The ’38 Hurricane was a near tragedy for my family. At that time I was in the third grade at the Washington Street School in downtown Fairhaven, and we lived at 14 Green Street, not far from Fort Phoenix.
The school was built as a wooden church in the 1800’s until Rogers built the Unitarian Memorial Church around 1903 or so. It then became a school, and in the mid-1940’s it was the Boys’ Club and is now home to the Northeast Maritime Institute.
My classroom was on the second floor, west side. In the early afternoon on the day of the storm, the sky darkened, the wind picked up out of the Southwest, and torrents of rain came down, – sideways it seemed. The wind was blowing rain in around the windows, so my teacher, Miss Smith, moved us all to the east side of the room, away from the windows. Then the Principal came in and ordered us all to the rear exit on the northeast side in the lee of the wind.
