January 15, 1919

[Omaha Steve]

http://todayinlaborhistory.wordpress.com/2014/01/15/january-15-1919/





A 58-foot-high metal tank, 90 feet in diameter, filled with 2.5 million gallons of crude molasses bursts in Boston, and the explosion sends a 40-foot tall tidal wave of molasses and debris crashing down Commercial Street. What became known as the Boston Molasses Flood killed 21 workers and residents and injured another 150. After many years of litigation, the United States Industrial Alcohol Company was eventually found culpable and forced to pay a million-dollar settlement.

[Squinch]

1. Wow! Never heard of this.

[Smarmie Doofus]

2. Me neither. Hidden from history, I guess. n/t

[Squinch]

3. It happened in the middle of the Spanish Flu pandemic, and only a year after WW1. I guess in the

scheme of unbelievably enormous things going on at that time, it went under the radar.

There's really no such thing as the good old days!

[frazzled]

4. Lord, death by molasses

I can't think of a worse fate.

Fascinating (thanks for sharing).

[PDittie]

5. Saw it on "Mysteries at the Museum"

on the Travel Channel recently. It was horrifying.

[Jenoch]

6. I think I remember reading

somewhere that in the heat of the summer, the odor of molassess can still be detected in that parted of Boston.

[Shankapotomus]

7. Wow

Must have read about it way back in high school but never saw a photo. Pretty horrible.

[Scuba]

8. And we apparently learned exactly nothing.

[panader0]

9. Dennis Lehane has a great book "The Given Day"

While the Molasses Flood is not the main subject of the book, it is talked about in detail.