If Teddy had been in charge

So how did the government handle a natural disaster comparable to Katrina: the San Francisco earthquake of 1906? Curious, I pulled out my copy of Gordon Thomas and Max Morgan Witts’ 1971 book on the topic and scribbled a few notes.

The earthquake itself was quite comparable to Katrina in scope and destruction: some 400 dead, 5,000 injured and 100,000 left homeless by the quake and three days of fire that followed it. Damage estimates ranged as high as $500 million – a large chunk of change in those days.

Government response was about as mixed as you might imagine. At the local level, city officials accomplished little in the early hours and the fire department was ineffective (not really its fault; the chief was mortally injured in the quake and the water was almost entirely unavailable).

Sixteen hours after the quake, “At 11:00 that night, confusion in the streets was as great as ever. … No attempt was made to marshal the remaining means of transportation into any real order; communications, where they existed, were haphazard, and verbal messages were frequently distorted.” Local officials also were accused of covering up an outbreak of bubonic plague.

The brigadier general in charge of U.S. troops in California immediately imposed something close to martial law. Looters and price gougers were treated mercilessly. A man digging in the ruins of a jewelry shop was run through with a bayonet. A shopkeeper who demanded 75 cents for a loaf of bread “was frog-marched outside his shop and executed.”

Dr. Alfred Spalding, part of a medical team, said later, “All along the streets I saw dead bodies placarded ‘shot for stealing.’ Ten men were shot while trying to get into Shreve’s. One man was shot for refusing to carry a hose.”
With no water, troops attempted to head off fire by dynamiting buildings in its path. It’s unclear whether those actions reduced or added to the destruction. Newspapers were filled with rumors and false reports that became conventional wisdom for the next half-century.

The federal government, with Teddy Roosevelt in charge, acted quickly. When the size of the disaster became clear by mid-afternoon the next day, the president immediately authorized federal military and relief intervention. Marines and sailors disembarked from warships earlier that day and formed firefighting squads.

It took Congress 10 minutes to pass $2.5 million in relief. By that time, express trains were on their way with tents, blankets and cots. Within six hours of the earthquake, 700,000 rations were on their way from commissaries in Portland and Seattle. Eventually, some $9 million in relief funds was received.

After the earthquake, bribery charges arose in part over deals made to rebuild. Mayor Eugene Schmitz was acquitted of bribery, but Abraham Ruef, a Republican political kingpin, was convicted and sentenced to 14 years in San Quentin. He served 4½. The body of Police Chief William J. Biggy, who was blamed for the death of a suspect, mysteriously turned up in Oakland Bay.