This Is Chance!: The Shaking of an All-American City, a Voice That Held It Together

Books

The thrilling, cinematic story of a community shattered by disaster-and the extraordinary woman who helped pull it back together "A powerful, heart-wrenching book, as much art as it is journalism."-The Wall Street Journal "A beautifully wrought and profoundly joyful story of compassion and perseverance."-BuzzFeed (Best Books of the Year) In the spring of 1964, Anchorage, Alaska, was a modern-day frontier town yearning to be a metropolis-the largest, proudest city in a state that was still brand-new. But just before sundown on Good Friday, the community was jolted by the most powerful earthquake in American history, a catastrophic 9.2 on the Richter Scale. For four and a half minutes, the ground lurched and rolled. Streets cracked open and swallowed buildings whole. And once the shaking stopped, night fell and Anchorage went dark. The city was in disarray and sealed off from the outside world. Slowly, people switched on their transistor radios and heard a familiar woman's voice explaining what had just ...