labor day, 1935

On September 2, 1935, hundreds of World War 1 veterans working for the WPA (Works Progress Administration) on the Overseas Railway waited anxiously for an evacuation train from Miami as a small but vicious hurricane bore down on the Florida Keys. The train never made it and neither did most of the veterans waiting for it.

 The 1935 Labor Day category 5 hurricane roared through the upper and middle Keys with winds estimated between 150 to 200 miles per hour and brought a 20 foot storm surge with it.

The combined violent forces of wind and water washed 10 cars from the evacuation train off the tracks leaving only
the locomotive.

Today is the 78th anniversary of that tragic day.

The Labor Day Hurricane of 1935 was the strongest tropical cyclone of that Atlantic hurricane season and the most intense hurricane ever to make landfall in the United States.

The storm formed as a weak tropical storm east of the Bahamas and then slowly proceeded westward where it found some warmer water and became a hurricane.

As Labor Day approached, hurricane warnings went up all over the Keys. A train was dispatched from Miami to evacuate the WPA construction workers from the low-rent camps they were living in on Windley Key and Lower Matecumbe Key. But, the train never made it.

The compact and intense hurricane caused extreme damage in the upper Keys, as the storm surge swept over the
low-lying islands.
The hurricane's strong winds destroyed most of the buildings in the Islamorada area and the men in the work camps were killed by flying debris.

The Red Cross report listed the death toll at 408 and the majority of those were the veterans.
The storm destruction throughout the Keys was estimated at $6 million. ($96 million in 2013 dollars).

Just east of U.S.1 at mile marker 82 in Islamorada, near where Islamorada's post office used to be, is a simple monument designed by the Florida Division of the Federal Art Project, constructed using Keys limestone (keystone) by the WPA.

Local residents hold ceremonies at the monument every year on Labor Day and on Memorial Day to honor the veterans and the civilians who died in the hurricane.

remembering labor day

Widely accepted as the brainchild of Peter J. McGuire, (general secretary of the Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners and a cofounder of the American Federation of Labor) Labor Day is "dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers."

The first ever Labor Day celebration was scheduled in New York City on the first Monday in September of 1882 but, for one reason or another, was held off for a day (probably called on account of rain) and so the parade and picnic were held instead on Tuesday, September 5, 1882.

Held as an annual "workingmen's holiday", by 1884 labor organizations in other cities joined the celebration.

The first governmental recognition of Labor Day came through local municipal ordinances passed during 1885 and 1886 and from them came a movement to secure state legislation. By 1894, 23 states had adopted the holiday in honor of workers.

In June of that year, in the aftermath of the deaths of a number of workers at the hands of the US. military and US. Marshals during the Pullman Strike, President Grover Cleveland made reconciliation with Labor a top
political priority.

Fearing further strikes and riots, legislation making Labor Day a national holiday was rushed through Congress and unanimously signed into law just six days after the
end of the strike.
Cleveland also signed a bill designating the first Monday in September as Labor Day while hoards of hungry unemployed were marching on Washington to demand relief.

But here in the Keys, the first Monday in September is notorious for only one event. . .
. . .The Labor Day hurricane of 1935.

On September 2, 1935 a category 5 storm made landfall in the upper keys at Islamorada bringing sustained winds of at least 160 mph and storm surge of 18 to 20 feet.

It would be the first of 3 category 5 storms to find their way to the United Sates in the 20th century (the other two being Camille in '69 and Andrew in '92)

Damage from the Labor Day Storm was estimated at $6 million (1935 dollars), it kicked the holy smoke out of Henry Flagler's Key West Extension of the Florida East Coast Railway and took 408 souls. Those, ironically enough, mostly World War I veterans who were "workingmen" along the rail line.

So to close out this post for Labor Day, I'll borrow a line from local songwriter Terry Cassidy's tune,
"Henry and his Railroad". . .
". . .This morning we'll remember what not to forget."

ukulele lady

This past Labor Day I woke up with a song dancing around
in my head.
You know how that happens. . .
A tune gets caught in the cogs of your mind and no matter what else you're doing or thinking about, the damned song haunts you all day long. You know what I'm talking about.
The song I woke with was "Ukulele Lady", published back in 1925 by Richard Whiting & Gus Kahn. . .

. . ."I saw the splendor of the moonlight on Honolulu Bay;

There's something tender in the moonlight
on Honolulu Bay. . ."

Well, a couple of hours later, after I'd had my 2 cups of morning coffee, the tune was still with me. . .

". . .And all the beaches, are filled with peaches who bring their ukes along; And in the glimmer of the moonlight,
they love to sing this song. . ."

I jumped in the shower, gave my head a good soak and the record just kept on playing. . .

". . .If you like Ukulele Lady, ukulele Lady like a'you;
If you like to linger where it's shady,
Ukulele Lady linger too. . ."

I knew right then there was no getting away from it so I surrendered and decided that being afflicted with a corny tune was as good a reason to take the day off as any.
No Monday thing at the BluePaper, no working the phones, no billing, no nothing. . .

". . .If you kiss Ukulele Lady, while you promise
ever to be true; And she sees another Ukulele Lady
foolin' 'round with you. . ."

I just wanted a long walk.

So I drove up the Keys to the "hinterland" and did
exactly that; walked.

". . .Maybe she'll sigh (an awful lot), maybe she'll cry (and maybe not); Maybe she'll find somebody else by and by. . ."

Whilst walking and feeding Florida's State Bird (the mosquito) with gallons of my blood, my mind began wandering as I wanted it too and it always does when I go walk-about.
And it hovered around school daze. . .


When I was a kid (all those hundreds of years ago), the most Labor Day meant to me was that in two more days school would start. I always thought it was cool that the first week of school was only 3 days long and imagined it was so the nuns could get used to wearing their scratchy habits again after dancing around naked all summer.

". . .To sing to when it's cool and shady,
where the tricky wicky wacky woo;
If you like Ukulele Lady, Ukulele Lady like a'you. . ."

But the first 3 day week of school was cool for us kids.
I mean, it sucked having to get back in long pants, long sleeved shirts buttoned up to the collar and those really sad embroidered clip-on ties but at least, for those first 3 days, we didn't have to do any real school work.
Those 3 days were spent calling role, being assigned classrooms, distributing books, getting to know who your new pain in the ass teacher was gonna be and sitting in assembly for a new school year pep-talk from the monsignor.

". . .She used to sing to me by moonlight, on Honolulu Bay;
Fond memories cling to me by moonlight,
although I'm far away..."

I never did like school. Being cooped up in a room behind a desk (which had a hole for an inkwell no one used anymore) for 6 hours with 30 or 40 other kids and a relic of a nun we nicknamed "Pruney", just wasn't my cup of meat.

". . .Some day I'm going, where eyes are glowing and lips are made to kiss; To see somebody in the moonlight
and hear the song I miss. . ."

All the same, I was good at it. (my parents would have nothing other) But then, about 6th or 7th grade, along came RoseAnne Dechelli. My adolescent testosterone went through the roof, my grades were like "who gives a sh*t" and I turned into the juvenile delinquent I still am to this day.
(". . .and maybe not")

But for all my stomping around in the brush,
I never out-paced that damned song.
". . .Ukulele Lady like a'you. . . . . . . . "

Here's a link to a version of the song in question.
Click on the chick to check it out.
(Go ahead, click on her; you know you want to. . .)

remembering labor day

Widely accepted as the brainchild of Peter J. McGuire, (general secretary of the Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners and a cofounder of the American Federation of Labor) Labor Day is "dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers."

The first ever Labor Day celebration was scheduled in New York City on the first Monday in September of 1882 but, for one reason or another, was held off for a day (probably called on account of rain) and so the parade and picnic were held instead on Tuesday, September 5, 1882.

Held as an annual "workingmen's holiday", by 1884 labor organizations in other cities joined the celebration.

The first governmental recognition of Labor Day came through local municipal ordinances passed during 1885 and 1886 and from them came a movement to secure state legislation. By 1894, 23 states had adopted the holiday in honor of workers.

In June of that year, in the aftermath of the deaths of a number of workers at the hands of the US. military and US. Marshals during the Pullman Strike, President Grover Cleveland made reconciliation with Labor a top
political priority.

Fearing further strikes and riots, legislation making Labor Day a national holiday was rushed through Congress and unanimously signed into law just six days after the
end of the strike.
Cleveland also signed a bill designating the first Monday in September as Labor Day while hoards of hungry unemployed were marching on Washington to demand relief.

But here in the Keys, the first Monday in September
is notorious for only one event. . .
. . .The Labor Day hurricane of 1935.

75 years ago, on September 2, 1935 a category 5 storm made landfall in the upper keys at Islamorada bringing sustained winds of at least 160 mph and storm surge of 18 to 20 feet.

It would be the first of 3 category 5 storms to find their way to the United Sates in the 20th century (the other two being Camille in '69 and Andrew in '92)

Damage from the Labor Day Storm was estimated at $6 million (1935 dollars), it kicked the holy smoke out of Henry Flagler's Key West Extension of the Florida East Coast Railway and took 408 souls. Those, ironically enough, mostly World War I veterans who were "workingmen" along the rail line.

So to close out this post for Labor Day 2010, I'll borrow a line from local songwriter Terry Cassidy's tune,
"Henry and his Railroad". . .
". . .This morning we'll remember what not to forget."