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Hurricane Archive

Collecting and Preserving the Stories of Katrina and Rita

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The Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media (CHNM) at George Mason University and the University of New Orleans organized the Hurricane Digital Memory Bank (HDMB) in 2005 in partnership with many national and Gulf Coast area organizations and individuals. HDMB was awarded the Award of Merit for Leadership in History, and is the largest free public archive of Katrina and Rita with over 25,000 items in the collection. Read More.

Items (8462 total)

My experience of Hurricane Katrina is a time a don't like to recount. However, I learned through Katrina that material things are not and should not be defining points in our lives. Rather the way we live our lives and…

Growing up, I was quite a Daddy\'s Girl. I idolized my dad and everything that he did. He renovated some of the oldest homes of New Orleans, and to me, that made him a hero. Some of my fondest memories as a child…

During the beginning of the Katrina evacuation, my family traveled north, frantically searching for hotels with vacancies. We were able to find a decent inn near Minden, Louisiana. My nuclear and extended family all…

Our Time in Houston Like many residents of New Orleans, my family and I spent Hurricane Katrina in Houston, Texas. After enduring a seemingly endless trek to Texas and helplessly viewing the destruction of our wonderful…

My 75 year old mother resided in a Cape Cod style house in Lakeview in August 2005. She had lived in that house for more than forty years. Saturday morning, August 27, 2005, was calm and dry. However, after…

My Katrina experience was probably like everyone else\'s. Though I may not have lost anything other than my grandmother\'s old house, I did learn that it is easier to love my family from a distance and that…

I was in 7th grade at the time of Hurricane Katrina, at St. Christopher Elementary School in Metairie. I do live in Metairie, but I remember when the hurricane was finally targeted at New Orleans, my school teachers and…

Hurricane Katrina was a devasting storm that affected the lives of many directly and indirectly. I am a person who was affected indirectly by the storm. My hometown which is an hour and a half away from the City of New…

My father built this house at 7510 Sheffield St. in New Orleans East right before I was born in 1982. Though my own rental home in Lakeview got 9 1/2 feet of water and I lost all my belongings, somehow this hit "home"…

Whitney's Big Hurricane Katrina Adventure
When Hurricane Katrina was stirring in the gulf, Whitney was a carefree 18 year old with her own apartment which she shared with her boyfriend Justin and her beloved older…