This week we’re revisiting Boston’s great Molasses Flood, the subject of one of our earliest podcasts. We’re giving you an update, now that our technology, research, and storytelling skills have improved. Stay tuned for tales of rum, anarchists, and the speed of molasses in January. It’s not slow!
Great Molasses Flood
- Look for the molasses tank in the upper left corner of this 1895 map of the North End, near the label “Bay State Distilling Company.”
- A brief history of molasses in Massachusetts.
- Molasses and the origins of “Beantown.”
- Edwards Park’s 1983 recollection of a boyhood in Boston, where it always smelled like molasses.
- Photos of the wreckage after the disaster.
- The initial coverage of the disaster by the New York Times.
- Records of the injured firefighters of Engine 31.
- Ferris Jahr explains the fluid dynamics of the molasses flood in Scientific American in 2013.
- Discussion of the responsibility engineers bear for making sure construction follows safe engineering practices from Scientific American in 1919.
- The Daily Kos uses the molasses flood to illustrate the history of government regulation.
Featured Historic Site
This week, we’re featuring the Clough House in Boston’s North End. The brick house was built circa 1715 by master bricklayer Ebenezer Clough as a home for himself and his wife, Thankful, and their growing family. Today, the home is one of the oldest buildings in Boston, and it was the site of an incredibly productive archaeological dig in 2013 that yielded tens of thousands of artifacts.
- Andrew Webster’s master’s thesis on the archaeology done at the Clough House in 2013.
- The official report on the 2013 dig.
For almost 100 years the home was lived in by the first two generations of the Clough family, and then Joseph and Sarah Pierce. The home was inherited by their daughters and their sons-in-law, including Moses Grant, a participant in the Boston Tea Party. Eventually the two daughters moved out and a third story was added to convert the building into apartments in 1806. In 1959, the property was purchased by the Old North Foundation.
Today you can visit the Clough House by stopping in at Captain Jackson’s Chocolate Shop, which will be joined this summer by a new venue for historic interpretation called “Patriots’ Corner.”
The Clough House is located adjacent to the Prado and behind Old North Church, just steps from the Freedom Trail. In March the shop is open on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays from 10 am to 4 pm. In April, you can visit Thursday through Monday from 10 am to 4 pm with extended hours during school vacation week: April 15-22. Beginning May first the shop will be open daily 9am to 6pm until November 15.
Upcoming Event
For our featured historic event, head to King’s Chapel on Thursday, April 5th at 6:30pm for “The Name and Virtues of Warren Shall Remain Immortal,” a free lecture from Joseph Warren biographer Samuel A. Forman, commemorating the anniversary of Warren’s funeral held at King’s Chapel, on April 8, 1776.
One of Boston’s best remembered speeches of the Revolutionary Era was the eulogy for Dr. Joseph Warren, delivered in early April 1776 at King’s Chapel by congregant Perez Morton.
Join Warren’s biographer to revisit this compelling personality. An American doctor, influential Son of Liberty, patriot, and President of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, Joseph Warren played a central role in the events leading to the American Revolution. He managed the Siege of Boston during its formative early months and fought dramatically at the Battle of Bunker Hill.
Learn about the circumstances surrounding the retrieval of Warren’s remains from Charlestown, and how Perez Morton’s words helped define Warren’s legacy as a national hero and fighting martyr of the American Revolution.
Samuel Forman is an historian, Harvard University faculty member, and businessman. He has published and lectured on historical topics that inform current issues. Forman is the author of ‘Dr. Joseph Warren – The Boston Tea Party, Bunker Hill, and the Birth of American Liberty’, the young adult romance ‘Twenty-One Heroes’, and an upcoming epic pioneer journey across geographic and racial frontiers of the Early Republic.
This event is free and open to the public. A suggested $5 donation appreciated to support King’s Chapel’s preservation efforts and the History Program.