Message #103047

[Bianca]

At Ashton Villa, an Italianate antebellum brick mansion with cast-iron balconies, 3 feet of water invaded. (In 1900, the surge was even worse, reaching the tenth step of the grand staircase.) By Thursday, fuzzy white mold had already begun sprouting on a Victorian settee that had floated to rest on its velvet back. Workers ripped up Oriental carpeting and scraped up the sodden padding to save the warping wooden floors.

"Heartbreaking," Denise Alexander said as she pushed aside her dust mask with a rubber-gloved hand. "There's not a lot else to say about it."

Murdoch's Bath House — which once housed a ballroom, bingo parlor, arcade and portrait studio — succumbed to the pounding surf.

"We lost a lot of things on this island," William Cottingham said in a choked voice as he stood on the seawall and peered at the tattered remains of the Balinese. "And I'm really sorry to say that it ain't going to be the same."

Residents have been told that it may be months before power and other services are restored, and Mayor Lyda Ann Thomas has asked those who stayed behind to leave the city. But she is eager for the world to know that Galveston's future is secure.

"The city of Galveston is not in ruins," she said. "It is recovering according to a well-established plan."

Some don't plan to be a part of that recovery. Click says two business owners have already told him they won't rebuild. But new blood will come in, the fourth-generation islander insists.

"We're not out. We're down," says Click. "And it'll be picked up and cleaned up and scraped off, and we'll rebuild something that's not exactly what it was, but something that might be better."

After the 1900 storm, wealthy families like the Moody mercantile clan poured large sums into rebuilding the city. Leocadi expects the same to happen this time.

"There's money here — monied people enough," she said as she stood with her video camera and watched a bizarre sight — Navy landing craft depositing amphibious trucks on the beach across from her home. "They'll make it come back."