Sudden Sea:
The Great Hurricane of 1938
by R. A. Scotti
The
gripping and unforgettable story of the Great Hurricane of 1938,
still remembered by all who survived it as the most terrifying
moment of their lives.
On September 21, 1938, the fastest hurricane on record caught the
Northeast by surprise and left a wake of death and destruction
across seven states. Traveling at record speeds, the storm raced
up the Atlantic coast, reaching New York and New England ahead of
hurricane warnings and striking with such intensity that
seismographs in Alaska registered the impact. Winds, clocked at
186 miles per hour, stripped cars of their paint. Walls of water
fifty feet high swept homes and entire families out to sea.
Drawing upon newspaper accounts, personal testimony of survivors,
and archival sources, Sudden Sea recounts that day in terrifying
detail. The Moore family climbed up to the attic of their
oceanfront home as the waters rose, only to find themselves
launched on a roiling ocean. Joseph Matoes watched as the bus
carrying his children home from school stalled on the causeway
just as the ocean surged into the bay. Three friends, separated
in the fury of the storm, found themselves reunited on a beach a
state away. These and other tales of heroism, terror, and
survival form the heart of this incredible account. At the same
time, R. A. Scotti uncovers the unlikely alignment of
meteorological conditions that conspired to bring about the
unthinkable: a tropical cyclone on the Northeast coast.
On the morning of September 21, 1938, the swath of coastline from
Cape May to Cape Cod was the wealthiest and most populous in the
world. By evening, it was a wasteland. The Great Hurricane of
1938 scarred a landscape and a generation. R. A. Scotti has
written an extraordinary account of an ocean rising up to wreak
total destruction on a way of life the world would never see
again.
R. A. Scotti, a former journalist on the Providence Journal-Bulletin and Newark Star-Ledger, is the author of five novels. A native Rhode Islander, Scotti grew up hearing stories of 1938, including one of an aunt who returned from work at the phone company in a rowboat and another about her grandmother's best friend, who stepped out onto the porch of her house and was never seen again. She summers at Narragansett Pier, Weekapaug, and Jamestown and lives the rest of the year in New York City.
"I grew up in Providence, Rhode Island, hearing stories about the Great Hurricane of 1938. To New Englanders-and New Yorkers-that maverick storm took on near mythical dimensions. The tales my grandaunts and uncles would tell-my Aunt Lally coming home from work at the telephone company in downtown Providence in a rowboat, the Higgins family washed out to sea in their Misquamicut cottage, my grandmother's best friend stepping out on the porch of her house and never seen again-were the impetus for Sudden Sea."
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Revised: April 03, 2005.
