NO VESTIGE LEFT OF BUILDINGS.
A few of the piles that once supported the street-railway trestle extending from Centre street to Tremont street on the beach are all that remains to mark the curved line of right-of-way. Not a vestige of the three large bath-houses of Keef’s Pagoda and Murdock is to be seen.
The Midway, with its many old shacks and frame houses, concert halls and other resorts, was swept to the sea, and the Gulf now plays twenty feet north of where the Midway marked the beach line. The Olympia-by-the Sea likewise fell an early prey to the storm, and the surf which formerly kissed the elevated floor of the Olympia now sweeps across the electric railway track about fifteen feet north of the big circular building. On Tremont street and Avenue P½ two buildings stand, or rather two structures mark where two frame buildings battled with the raging elements. The two houses were occupied by Mr. Joseph Magilavaca and family and Mr. C. Nicolini and family. Both houses were stripped of every piece of furniture, wall-paper, window-frames and doors on the first floor and second floor remained intact. The houses were blown from their elevated foundations and dropped down on the ground and the sea washed the interior of the first floors almost up to the ceilings. The families took refuge in a house across the street, which gave way and was leveled almost to the ground, but all the inmates escaped with their lives. These two dwellings stand like charmed structures in the centre of the hurricane’s track.
The Rosenburg School-house suffered severely on the east side of the building. The roof of this wing fell in and carried the second floor and nearly all of the south wall with it. It was reported that a number of people sought refuge in this building and that all of them escaped without serious injury.
TO HASTEN ONE BRIDGE.
The indications this morning are that there will be reasonably free intercourse with the outside world within ten days at the most, although those in charge of transportation lines are rapidly finding that the storm did more damage than they had at first calculated upon. At another conference the question of utilizing one of the railroad bridges across the bay and repairing that for the use of all lines prior to the repairing of the other bridges or the building of a steel bridge was practically settled. Colonel L. J. Polk, general manager of the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe, said that it was reasonably certain that this would be done, all the roads concentrating all their efforts to the completion of one bridge. In regard to his own line he said:
“I do not know when the wrecking gangs will get to Virginia Point. The statement I made to you yesterday that I expected we would have a train to the point to-day was based on information from the other side, but it appears that they did not know the amount of work there was before them. Practically they have to build a new track from Lamarque to the Point.
“We shall probably not reach the bay on the island side before Saturday, as the same conditions prevail, and we did not realize the immense damage the storm had done.
“We have practically decided to unite in the repairing of one bridge for the use of all lines for the present. Our chief engineer, Mr. Felt, and Mr. Boschke, of the Southern Pacific, went to the mainland this morning to establish communication with the parties at interest who are on that side. J. M. Barr, third vice-president of the Santa Fe system, and James Dun, chief engineer of the system, both of Chicago, are on the mainland. They came down here to assist in any way they could in the re-establishment of the business.”