Tagged: Under the Sun

Journalist and  professor Madeleine Blais contemplates a move back to South Florida for a job teaching as a visiting professor at Florida International University.   As part of her employment paperwork, she’s asked to sign an oath of loyalty to the state of Florida.  As a journalist, this kind of thing makes her suspicious.  She reflects on her previous years in Miami as she contemplates signing the oath and moving back:

Green Card Stories (Umbrage Books) is a collection of profiles and photographs of fifty immigrants from around the country by journalist Saundra Amrhein and photographer Ariana Lindquist.  Amrhein has been a journalist for seventeen years.  She spent ten years at the St. Petersburg Times (now the Tampa Bay Times.)  Immigrants profiled include a triathelete, a magician, a flea market worker, small business owners and executives.

We received several hundred responses when we called out to our audience for stories about Hurricane Andrew.  As we learned while doing the “Remembering Andrew” project, people who experienced Hurricane Andrew still have vivid memories they are eager to share.

Today is the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Andrew in South Florida. The culmination of our “Remembering Andrew” project is our one hour documentary special, hosted by Kenny Malone and Alicia Zuckerman, with production help from Sammy Mack, Trina Sargalski and the entire WLRN-Miami Herald News team.

After Hurricane Andrew, ice became a precious commodity and a flashpoint of conflict.

Power was out, food was spoiling/rotting, and federal aid hadn’t arrived yet.

Deborah Gray Mitchell spent those first sticky days cleaning up debris outside her home in Belle Meade.

My friend brought us this gallon jug of ice, and in that gallon jug where it had melted a little bit was a little bit of water that that we could use to whet our whistle. It was just the most refreshing, happiest moment of my life to have a nice, cold drink of water.

Throughout the course of reporting the Remembering Andrew series we’ve been asking a few of the same questions about Hurricane Andrew to virtually everybody we interview. Things like:

When did you know it was time to take Andrew seriously?

When did you know Andrew had truly arrived?

But there’s one question in particular, that seems to trip people up:

What did you see the moment you stepped out of your door after Andrew?