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    Galveston’s Tree Carvings
    Galveston’s Tree Carvings
    Galveston’s Tree Carvings
    Ebook142 pages28 minutes

    Galveston’s Tree Carvings

    By Joseph R. Pellerin

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    About this ebook

    On September 13, 2008, Hurricane Ike made landfall in Galveston with a 12-foot storm surge that flooded most of the island. The salt water then killed between 40,000 and 50,000 trees in Galveston. After they died, the trees were cut down. A local citizen made the suggestion to carve the stumps into sculptures. Three different professional artists and one amateur artist carved all of the carvings on the island. The first carving was completed in 2009, and the stumps continue to be carved as of 2014. They have become a must-see tourist attraction in Galveston.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArcadia Publishing
    Release dateFeb 16, 2015
    ISBN9781439649541
    Galveston’s Tree Carvings
    Author

    Joseph R. Pellerin

    Joseph R. Pellerin is a third-generation Gavlestonian, or BOI (born on the island). He received his bachelor's and master's degrees from Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas. Joseph began his career as an adjunct history professor at San Jacinto College in Pasadena, Texas, in 2006. That same year, he started with the Galveston Historical Foundation. After four years there, Joseph took over a tour company called Galveston Historic Tour. Today, Joseph continues to teach part time and give tours of Galveston full time.

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      Book preview

      Galveston’s Tree Carvings - Joseph R. Pellerin

      author.

      INTRODUCTION

      My name is Joseph Pellerin, and I am a third-generation Galvestonian, or, as we say in Galveston, a BOI (born on the island). I teach American history part time at San Jacinto College in Pasadena, Texas, but I operate a sightseeing tour business, Galveston Historic Tour, as my full-time job. The tree carvings are included on my tour, and several of my guests asked me if there was a book on them. When I mentioned there was not, they suggested there should be. I thought that was great idea, so here we are. First, some background on the area is needed. Galveston is a sand barrier island that nature created to protect the Texas Gulf Coast from hurricanes. However, as it was the deepest natural harbor in the state, Michel Menard thought it a great place to establish a city. The city of Galveston was chartered in 1839. Being a sand barrier island, Galveston has had its fair share of hurricanes, with the worst occurring in 1900, known locally as the Great Storm or Great Hurricane of 1900. To date, it remains the worst natural disaster in the history of the United States, and an estimated 6,000 people were killed in Galveston alone. Following the disaster, many people stayed and helped rebuild the city, and two improvements were made. One was the addition of a 17-foot-high, 3-mile-long seawall along the gulf side of the island. After three extensions, the current seawall is roughly 10 miles long. The second improvement was the grade raising. The city dredged Galveston Bay and filled in the city. The grade raising begins at the seawall, matching its height at 17 feet. There is then a gradual slope down that runs south to north. Since the construction of the seawall, hurricane storm surges coming from the gulf have been thwarted by the seawall. However, with nothing to protect the bay side, the flooding has come from there. This what happened during every hurricane since 1900, including the 1915 hurricane, Hurricane Carla in 1961, Hurricane Alicia in 1983, and Hurricane Ike in 2008, which brings us to the tree carvings.

      The Saffir-Simpson wind scale measures the strength of hurricanes based on their wind speed on a scale of one to five, with five being the strongest. Hurricane Ike in 2008 was a Category 2 with 110-mile-per-hour sustained winds. However, it brought with it a massive storm surge of 12 feet. This was well above average for a Category 2 hurricane. Just as with every hurricane since 1915, the seawall stopped the surge from the Gulf of Mexico, but there was nothing to stop it from Galveston Bay. As a result, downtown Galveston, also known as the Strand District, got the worst flooding (roughly eight feet). The water level then decreased as it approached the seawall since the island becomes higher when traveling that direction, so the water level was only around six inches

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