Scenic Drive in Pass Christian was a row of mansions built by wealthy New Orleans families who came across the Sound to summer here through the nineteenth century. Greek Revival and Acadian, deep galleries, mid-1800s — one of the most significant historic streets in the South, lived in continuously for a century and a half.
Hurricane Camille destroyed scores of these houses in 1969. The ones that were rebuilt or had survived were largely finished by Katrina in 2005, which destroyed or condemned an estimated eighty percent of Pass Christian's beachfront homes — including Union Quarters, an 1855 Greek Revival house on the National Register, gone completely. East Scenic Drive sits about twenty-five feet up and kept more of its houses; the rest of the street is lots, slabs, and a few survivors between them. The live oaks are still there. They were here before the houses and they outlasted them.
What stood here
3 surviving images.
Hurricane Katrina aftermath in Pass Christian, Mississippi. Before their destruction, these houses were part of the Scenic Drive Historic District, a, 2005
Looking Back on Camille--Parnell McKay, civil defense director of Pass Christian, views the main business district of the demolished town Saturday mor, 1969
The aftermath of Hurricane Camille. Location not identified on web source; likely Mississippi Gulf Coast from other photos in series. According to, 1969