Witnesses to the Perils of Paradise

Waveland, Miss. — The mayor was gone when local residents came calling for him Tuesday morning. But then, so was City Hall.

Not one brick of the 127-year-old three-story building remained in what had been the historic and commercial center of this seaside town of 7,000. It was obliterated, like much of a town that never expected its name to sound like a cruel joke. All that was left of City Hall after a 30-foot tsunami-like wall of water rolled up from the beach a little over a week ago is a tile mural and a plaque dedicated to those who helped the town recover from its last knockout punch -- Hurricane Camille.

“On Aug. 17, 1969, our city was devastated,” says the plaque.

Nonsense, said Brian Mollere, whose house used to be across the street from City Hall.

“Katrina was 10 times worse than Camille,” he said under the tarp he and a few others have been using for shelter since their houses became piles of sticks.

A few blocks from where Mollere contemplates his future over a meal of canned fish and cheese and crackers, a 10-foot-long alligator lay dead on the side of the road near a house that became a pile of kindling. A dead fawn lies in Nicky Gollot’s yard down on the beach, and the shrimper figures it must be from an island 10 miles out to sea.

The police and fire department buildings are wrecked, and 12 police officers are still drying their socks after clinging for hours to the top of a pine tree while awaiting rescue.

It’s not known what sins were committed in this sleepy seaside burg to incur the wrath of Mother Nature, who seems determined to wipe Waveland off the map. Virtually no building was left unscathed, an estimated 40 people were killed, and some residents were wondering whether the town is even worth rebuilding.

Talking to them is like talking to Californians after an earthquake, wildfire or mudslide. Yeah, they always knew the threat was there. But living on the edge was part of the allure and worth the gamble when you think of your home as the closest thing to paradise.

“It’s too early to know what’s going to happen,” said Mollere, who tried to stand up to Katrina and ended up swimming for his life with his Chihuahua, Rocky, grabbing roof lines and treetops to survive.

“We haven’t heard yet what [the Federal Emergency Management Agency] is going to do, or the insurance companies. But even if they rebuild this town, it’ll never be the same.”

On a stroll down Nicholson Street, where 100-year-old oaks were the only lumber to stand up to Katrina, I spotted two couples sifting through the rubble of their homes in search of photographs and other salvageable goods. But there wasn’t much. Katrina even blew the seats off of toilets.

“This was our floor,” Pat Ellis said. “Oh, wait. That’s not our floor; it’s from next door.”

Pat and John Ellis have lived here since 1987, next door to Darlene and Bobby Underwood. Each couple has two daughters, and the girls hung out together on the beach. The water is shallow, and Wavelanders love wading out there a few hundred yards, or taking spotlights out at night and fishing for flounder.

You’ve got nature to deal with no matter where you live, Darlene Underwood said, explaining the deal she cut to live in hurricane country.

“Earthquakes out West, ice storms in the East. Pick your poison.”

Her husband, Bobby, is worn out between dealing with his loss and running patrol for the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department.

“That’s your roof, Bobby,” Pat Ellis told him as he traversed the rubble.

“That’s mine?” he asked. The roof was two lots over from his lot.

“Oh, yeah. I’m on top of my house now.”

Bobby Underwood followed a foul odor and ended up wishing he hadn’t.

“That looks like Dixie,” he said of his lost beagle, one of three dogs unaccounted for.

Dixie came to rest under some bushes, and Bobby got a shovel to dig a grave under an oak tree.

When Darlene found out Dixie was gone, she broke down, and Bobby tried to comfort her as they stood on the roof of their house, three feet off the ground, destruction as far as the eye could see.

“I feel so guilty,” he said about not getting the dogs out before the hurricane hit.

“Well, I know you wouldn’t have done it if you had any idea,” Darlene said.

Will either the Underwoods or the Ellises rebuild?

Too soon to know, they said.

“But I sure do love this place,” said Darlene, who held a family photo Pat Ellis had found blown into her yard.

Mayor Tommy Longo, who lost the house four generations of Longos have lived in, turned out to be in his makeshift office and home on the second floor of the water treatment plant. If he gets his way, Longo said, Waveland will rise again. A day earlier, he had gone up to Poplarville to tell President Bush he needs help from FEMA, and he needs help getting insurance companies to settle claims quickly and fairly.

“I told him I need him to step up to the plate,” Longo said. “He told me he knew the difference between a photo-op and the real thing.”

We’ll see. If mayors like Longo have anything going for them, it’s that the president can’t afford to disappoint them yet again with a slow-footed response to epic disaster.

Back at the old City Hall, the one that no longer exists, Brian Mollere had raised a U.S. flag along with his father’s Marine Corps flag. He and Wild Bill LaPrine, a neighbor whose house was pulverized, were planning a cocktail party under the tarp.

“It was so quiet and peaceful here last night,” Mollere said with Rocky at his feet.

“You should have seen the stars in the sky,” said Wild Bill.

“We just talked all night,” Mollere said.

About what?

“About nice things. About the way it used to be.”

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Reach the columnist at [email protected] and read previous columns at latimes.com/lopez