1928 hurricane San Felipe Segundo

42 - 1928 San Felipe Segundo

1928 San Felipe Segundo (detail)
acrylic and enamel on paper
11 x 14 in. / 27.9 x 35.6 cm

Category 5 hurricane, San Felipe Segundo, that struck Palm Beach in 1928 with the storm surge caused water to pour out of the southern edge of the Lake Okeechobee, flooding hundreds of square miles as high as 20 feet (6.1 m) above ground.

[A]lthough the hurricane destroyed everything in its path with impartiality, the death toll was by far highest in the economically poor areas in the low-lying ground right around Lake Okeechobee. Around 75% of the fatalities were from migrant farm workers, most of whom were black. Black workers did most of the cleanup, and the few caskets available for burials were mostly used for the bodies of whites; other bodies were either burned or buried in mass graves. Burials were segregated, and the only mass gravesite to receive a memorial contained only white bodies. The inequity has caused ongoing racial friction that still exists. The effects of the hurricane on black migrant workers is dramatized in Zora Neale Hurston‘s novel Their Eyes Were Watching God.

Via: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1928_Okeechobee_hurricane