Once again, earthquakes have rolled around into the local Southern California headlines with a minor rash of temblors in the Los Angeles area a week or so ago. And once again, the shaking was scarcely felt on Catalina.
Once again, earthquakes have rolled around into the local Southern California headlines with a minor rash of temblors in the Los Angeles area a week or so ago. And once again, the shaking was scarcely felt on Catalina.
Credit plate tectonics or distance from the epicenter or just plain luck, but it always seems that when the L.A. area is hit with even a large quake we seem to be spared out here. I’m no geologist but I suspect that all that weight and fluidity of the San Pedro Channel might also have some kind of dampening effect on those S-waves and P-waves, making Catalina a right proper place to be during an earthquake.
Such was the case back in 1933 when the Long Beach area was struck by (what else) the Long Beach Earthquake of 1933, which registered 6.4 on Dr. Charles Richter’s eponymous scale. Despite more than 100 deaths and significant destruction to the Long Beach area, Catalina was barely touched.
However, where Catalina does enter into the equation was in an outrageous rumor that spread about the Island during the event.
As Mark Twain said, a lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes and that bit of wisdom was evident on March 10, 1933, when news spread that Catalina Island had been destroyed by a tidal wave during the earthquake.
“Quake Shocks Felt But No Damage Done At Catalina Island,” reads the headline on the March 15, 1933, issue of this very newspaper, essentially contradicting that rumor.
The front page article goes on to describe the bedlam in Long Beach and Compton, but also describes the minimal effect on Avalon.
“The first shock, which occurred Friday (March 10, 1933) at 5:51 p.m., caused many of the Avalonites to leave their homes and places of business.
“Although some of the shocks were felt at Catalina Island,” continues the article, “the vibrations were not severe enough to injure the local buildings or the public utility power-lines.”
Under the direction of the Island Company’s General Manager D.M. Renton, surveys were quickly made of the Island’s water supply lines and reservoirs. Everything was found to be in excellent working condition.
The mainland, of course, didn’t fare quite so well and Islanders soon discovered that most, if not all, of the Los Angeles-based radio stations had been knocked out. That fact, coupled with a complete failure of power and telephone communications in much of the L.A. and Long Beach areas, meant that rescuers were left largely in the dark. A small army of ham radio operators and intrepid motorcyclists, bicyclists and anyone who could navigate the rubble-strewn streets assumed the task of relaying vital information to police and fire units.
It was this bottleneck of information that gave rise to the Catalina tidal wave rumor. The rumor, it seems, was that Catalina had been struck by a “30-foot tidal wave” and that the Island had sunk “369 feet” in the process, essentially destroying the place. (How they arrived at the exact figure of 369 feet I have no idea).
One of the main recipients of these rumors and messages was Los Angeles County Sheriff Eugene Biscailuz who was essentially the man in charge during this crisis. Because of the lack of communications and the impassable streets, Biscailuz turned to his pilot friend C.N. “Jimmy” James and asked him to soar high above the maelstrom and report what he found. James was a pilot for Western Air Express, which at one time had several daily flights to Catalina Island.
Once James was in the air, his first priority was to survey the Long Beach area.
“I got down to within 100 feet of the ground,” he would say later, “and could see them collecting bodies in open places, such as service station yards. There were only two small fires visible. One was a small building on the high school grounds and the other was a small fire of no consequence.”
Once he had some time to free himself from his mainland reconnaissance, however, James was able to fly far enough out towards Catalina to see that the Island was, in fact, still there. This information was related to Sheriff Biscailuz and the Catalina-destroyed-by-tidal-wave rumor was put to rest.
Although Catalina had dodged a bullet, the Long Beach and Compton areas suffered significant damage.
All told there was more than $50 million worth of damage and 120 deaths attributed to the quake. Many of these deaths—including those of many school children—occurred as people fled buildings and were hit by falling debris.
In fact, it was the tragedy surrounding this quake that resulted in the Field Act, which mandated that all school buildings in the state be earthquake-resistant.
Editor’s note: Jim Watson is the author of “Mysterious Island: Catalina,” available on Amazon, Kindle and in stores in Avalon.
