MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2019 The Boston Globe Metro B
By Lucas Phillips
GLOBE CORRESPONDENT
As Hurricane Dorian bore
down on the Bahamas, a pocket
of New Bedford transplants on
Florida’s eastern shore won-
dered what was ahead for
them.
The last time Jack Maravell
was in Massachusetts as a ma-
jor hurricane bore down on
Florida, he returned to find his
condo roof had caved in, leav-
ing him homeless for a year.
When the eye of Dorian
made landfall in the northern
Bahamas Sunday afternoon,
maximum sustained winds
were clocked at 185 miles per
hour, which tied for the stron-
gest Atlantic hurricane landfall
on record, according to the Na-
tional Weather Service. The
slow-moving storm could take a
hook into Florida at some point
midweek, forecasters said.
“I think if you live on the
coast you get hurricanes, but
down there they’re really more
scary,” said Maravell, 64, a Paul
McCartney impersonator who
lives in Fort Pierce, a small Flor-
ida city that he said is just like
New Bedford.
In Florida, he said, “it’s a di-
rect hit: You’re just hanging
over [the water] and it’s like
bam,” he said in a phone inter-
view.
Lila Bryant, 62, is also one of
a small pocket of people who
grew up in New Bedford andnowliveonFlorida’sAtlantic
coast. She spoke to the Globe on
the phone while watching the
growing waves.
“It’s not even getting started
and we can tell already we’re
going to lose the boardwalk and
all the stairs,” Bryant said from
Vero Beach, not far from Fort
Pierce.
She and her husband had
been preparing for the hurri-
cane for days, she said, along
with her two daughters and a
childhood friend from New
Bedford who all once again live
on the same street.
“The minute you see the
Weather Channel and [meteo-
rologist] Jim Cantore in the
next town... you know it’s go-ing to be serious,” Bryant said.
But after almost 30 years in
Florida, Bryant said, she and
her husband know the drill.
Their Mercedes-Benz is
parked in front of the garage
door to help prevent wind from
getting in and ripping the roof
off. She was scanning a local
Facebook group for updates on
what stores had received gener-
ator shipments and where peo-
ple could still buy gas. Grocery
store shelves keep on emptying.
It cost $300 to put up hurricane
shutters that have to come back
down within two weeks at her
gated community, because they
are a fire hazard.
And the New Bedford trans-
plants, including her grandsonand his Florida Atlantic Univer-
sity roommates, are on tenter-
hooks as the forecast keeps
shifting. She “took the lock off
the cabinet” of hurricane food
when the original evacuation
and shelter orders were lifted.
Then, the orders were back on.
“It takes only a few storms
before you start making your
own ice at just the word hurri-
cane,” she said, explaining that
she uses the ice to preserve food
when the power goes out.
But even if the storm mostly
spares the Florida coast, Bryant
and Maravell will worry about
the Bahamas, where both have
spent time.
Bryant has three cruises
planned there this year. AndMaravell’s Beatles tribute band,
McCartney Mania, regularly
performs on cruises to the is-
lands.
“There’s one island that we
always stop at,” Maravell said.
“I’m afraid it’s going to get flat-
tened.”
He was glad to be back in
New Bedford as the storm
threatened Florida and his
newfound home of 18 years.
But his thoughts were still
with his fellow transplants in
Florida.
For some, their “anxiety lev-
el is going through the roof,” he
said. “Pardon the pun.”Lucas Phillips can be reached at
[email protected].Florida transplants from New Bedford await hurricane
By Amanda Kaufman
GLOBE CORRESPONDENT
New Englander Parker
Plumley knows what it’s like to
live through a Florida hurri-
cane.
The Farmington, Conn., na-
tive was a student at Jackson-
ville University during hurri-
canes Matthew in 2016 and
Irma in 2017, when students
were crammed into the single
dorm that can withstand severe
storm conditions. The power
went out, no water was avail-
able, and businesses were shut-
tered for days afterward.
Now a senior, and with Cate-
gory 5 Hurricane Dorian threat-
ening Florida and Southeast
this week, the 21-year-old
wasn’t willing to do it again, he
said.
“I’ve learned that it’s just saf-
er to kind of get out and not risk
it,” he said in a phone interview
a couple of hours after his plane
from Jacksonville, Fla., landed
at Logan International Airport.
“I’m trying to treat it as a little
holiday.”
Plumley was among several
travelers who arrived in Boston
Sunday afternoon on flights
from Florida who were seeking
to avoid the storm.
Jennifer Mehigan, a Massa-
chusetts Port Authority spokes-
woman, said she did not know
how many flights at Logan had
been canceled or delayed Sun-
day due to the hurricane, but
she warned that flights to
southern parts of the country
this week would probably be af-
fected; the storm’s track ap-
pears to move west toward the
Florida coast, forecasters said.
At Logan, airlines began of-
fering passengers incentives to
rearrange their travel plans for
before or after the hurricane
nears Florida, Mehigan said, a
deal that Meghan Collette and
her family, who live in Ashland,
took advantage of when they
opted to return a day early from
Orlando to Boston instead of toHartford, as initially planned.
Collette and her two chil-
dren,Lorelai,9,andSam,5,
were celebrating Lorelai’s birth-
day at several theme parks in
the Central Florida city, meet-
ing the cartoon characters that
fill the Walt Disney World Re-
sort and enjoying the rides at
Epcot and Animal Kingdom.
But hearing theme park
workers speak about the scram-
ble to fill their cars with gas and
stock up on water ahead of theimpending storm had Lorelai,
who will begin fourth grade at
David Mindess Elementary
School in Ashland on Tuesday,
feeling stressed.
“I thought I was going to die
in the hurricane,” she said as
she wheeled her emoji-covered
suitcase out of Logan. “And I’ve
never been late or missed the
first day of school.”
Mary Lee Shepard, 71, her
husband, Bob, and her Shih
Tzu, Wolfgang, moved fromSouthbridge to a retirement
community in Florida called
the Villages just one week ago.
The town, located about 60
miles north of Orlando, saw
some storms with booming
thunder as early as Saturday,
she said. As she prepared for
the hurricane, she vowed to re-
main upbeat.
“I am very excited to be
here,” she said in a phone inter-
view from her Florida home.
“But it’s not as exciting plan-ning for a hurricane as it is for a
nor’easter, because a nor’easter
you get excited when the snow
falls, and it doesn’t do any-
where near the destruction the
hurricane does.
“I have a little more respect
for the hurricane.”Amanda Kaufman
can be reached at
[email protected].
Follow her on Twitter
@amandakauf1.Forsome,homeisthe
placetobeforDorian
Lorelai Collette wanted to return from Orlando early
because she was “afraid of dying in the hurricane.” With
her are mother Meghan Collette and brother Sam.PHOTOS BY PAT GREENHOUSE/GLOBE STAFF
School had started for Jacksonville University senior
Parker Plumley (center) but he’s returning home with
parents Lori and Sam Plumley during the hurricane.coworkers who had found
worn-looking but still valuable
treasures in the past.
“Last year, one of my
colleagues got a flat-screen TV,”
Cohen said as he stood on Pratt
Street, which was choked with
cars and trucks all packed with
students and their parents
trying to find parking.
It is a tradition older than
the students themselves: Every
Sept. 1, when leases are up,
students who have graduated
or are simply moving discard
the old in the hopes it will
become someone’s new. It is a
ritual that extends throughout
the city, but those who have
studied the phenomenon
believe it can be traced back to
the 1960s in the working-class
neighborhoods of Allston and
Brighton, when Boston
University and Boston College
were expanding and students
began flocking there to find
affordable housing.
It is unclear when the
phrase Allston Christmas was
coined, but it has been around
since at least 2008, when it
appeared in the urban
dictionary.
And few are above trying to
capitalize on the weekend,
from a boy who was selling $
cups of lemonade on Osborne
Street — “I hope to make $
by the end of the weekend,” he
said — to the beer maker
Harpoon Brewery, which
released a limited-edition brew
called Allston XMAS.
“Pairs well with unpacking,”
Harpoon’s innovation brewer,
Tom Graham, recently quipped
to Boston.com.
On Sunday, outgoing
tenants left paintings, couches,
grills, and an Apple television.
Jack Claxton, a 21-year-old
Boston University senior,
dragged a large round, black
grill that still had charred coals
inside.
He had found it on Pratt
Street but made sure he got the
blessing of the people inside
before he went off with it.
“Last year we were moving
out and we got two TVs stolen,”
Claxton said as he made the
half-mile trek from Pratt Street
to his new place in Brookline.
Then there was the trash no
one wanted.
uALLSTON
Continued from Page B
On Ashford Street, bags
were strewn in the driveway.
One looked like some creature
had torn into it, with empty
cartons spilled out onto the
pavement. Red plastic cups,the ubiquitous drinking
container of college students
everywhere, had rolled near
the sidewalk. City inspectors
were not pleased and left a
$250 ticket for thehomeowner.
In the past, landlords
regularly failed to follow city
codes, once to deadly
consequences. In 2013, a
Boston University student waskilled in a fire after she was
unable to escape from her attic
room. The tragedy led to a
Globe investigation that
uncovered numerous
violations by landlords whotook advantage of cash-
strapped students, allowing for
overcrowding and failures to
adhere to safety codes.
On Sunday, Dion Irish,
commissioner of the city’s
inspectional services, sent
inspectors to one house on
Ashford Street at the request of
parents, who wanted to make
sure the landlord had updated
the smoke and carbon
monoxide alarms and secured
porch railings. The house
looked good, said Irish, noting
with approval the dumpster
the landlord rented for the
outgoing tenants to use.
“They’re meeting our
expectations,” he said of
landlords.On the sidewalks, few items
went unclaimed. A tall, rusty
and unwieldy metal shelf rack
left on Ashford Street was
quickly scooped up by Olivia
Fordyce, a 20-year-old Boston
University junior.
“I’m a student with not a lot
of money,” Fordyce said as she
huffed along Ashford Street
with her friend, Sharon Yeh, a
21-year-old junior.
“Isitrickety?Isithuge?Isit
annoying to carry? Yes. But I
got it for free and it’s going to
come in handy.”
Fordyce said last year
Allston Christmas helped her
keep her furniture expenses at
$30. She hoped to come in
under that this year.
“I found a mattress for free,”
Fordyce said.
Yeh was horrified.
“Aaagggh!” she groaned.
“I’ll disinfect it,” Fordyce
shrugged. “I’ll put new sheets
on it. As long as it doesn’t have
bedbugs.”
Yeh shook her head.
“There are some things that
are used that shouldn’t be
reused,” Yeh said.Maria Cramer can be reached
at [email protected].
Follow her on Twitter
@globemcramer.AllstonChristmas:Amessysidewalkbazaar,butwithsomerules
PHOTOS BY NIC ANTAYA FOR THE BOSTON GLOBEBoston University junior Tyler Hess
(top) and senior Reece Eddy moved
furniture to their new home on
Pratt Street in Allston on Sunday as
Karina Luetjen (above) watched all
the activity along Ashford Street
and Jack Claxton (right) scored a
barbecue grill.‘I’mastudentwith
notalotofmoney.’
OLIVIA FORDYCE,aBU
student, assessing her strategies