Situation in Puerto Rico After Hurricane San Ciriaco
On August 8, 1899, Hurricane San Ciriaco, with winds of over 100 miles per hour, struck Puerto Rico and, on August 22, another hurricane followed. The floods caused by 28 days of continuous rain damaged the agricultural industry and left 3,400 dead and thousands of people without shelter, food or work. As a result, there was a shortage of sugar from the Caribbean in the world market and a huge demand for the product from Hawaii and other sugar producing countries. To meet the demand, plantation owners from Hawaii began a campaign to recruit the jobless laborers in Puerto Rico.
Read more about this topic: Manuel Olivieri Sanchez
Famous quotes containing the words situation, hurricane and/or san:
“... the man in the violent situation reveals those qualities least dispensable in his personality, those qualities which are all he will have to take into eternity with him.”
—Flannery O’Connor (1925–1964)
“Thought and beauty, like a hurricane or waves, should not know conventional, delimited forms.”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)
“The gold-digger in the ravines of the mountains is as much a gambler as his fellow in the saloons of San Francisco. What difference does it make whether you shake dirt or shake dice? If you win, society is the loser.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)