RePost: A New Name in the Family

Looking at a friend's house pictures, his place in Galveston had a 1900/2000 Two Storm Survivor medallion. It reminded me of one "root" in my family that goes back to Galveston, making this "repost" fresh to me, and maybe to you.

It wasn’t such a long journey to Galveston from Polk County, Texas. He just caught the train near the house in Moscow, rode through Houston, and down to Galveston. Bryan didn’t want to go in September, with Pearl expecting by mid-month, but there was a surgery demonstration that the young doctor (four years after his degree from that school) needed to see.

The ride was uneventful, weather good, and he arrived on Friday to be ready for the Monday sessions. By late in the day Friday, there were signs of a storm, and by Saturday afternoon, September 8, 1900, the Great Storm of 1900 was close. By dark, it was clear the storm-eye was to pass just west of the town. Winds of 135 mph swept a storm surge twice the elevation of the city, and by Sunday morning, the sun rose on a destroyed city. Thousands died, but the young doctor survived in one of the strongest buildings, the medical school. He worked at the hospital for a special few terrible days, caring for a long procession of survivors. It was America’s worst natural disaster.

Back in Moscow, Pearl had a baby early, on September 7. The recovery in Galveston kept Bryan in town longer than he wanted, and when the Katy Railroad finally took him north, The Great Storm would never be mentioned, ever again. It was too painful to discuss.

Except for one thing: the baby needed a name. Clayton. There had never been one in the family, but Nicholas J. Clayton, Galveston’s famous architect, who had designed the building in which the young doctor survived the Great Storm, was the name chosen for a boy born the night before the storm. Pearl made it clear: names mean things, and she was determined to honor the man whose work kept her husband alive! So, Pearl and Bryan named him Clayton Lawrence Canon, a new name in the family.

Honor, love, purpose, life mission, these are things informed by gratitude, and offered up to God by a Christian man and woman, so aware of the Old Testament stories of the naming of children, expressing their thanks to God by honoring and blessing an architect named Clayton.