Keys resident commemorates 1935 hurricane in song

Tuesday (Sept. 2) marked the 75th anniversary of the Labor Day Hurricane of 1935. As I reflect back on how I came to write a song about this event, I can’t help feeling a bit like a time traveler who with my songs creation became immortally linked to a storm that occurred 29 years before my birth.

Out of the 100’s of hurricanes that occurred from 1900-1999 only 3 made landfall as a Category 5. Hurricane Camille 1969, Hurricane Andrew 1992 and The Labor Day Storm of 1935. The intensity of these storms is unimaginable to anyone who has never lived through one. Even I could not begin to tell you what a horrifying experience they would be. One can only look back and try to understand how a boat ended up on top of a house, or a car ended up in a tree, or planks of wood impaled a tree and how the trees themselves were snapped off like a lawn mower had just cleared a path, and yet still hurricanes are a force way beyond this limited description.

My 1935 Labor Day song is not only the longest song I have ever recorded at 8:43 but was also a month in the making. Most songs I complete in a day or maybe 2 or at most a week. This song was a story that I felt had to be shared and because of its personal meaning to me I wrestled with how I should tell the story for a good while. After about a month I came back to my original inspiration which was the first story about the hurricane I had read. It was of Bernard Russell. Bernard, a lifelong resident of the keys had lived through the storm at the age of 17, only to find out the next morning that 50 out of 61 of his immediate family were lost to the storm.  With extraordinary character and perseverance, Bernard dedicated himself to rebuilding his home and the upper keys. He was instrumental in establishing emergency services to the keys. An event that would ruin most men, was risen above by a true life unassuming hero. His legacy was accentuated by the fire station in Islamorada Florida that bears his name. 

In memory of this event, I created a video that includes images of this storm. Due to a limited number of photos from that era, I also included images from other hurricanes.
I hope you give yourself ten minutes to hear the story and take in one of my best creative lyrical works. Here is the link to the “The Storm of the Century” video:




Chris Foster
Musician, Lyricist and Keys Resident