many owners had been wise enough to protect themselves. Figures which have been published later reveal the percentage to have been comparatively small.
As I passed through the business district I was impressed with the destructive force of the storm as never before, because here were solid walls of masonry buttressed against each other, which had not withstood the ravages of wind and rain. Nearly every store front had been crushed in and the stocks ruined or damaged. The electric sign on the First National Bank Building had been twisted out of shape, as if it had been a toy, and the great electric signs of the Olympia theatre and the Cromer & Cassel department store had been torn off and demolished. The wisdom of permitting the erection of such signs is seriously questioned. In times of such stress and suffering it seems quite needless, if not absurd, that human life should be endangered by such ornate appendages.
Soon after reaching the down town section I met Floyd Williams and his brother, Orris. They were looking for a place where they might get coffee. I had been so absorbed in my sight seeing that I had not been conscious of hunger and when the Williams brothers suggested coffee it occurred to me that there was hardly a place where it might be had. Drinking water was hard to get and consequently few places were serving coffee. Neither was there water for flushing toilets. These inconveniences existed for several days, due to crippled electric power plant and lines.
Upon the whole, however, I was surprised at the strength with which the down town section had stood up. The McAllister, the Alcazar, the Everglades and other large hotels on the Bayfront were intact with the exception of crushed in windows and other minor damages. I noticed that the weather vanes on the Everglades and Daily News towers were bent in the direction of the northwest, which was the case with every pine and palmetto tree and with every other stalk and bit of living foliage which had spine enough left to bend in any direction whatever. Bay Front park was a sight. At least a dozen barges and large vessels had been cast up by the waters and were stranded hundreds of yards from the bay.
I was surprised at the excellent manner in which the arcade shops passed through the storm. Those near the street entrances were rather badly damaged, but those inside were not hurt to any extent and their stocks apparently were not damaged.
I could not fail to observe that the Roman Catholic Church and the school building immediately to the east of it were unharmed.
