed Cell, LJ 9/1/92) presents here a fascinating social history of the effects of the massive flood. More than 30 feet of water stood over land inhabited by nearly one million people. Almost 300,000 African Americans were forced to live in refugee camps for months. Many people, both black and white, left the land and never returned. Using an impressive array of primary and secondary sources, Barry clearly traces and analyzes how the changes produced by the flood in the lower South came into conflict and ultimately destroyed the old planter aristocracy, accelerated black migration to the North, and foreshadowed federal government intervention in the region's social and economic life during the New Deal."
Posted by dougsimpson at September 3, 2005 10:32 AM