The
Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 was the most destructive river flood in the
history of the United StatesThe history of the United States traditionally starts with the Declaration of Independence in the year 1776, although its territory was inhabited by Native Americans since prehistoric times and then by European colonists who followed the voyages of Christopher Columbus starting in 1492. The...
.
Events
The flood began when heavy rains pounded the central basin of the Mississippi in the summer of 1926. By September, the Mississippi's tributaries in Kansas and Iowa were swollen to capacity. On
Christmas Day of 1926, the
Cumberland RiverThe Cumberland River is a waterway in the Southern United States. It is long. It starts in Harlan County in far southeastern Kentucky between Pine and Cumberland mountains, flows through southern Kentucky, crosses into northern Tennessee, and then curves back up into western Kentucky before...
at Nashville topped levees at 56.2 feet (17 m), a level that remains a record to this day, even exceeding the
devastating 2010 floodsThe May 2010 Tennessee floods were 1000-year floods in Middle Tennessee, West Tennessee, south-central and western Kentucky and northern Mississippi as the result of torrential rains on May 1 and 2, 2010...
.
Flooding overtook the levees causing the Mounds Landing to break with more than double the water volume of Niagara Falls. The
Mississippi RiverThe Mississippi River is the largest river system in North America. Flowing entirely in the United States, this river rises in western Minnesota and meanders slowly southwards for to the Mississippi River Delta at the Gulf of Mexico. With its many tributaries, the Mississippi's watershed drains...
broke out of its
leveeA levee, levée, dike , embankment, floodbank or stopbank is an elongated naturally occurring ridge or artificially constructed fill or wall, which regulates water levels...
system in 145 places and flooded 27000 square miles (69,929.7 km²). This water flooded an area 80 km (49.7 mi) wide and more than 160 km (99.4 mi) long. The area was inundated up to a depth of 30 feet (10 m). The flood caused over $400 million in damages and killed 246 people in seven states.
The flood affected
ArkansasArkansas is a state located in the southern region of the United States. Its name is an Algonquian name of the Quapaw Indians. Arkansas shares borders with six states , and its eastern border is largely defined by the Mississippi River...
,
IllinoisIllinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
,
KentuckyThe Commonwealth of Kentucky is a state located in the East Central United States of America. As classified by the United States Census Bureau, Kentucky is a Southern state, more specifically in the East South Central region. Kentucky is one of four U.S. states constituted as a commonwealth...
,
LouisianaLouisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...
,
MississippiMississippi is a U.S. state located in the Southern United States. Jackson is the state capital and largest city. The name of the state derives from the Mississippi River, which flows along its western boundary, whose name comes from the Ojibwe word misi-ziibi...
,
MissouriMissouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...
,
TennesseeTennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...
,
TexasTexas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
,
OklahomaOklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...
and
KansasKansas is a US state located in the Midwestern United States. It is named after the Kansas River which flows through it, which in turn was named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribe's name is often said to mean "people of the wind" or "people of the south...
. Arkansas was hardest hit, with 14% of its territory covered by floodwaters. By May 1927, the Mississippi River below
Memphis, TennesseeMemphis is a city in the southwestern corner of the U.S. state of Tennessee, and the county seat of Shelby County. The city is located on the 4th Chickasaw Bluff, south of the confluence of the Wolf and Mississippi rivers....
, reached a width of 60 miles (96.6 km).
Attempts at relief
On April 15, 1927, 15 inches (381 mm) of rain fell in New Orleans in 18 hours. More than 4 feet (1.2 m) of water covered parts of the city, and influential bankers in town met about how to guarantee the safety of the city, with the scale of flooding upriver already known. A few weeks later, about 30 tons of
dynamiteDynamite is an explosive material based on nitroglycerin, initially using diatomaceous earth , or another absorbent substance such as powdered shells, clay, sawdust, or wood pulp. Dynamites using organic materials such as sawdust are less stable and such use has been generally discontinued...
were set off on the levee at
Caernarvon, LouisianaCaernarvon is an unincorporated community in St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana, United States. The name of the community is from a plantation originally located here. The plantation's name is widely believed to be from a similarly named town in Wales.-History:...
and sent 250,000 ft³/s (7,000 m³/s) of water pouring through. This was intended to prevent New Orleans from experiencing serious damage, but flooded much of St. Bernard Parish and all of Plaquemines Parish's east bank. As it turned out, the destruction of the Caernarvon levee was unnecessary; several major levee breaks well upstream of New Orleans, including one the day after the demolitions, made it impossible for flood waters to seriously threaten the city.
Political, sociological and cultural effects
Following the Great Flood of 1927, the Army Corps of Engineers was again charged with taming the Mississippi River. Under the
Flood Control Act of 1928The Flood Control Act of 1928 authorized the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to design and construct projects for the control of floods on the Mississippi River and its tributaries as well as the Sacramento River in California. It was sponsored by Sen. Wesley L. Jones of Washington and Rep. Frank R...
, the world's longest system of levees was built. Floodways that diverted excessive flow from the Mississippi River were constructed.
The aftermath of the flood was one factor in the
Great MigrationThe Great Migration was the movement of 6 million blacks out of the Southern United States to the Northeast, Midwest, and West from 1910 to 1970. Some historians differentiate between a Great Migration , numbering about 1.6 million migrants, and a Second Great Migration , in which 5 million or more...
of African-Americans to northern cities. During an era driven by racism, blacks built levees at gunpoint, starved in refugee camps and many were left to fend for themselves during the flood, while whites were rescued. Previously, the move from the rural South to the Northern cities had virtually stopped. In June 1927 the flood waters began to recede, however interracial relations continued to be strained. Hostilities had erupted between the races; a black man was shot by a white police officer when he refused to be conscripted to unload a relief boat. As a result of displacements lasting up to six months, tens of thousands of local African-Americans moved to the big cities of the North, particularly
ChicagoChicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, many thousands more followed in the following decades.
The flood propelled Secretary of Commerce
Herbert HooverHerbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...
, who was in charge of flood relief operations, into the national spotlight and set the stage for his election to the Presidency. It also helped
Huey LongHuey Pierce Long, Jr. , nicknamed The Kingfish, served as the 40th Governor of Louisiana from 1928–1932 and as a U.S. Senator from 1932 to 1935. A Democrat, he was noted for his radical populist policies. Though a backer of Franklin D...
be elected Louisiana Governor in 1928.
The flood had the unlikely effect of contributing to both the election of Herbert Hoover as President, and his defeat four years later. He was much lauded for his masterful handling of the refugee camps, but later concerns over the treatment of blacks in those camps caused him to make promises to the African-American community which he later broke, losing the black vote in his re-election campaign.
Several reports on the terrible situation in the refugee camps, including one by the Colored Advisory Commission by
Robert Russa MotonRobert Russa Moton was an African American educator and author. He served as an administrator at Hampton Institute and was named principal of Tuskegee Institute in 1915 after the death of Dr. Booker T. Washington, a position he held for 20 years until retirement in 1935.-Youth, education,...
, were kept out of the media at the request of Herbert Hoover, with the promise of further reforms for blacks after the presidential election. When he failed to keep the promise, Moton and other influential African-Americans helped to shift the allegiance of Black Americans from the Republican party to Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the Democrats.
The flood resulted in a great cultural output as well, inspiring a great deal of
folkloreFolklore consists of legends, music, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular beliefs, fairy tales and customs that are the traditions of a culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices through which those expressive genres are shared. The study of folklore is sometimes called...
and folk music.
Charlie PattonCharlie Patton , better known as Charley Patton, was an American Delta blues musician. He is considered by many to be the "Father of the Delta Blues", and is credited with creating an enduring body of American music and personally inspiring just about every Delta blues man...
,
Bessie SmithBessie Smith was an American blues singer.Sometimes referred to as The Empress of the Blues, Smith was the most popular female blues singer of the 1920s and 1930s...
,
Barbecue BobRobert Hicks, better known as Barbecue Bob was an early American Piedmont blues musician. His nickname came from the fact that he was a cook in a barbecue restaurant. One of the two extant photographs of Bob show him playing his guitar while wearing a full length white apron and cook's hat.-Early...
, and many other
bluesBlues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
musicians wrote songs about the flood.
Kansas Joe McCoyKansas Joe McCoy was an African American Delta blues musician and songwriter.-Career:McCoy played music under a variety of stage names but is best known as "Kansas Joe McCoy". Born in Raymond, Mississippi, he was the older brother of the blues accompanist Papa Charlie McCoy...
and
Memphis Minnie'sMemphis Minnie was an American blues guitarist, vocalist, and songwriter. She was the only female blues artist considered a match to male contemporaries as both a singer and an instrumentalist.-Career:...
"
When the Levee Breaks"When the Levee Breaks" is a blues song written and first recorded by husband and wife Kansas Joe McCoy and Memphis Minnie in 1929. The song is in reaction to the upheaval caused by the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927....
" was reworked by
Led ZeppelinLed Zeppelin were an English rock band, active in the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s. Formed in 1968, they consisted of guitarist Jimmy Page, singer Robert Plant, bassist/keyboardist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham...
, and became one of that group's most famous songs.
William FaulknerWilliam Cuthbert Faulkner was an American writer from Oxford, Mississippi. Faulkner worked in a variety of media; he wrote novels, short stories, a play, poetry, essays and screenplays during his career...
's short story "Old Man" (in the book If I Forget Thee Jerusalem) was about a prison break from
Parchman PenitentiaryMississippi State Penitentiary , also known as Parchman Farm, is the oldest prison and the only maximum security prison for men in the state of Mississippi, USA....
during the flood. Several decades after the flood,
Randy NewmanRandall Stuart "Randy" Newman is an American singer-songwriter, arranger, composer, and pianist who is known for his mordant pop songs and for film scores....
wrote the song "
Louisiana 1927"Louisiana 1927" is a 1974 song telling the story of the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 that left 700,000 people homeless in Louisiana and Mississippi...
,"
Zachary RichardZachary Richard is a Cajun singer/songwriter and poet. His music is an innovative combination of Cajun and Zydeco musical styles.-Biography:...
wrote the song "Big River," and
Eric BibbEric Bibb is an American acoustic blues singer-songwriter. He is based in London and launched his career in Europe. Today he lives in Finland.-Biography:...
wrote the song "Flood Water" about it.
See also
- 2011 Mississippi River floods
The Mississippi River floods in April and May 2011 were among the largest and most damaging recorded along the U.S. waterway in the past century, comparable in extent to the major floods of 1927 and 1993. In April 2011, two major storm systems deposited record levels of rainfall on the Mississippi...
- Effect of Hurricane Katrina on New Orleans
The effects of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans have been long-lasting. As the center of Katrina passed South-east of New Orleans on August 29, 2005, winds downtown were in the Category 3 range with frequent intense gusts and tidal surge. Hurricane force winds were experienced throughout the...
- Great Flood of 1993
The Great Mississippi and Missouri Rivers Flood of 1993 occurred in the American Midwest, along the Mississippi and Missouri rivers and their tributaries, from April to October 1993. The flood was among the most costly and devastating to ever occur in the United States, with $15 billion in damages...
- Mississippi River floods
The Mississippi River and its tributaries have flooded on numerous occasions. This is a list of major floods.-Flood of March 1543:Hernando DeSoto's party was passing through a village at the confluence of the Mississippi River and Arkansas River on March 18...
- Timeline of environmental events
The timeline lists geological, astronomical, and climatological events in relation to events in human history which they influenced. For the history of humanity's perspective on these events, see timeline of the history of environmentalism...
Further reading
Contains over 200 pictures of the flood as it affected the Tensas Basin in eastern Louisiana.
Website with selected photographs from the book.
External links
- Short silent film of the flood aftermath and relief efforts for the refugees. Produced by the US Army Signal Corps.