50 years after the flood which hit Florence and its citizens on 4 November 1966, Indire publishes an online exhibition based on its archive materials: children’s drawings, photos and documents testifying to the damages caused also to Palazzo Gerini, the historical headquarters of the Institute, by the overflowing of Arno river.

That same year, Palazzo Gerini hosted the Centre for Teaching Studies and Documentation, point of reference for researchers and teachers and repository of the important historical book heritage of the National Teaching Museum. The photos taken in the aftermaths of the flood show the damages caused by the violent wave of water, mud and naphtha, which knocked down the main entrance door, flooded (more than three meters) and destroyed the first floor of the institute.

The photos gathered in the gallery show devastation but also the participation and the efforts of many volunteers who got down to work from the day after the flood, in order to recuperate what was left after the flood. Moreover, some letters testify to the closeness and solidarity of cultural institutions in order to recuperate the library.

Indire and the 1966 Florence flood. The photos and the children’s drawings of the institue’s historical archive

Enter the virtual exhibition “Indire and the 1966 Florence flood”

Among the documents rediscovered, there is also a series of drawings of elementary and secondary school students, providing an original point of view of the drama lived by the city. The magazine “Forma ed espressione” devoted to arts education in compulsory school, in 1967, dedicated its March issue to the memory of the previous year’s flood. Schools were invited to contribute to this special issue of the magazine, in collaboration with the Centre for Teaching Studies and Documentation of Florence and many students sent what was defined by the Mayor of that time, Piero Bargellini, “ the most original and unexpected documentation of the flood”.

The drawings were compiled in an exhibition “ The youngsters and the flood” set up in the Centre for Teaching Studies and Documentation, reopened on 22 April 1967, after intense restoration works. The images provide a fresh and sincere vision of what the children of that time had experienced, with the sensitivity, imagination and intuition capacity which characterise that age. These extraordinary documents testify to the past and present role of the school as an instrument for raising awareness of important event.