ABSTRACT
Hurricane Ike struck the Galveston and Houston areas of Texas in late summer 2008 and left behind years of reconstruction of both property and lives of residents. It is an unfortunately familiar refrain for Americans who have heard similar stories about storms with historic names such as Katrina, Andrew, and Camille. In addition to countless news and feature stories covering what was going to happen, what happened, and what the impact of the event were, news organizations all over the United States have also told readers about what happened after the storm, its aftermath. While residents and others worked tirelessly to clean up and try to restore their lives in the weeks after the story, some reporters and writers managed to find a positive story in the aftermath of the natural disaster. Houston Chronicle staff writer Liz Austin Peterson (2008) learned about a group of Houston area immigrants who had been seeking finalization of their long efforts to obtain U.S. citizenship at the time of the storm. The final step, the citizenship ceremony where a judge swears them to an oath and they become official, had been postponed because of Hurricane Ike. It is a good human-interest story and a strong aftermath story that stands out in a long period of generally bad news for Texans immediately after the hurricane struck. This is how Peterson began her story and gave it focus on individuals who not only became citizens, but also became eligible to vote in the 2008 presidential election:
Standing under a piercing blue sky, Gladys Palma raised her right hand Saturday and realized a dream she has nurtured for 35 years after escaping war-torn El Salvador: She became a U.S. citizen.
