Tag: Immigration

Vilna Shul: Last Synagogue Standing (episode 257)

The West End and the North Slope of Beacon Hill have gone through extreme transformations over time. At the turn of the 20th century, these neighboring communities welcomed Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe, though very few signs of those vibrant communities remain today. As the last of the purpose-built immigrant synagogues still standing in downtown Boston, the Vilna Shul is a unique building with a rich history of immigration, community, and the evolving American identity. Vilna Shul Executive Director Dalit Horn joins us this week to talk about the history and future of this unique synagogue.


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Spring Gun in the Grape Vines (episode 235)

This week we’ll explore the strange case of a 1907 shooting in Jamaica Plain.  There was a gun, a gunshot, and a gunshot victim… a child, in fact.  But there was no shooter, or at least no human shooter.  If this was today, we might be talking about a terrifying robot machine gun, but 1907 was a little early for that.  Instead, we’re talking about a deadly trap laid by a homeowner to protect his grape arbor.  For setting this deadly trap, the homeowner would face criminal trial for assault, but pay only a trivial fine.  As bizarre as the case sounds, it was part of a trend that was sweeping the nation at the time, with many spring gun cases arising in the Boston area, until the matter was finally settled in a state supreme court case that every first year law student still studies today.  


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Boston in the Time of Cholera (episode 161)

Cholera is a truly horrifying disease, with severe diarrhea causing death through dehydration, while the patient remains awake and in agony.  The disease is carried by fecal bacteria, so it’s virtually unknown in highly developed countries today, because of our sophisticated sewage and drinking water systems.  Back in 1849, Boston had just begun to address its drinking water needs, with the Cochituate aqueduct opening the year before. We had not, however, even begun to deal with our sewage.  In most of Boston, raw sewage ran in open gutters down the sides of the street. When the first major cholera epidemic hit Boston in the summer of 1849, hundreds died.  There were no antibiotics or IV rehydration to treat victims with.  Instead, the city government took a public health approach that was focused on sanitation first.


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The Ursuline Convent Riot, revisited (episode 122)

This week we’re discussing the riots and destruction of Charlestown’s Ursuline convent, which we first covered back in January 2017. This episode touches on themes of xenophobia, anti-immigrant prejudice, and religious intolerance – lessons we can all learn from today.  On a hot summer’s night in 1834, rumors swirled around a Catholic girls’ school in Charlestown.  Catholicism was a frightening, unfamiliar religion, and Catholic immigrants were viewed with great suspicion.  People said that the nuns were being held in slavery, or that Protestant children were being tortured and forcibly converted.  A crowd gathered, and violence flared.  When the sun rose the next morning, the Ursuline Convent lay in smoking ruins.  Thirteen men were tried, but none served time. What deep seated biases led Yankee Boston down this dark road?  Listen to this week’s episode to find out!


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Amelia Earhart in Boston (episode 94)

You probably know about Amelia Earhart’s famous career as a groundbreaking aviator, and you almost certainly know about her famous disappearance over the Pacific.  But you may not know about Amelia Earhart’s first career as a social worker in one of Boston’s many settlement houses. This week, we discuss her early exposure to aviation, the famed Friendship crossing, and also her reflections on her career of service to newly immigrated Americans.


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Immigration in Boston (episode 86)

In this week’s episode, we use three classic episodes to turn the Trump administration’s anti-immigrant rhetoric on its head. The President teaches us to be afraid of Central American and Middle Eastern immigrants and asylum seekers because of terrorism, crime, and an unfamiliar religion. Our ancestors had these same fears about earlier immigrant groups, groups that are today considered part of the fabric of America. In their day, Italian Americans were suspected of terrorism, Chinese Americans were blamed for organized crime, and Irish Americans were feared because of their unfamiliar and potentially dangerous religion.


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The Broad Street Riot (episode 84)

The Broad Street Riot of 1837 was one of Boston’s many historical melees.  This one took place when a company of Yankee firefighters ran into an Irish funeral.  Despite our reputation as a coastal liberal enclave, Boston has a history of hostility towards newcomers.  When Irish immigrants began arriving in our harbor en masse, Yankee nativists welcomed them with violence and prejudice. Before long, a funeral procession in the wrong place at the wrong time led to a brawl with well over 10,000 participants and onlookers.


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Rat Day (Ep72)

The Boston Women’s Municipal League was a civic organization made up of mostly middle and upper class women, at a time when most women didn’t work outside the home.  In 1915, they declared war on rats.  Over the next few years, Women’s Municipal League published literature on eradicating rats, carried out an extensive education campaign, and in 1917 hosted a city-wide Rat Day with cash prizes for the citizens who killed the most rats.  

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Episode 49: The Tong Wars and the Great Chinatown Raid

This week’s episode takes on the early history of Boston’s Chinatown, two murders that took place there at the turn of the twentieth century, and a terrifying crackdown on Chinese Americans in Boston that sparked an international incident and has parallels in today’s headlines.  

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Episode 35: The Boston Symphony Orchestra in World War I

With a partial “Muslim Ban” in place, it’s important to remember that vilifying “enemy aliens” is one of the darkest chapters of our nation’s history.  A hundred years ago, Americans were all too willing to imprison or even deport their neighbors of German descent.  Here in Boston, the preeminent director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra was affected, along with almost a third of the orchestra’s musicians.

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