| On April 18,1906,a severe break occurred in the San Andreas Fault in California,causing a strong earthquake that hit the San Francisco Bay Area.In the following three days,the city suffered hundreds of aftershocks and a great fire that spread throughout the city and burned down the most prosperous and important parts of San Francisco.In the early days after the disaster,the impact seemed to be the same on everyone.It caused all the residents of the city,both rich and poor,to become refugees,who had to line up and wait in the long queue for food aid.After the catastrophe,a considerable number of residents chose to leave their devastated homes by train,by car,by horse carriage,by boat.However,at least 200,000 residents stayed and most of them lived in parks,open space or beaches.Saving San Francisco became a national event at the time.All levels of government,federal troops,American Red Cross and religious organizations immediately launched an all-around relief to all the refugees in San Francisco.San Francisco was a major town where Chinese people lived in the United States,and the disaster had seriously damaged Chinatown,leaving many Chinese Americans homeless.Therefore,these Chinese Americans had no choice but to either seek shelter in the homes of their friends or their relatives or to move to places where they had lived before.After an initial period of chaos,the San Francisco government authorities gradually restored the city order and drew up a series of different reconstruction plans to restore the residents' houses,businesses and furniture supplies.San Francisco quickly began to rebuild according to the previous urban layout after the disaster,and the Panama Pacific Exposition was held in San Francisco in 1915,which marked the complete revival of San Francisco from the ruins.This dissertation consists of three parts: the introduction,the main body which falls into six chapters,and the epilogue.The introduction part justifies the choice of the topic,reviews former studies home and abroad on this topic.On top of that,the introduction also illuminates the academic and realistic value,the research contents,the methodology,the innovative points,the definition of related concepts,and the main data sources of this dissertation.The first chapter describes in detail San Francisco's geographical location,climate and environment,the generation and development of the city,and the lack of early urban disaster prevention and mitigation measures.In particular,this chapter focuses on and analyzes the history of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and conflagration.This chapter deems that it was the convenient geographical location and favorable climatic environment of San Francisco that paved the way for the rapid prosperity and development of the city.However,because San Francisco is located at the boundary between the Pacific and the American plates,the collisions between the two plates would cause frequent seismic activities in San Francisco.In the history of urban development in San Francisco,there had been many disasters in San Francisco,but due to rapid urban development and weak awareness of disaster prevention,by the end of the 19 th century and the beginning of the 20 th century,San Francisco did not establish effective measures for disaster prevention and mitigation.However,in 1906,a earthquake and the subsequent fire that spread throughout the city brought huge disaster to the San Francisco people,earthquakes and fires almost destroyed the city.This chapter analyzes in detail the causes of the tremendous damage caused by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.The second chapter discusses in detail how the U.S.government at all levels,federal troops,the American Red Cross responded to the disaster,and the roles of religious organizations and people in the relief process.How the government,federal troops,and the Red Cross formed the organizations,carried out relief operations,donated emergency relief supplies,and their shortcomings are the main focuses of this chapter.Among the non-governmental relief organizations,this chapter summarizes the important roles played by religious organizations and ordinary people in donating emergency relief supplies,housing homeless refugees,and distributing food.The third chapter focuses on the diet,clothing,shelter and health condition of the refugees.This chapter details the distribution of desperately needed supplies of the refugees by the federal troops,the American Red Cross,and analyzes the living and health conditions of those refugees who lives in the unburned area or rescue camps.Considersing some vulnerable groups vulnerable groups such as the elderly,the infirm and the disabled are particularly affected by the earthquake and the fire,their post-disaster situation is more worthy of attention and research.Therefore,this chapter takes the Ingleside Model Camp as a case to analyze and explore the living conditions of the vulnerable groups after the 1906 calamity from the micro level.The fourth chapter analyzes the impact of the 1906 San Francisco disaster on the Chinese American community.This chapter mainly discusses a series of issues ranging from the severe devastation of the Chinatown,the plundering of properties belonging to the local Chinese Americans,the multiple relocations of the Chinese American camps,the rescue and living conditions of Chinese Americans,and the reconstruction of the Chinatown.The disaster of 1906 not only caused great physical and spiritual damage to the Chinese Americans,but also created a certain opportunity and positive influence to the Chinese Americans.In fact,after the disaster,the visage of the Chinatown and the geographical distribution of Chinese Americans have witnessed various changes,and many Chinese workers have taken the opportunity to obtain U.S.citizenship.In retrospect,the 1906 Calamity changed the historical destiny of some Chinese Americans and the Chinatown,and brought a long-term impact on individuals,families and the entire Chinese American community.The fifth chapter outlines the plan and implementation of urban reconstruction after the disaster.In the aftermath of the 1906 calamity,the San Francisco government set up a series of reconstruction plans for local residents based on their incomes,including housing,commerce,family appliances and so on.In the choice of urban reconstruction path,due to the lack of federal government and private investment,and the Burnham plan's detrimental effects to commercial interests of downtown owners,San Francisco basically witnessed no large-scale change in the urban layout after the disaster,and the city quickly was rebuilt according to the previous layout.The Panama Pacific Exposition was held in San Francisco in 1915,which conveyed the message of a complete recovery of the city to the world.The sixth chapter analyzes and summarizes the influence of San Francisco disaster and its enlightenment.Firstly,the made land had brought huge disasters to the people,and the houses built on it had suffered the most serious damage in the earthquake.Secondly,buildings using reinforced structural frames and concrete had a prominent anti-seismic effect in earthquakes,effectively protecting people's lives.Thirdly,the 1906 disaster brought tremendous damage to San Francisco's industry,causing a large number of urban population,businesses and financial industries to move out,which continued to accelerate the decline of San Francisco's industrial status in California.Finally,earthquake and fire have a lasting impact on the memory of the people.In fact,prior to the spreading of the big fire to people's homes,the only thing refugees could save was the stuff that they could carry.The survivals preserved by the people after the disaster not only symbolize the experience of the people in the 1906 disaster,but also prove the family history of the ordinary people,and they also become reminders of the 1906 disaster,so that the people will always remember this disaster.The epilogue summarizes the improvement of disaster prevention level in modern city of San Francisco.After the disaster,as San Francisco government officials and the public deeply realized the great damage caused by the earthquake,government gradually began to adopt stricter building codes and better construction methods,and the city expanded the water supply system to cope with possible disasters in the future.It was inspired and promoted by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake that the U.S.Congress authorized the establishment of the “National Earthquake Hazard Reduction Program” to guide the protection of communities to reduce the damage caused by severe earthquakes.In the more than 100 years since the 1906 San Francisco earthquake,earthquakes have occurred frequently in various countries around the world,and China has not been spared(such as the Tangshan Earthquake in 1976 and the Wenchuan Earthquake in 2008).Although the magnitude,impact,and response of the earthquake were not the same,but people have always attached great importance to how to predict earthquakes and reduce the damage caused by earthquakes.Needless to say,the San Francisco earthquake and fire provide a good reference for our future disaster prevention and mitigation work.This is also the value and significance of this study. |
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