Abstract
Oral history interview with Maureen Lewis conducted by Hillery Pinchon on March 17, 2006 for the Hurricane Katrina Survivors in Las Vegas Oral History Project. In this interview, Lewis first describes her upbringing as one of eleven children, raised in the home her father built in New Orleans, Louisiana's Lower 9th Ward, the area of the city hardest hit by Hurricane Katrina. She then begins to describe the events in the days leading up to the landfall of of the hurricane, as she stayed behind in New Orleans with her eldest son and a cousin as most of the family evacuated to Alabama. She relates how she and the cousin were able to leave the city after the initial impact of the storm, but her son was one of the hundreds trapped on an interstate bridge for several days without food or water. She continues talking about the response of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), about people who were forced to commute between Alabama and New Orleans to keep their jobs, sky-rocketing rents, the inadequate state and local response to the emergency, and the strong response of the American Red Cross. She then describes her move to Las Vegas, Nevada with her son, his financee, and their child, and ends with some comments on questions how much racial prejudice played into the tragedy in New Orleans.
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Scope and Contents Note
Oral history interview with Maureen Lewis conducted by Hillery Pinchon on March 17, 2006 for the Hurricane Katrina Survivors in Las Vegas Oral History Project. In this interview, Lewis first describes her upbringing as one of eleven children, raised in the home her father built in New Orleans, Louisiana's Lower 9th Ward, the area of the city hardest hit by Hurricane Katrina. She then begins to describe the events in the days leading up to the landfall of of the hurricane, as she stayed behind in New Orleans with her eldest son and a cousin as most of the family evacuated to Alabama. She relates how she and the cousin were able to leave the city after the initial impact of the storm, but her son was one of the hundreds trapped on an interstate bridge for several days without food or water. She continues talking about the response of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), about people who were forced to commute between Alabama and New Orleans to keep their jobs, sky-rocketing rents, the inadequate state and local response to the emergency, and the strong response of the American Red Cross. She then describes her move to Las Vegas, Nevada with her son, his financee, and their child, and ends with some comments on questions how much racial prejudice played into the tragedy in New Orleans. Digital audio available; digital transcript available.
Access Note
Collection is open for research. Where use copies do not exist, production of use copies is required before access will be granted; this may delay research requests. Advanced notice is required.
Publication Rights
Materials in this collection may be protected by copyrights and other rights. See Reproductions and Use on the UNLV Special Collections and Archives website for more information about reproductions and permissions to publish. Some transcripts do not exist in final form, therefore any editing marks in a transcript (deletions, additions, corrections) are to be quoted as marked. No release form is on file for this interview. The interview is accessible onsite only, and researchers must seek permission from the interviewee or heirs for quotation, reproduction, or publication. Please contact special.collections@unlv.edu for further information.
Preferred Citation
Maureen Lewis oral history interview, 2006 March 17. OH-01114. [Cite format consulted: Audio recording or Transcript.] Oral History Research Center, Special Collections and Archives, University Libraries, University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Las Vegas, Nevada.
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Acquisition Note
This interview was conducted by the Oral History Research Center (OHRC) which is part of the UNLV University Libraries Special Collections and Archives Division.
Processing Note
Interview materials were processed by UNLV Libraries Special Collections and Archives in 2019. Melise Leech wrote the collection description. The audio cassette(s) for this interview have been reformatted by an external vendor into a digital format. MP3 files of the audio are available for research use. The audio has been minimally reviewed and all readily available information has been included in the description.