Dr. Patricia Bixel

A lot of housewives took the opportunity, women, probably men too, but they took the opportunity to get rid of objects they didn't really like.

And we found some very funny pictures along the way of next to the canal are pictures of where people put in chairs or they put in pieces of furniture or they put in things that maybe they didn't like.

One lady wrote in her diary that many women got rid of white elephants this way.

Personally, I think they were probably still a little shell-shocked because this is before they've decided to build the seawall.

This is before they've gotten the government change.

This is before the grade-raising.

They have just survived a year, a pretty horrific year.

So there is a major celebration of survival.

The most important part of it takes place at Lucas Terrace, which was an apartment building that had been at the east end of the island where 55 people had died, but 22 had survived.

And they have a big ceremony there with the survivors and children.

The children are given salt cedar and oleander stems to go plant.

as an omen of the future.

Since then, there have been other celebrations.

Obviously, there was a fairly large event in 2000, the 100th anniversary.

When the seawall is completed, there are posts at the end of that first section of the seawall.

There are statues and there are plaques and there are other things, mostly along the seawall, commemorating the orphan's home that was destroyed and other instances and other things that have happened since the storm.

I think if you live in Galveston, if you were born there, if you have grown up in Galveston, it's always there.

I lived there for a fairly long time in the late 20th century, and people divide their lives before the storm and after the storm, especially if you're one of the old Galveston families and your family's been there for generations and for years and years.

It's before the storm and after the storm.

So the storm is very much a part of the island culture.