The 101st anniversary of the Boston Molasses Flood

"CB" (jrcb) 01/15/2020 at 13:39 • Filed to: History is weird

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Learn yourself some history today.

If only EssExTee could be so grossly incandescent > CB 01/15/2020 at 13:43

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I live in MA. It's actually taught about in history classes here.

My X-type is too a real Jaguar > CB 01/15/2020 at 13:45

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That seems like a horrible way to die. I mean really bad

CB > My X-type is too a real Jaguar 01/15/2020 at 13:48

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It’s probably one of the worst that’s actually happened.

Thomas Donohue > CB 01/15/2020 at 13:50

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TIL that broiled lamb chops were 70 cents at the Quincy House.  Quinzy, dude!

Sampsonite24-Earth's Least Likeliest Hero > My X-type is too a real Jaguar 01/15/2020 at 13:56

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yeah like drowning has to suck but drowning/being crushed by molasses has to be even worse

fintail > Thomas Donohue 01/15/2020 at 13:57

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Quite the mix of fonts there.  Also, Ford owners, don’t crank in vain - ad for a carburetor, perhaps.

fintail > CB 01/15/2020 at 13:58

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Horrific . Not the good old days.  I hope it was more explosion than flood in those casualty numbers.

Today, they could maybe hire Brad Marchand to lick it up? 

Thomas Donohue > fintail 01/15/2020 at 14:01

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Yup..... Clifton Vaporizers. Not sure if full replacement or not.

winterlegacy, here 'till the end > CB 01/15/2020 at 14:01

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“Oh, it’s just molasses in January, it’s got to be cold, it can’t possibly be that fast!”

Molasses’ density is about 1.4 tonnes/m 3 , 40% more dense than water, so it had a great deal of potential energy . The collapse translated this energy into a wave of molasses 25 ft (8 m) high at its peak, moving at 35 mph (56 km/h).

Okay, nevermind, that’s frightening.

Rusty Vandura - www.tinyurl.com/keepoppo > My X-type is too a real Jaguar 01/15/2020 at 14:03

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Forget dying. Imagine the molasses being tracked everywhere!

CB > fintail 01/15/2020 at 14:04

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I had a good laugh at that.

CB > winterlegacy, here 'till the end 01/15/2020 at 14:05

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Any time someone says “slow as molasses in January” I immediately chime in with this fact.

It’s why I don’t go to parties anymore.

winterlegacy, here 'till the end > CB 01/15/2020 at 14:09

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Parties? Social gatherings? What are those?

CB > winterlegacy, here 'till the end 01/15/2020 at 14:10

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Things that molasses historians like me don’t get invited to.

Thomas Donohue > CB 01/15/2020 at 14:11

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At least they had a year to drown their sorrows in alcohol (too soon?)....the following day the 36th state ratified the Prohibition amendment .

The Volstead Act went into effect the following January 1920, the 100th anniversary of which is Friday.

user314 > winterlegacy, here 'till the end 01/15/2020 at 14:14

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It gets worse; fresh (warm) molasses had been pumped into the tank prior to the collapse, so the wave was more fluid. After the accident, the molasses started cooling, becoming thicker and more viscous and hampering efforts to rescue survivors .  I can’t imagine living through a massive wall of molasses, then becoming trapped in it like a bug in amber.

Ash78, voting early and often > fintail 01/15/2020 at 14:18

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Yet no Comic Sans to be found. The rumors of old-school New England pragmatism are true.

facw > Thomas Donohue 01/15/2020 at 14:26

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On the other hand, this molasses tank served a distillery so earlier prohibition could have prevented this.

Also scary stuff (and an opportunity for car identification):

I like cars: Jim Spanfeller is one ugly motherfucker > Sampsonite24-Earth's Least Likeliest Hero 01/15/2020 at 14:31

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I don’t even think you could call it “drowning”. If it cooled and thickened fast enough, it would just be suffocation. Horrifying.

Aremmes > winterlegacy, here 'till the end 01/15/2020 at 14:37

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They're like car meets, but without cars. Absolutely horrific and reprehensible.

benn454 > fintail 01/15/2020 at 14:42

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 He'd just drown everyone in his tears.

Ash78, voting early and often > Thomas Donohue 01/15/2020 at 14:43

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Ford drivers and their vape habits....sheesh!

fintail > benn454 01/15/2020 at 14:52

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Well-played

user314 > Rusty Vandura - www.tinyurl.com/keepoppo 01/15/2020 at 15:19

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You jest, but...

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

Cleanup crews used salt water from a fireboat to wash away the molasses and sand to absorb it, and the harbor was brown with molasses until summer. The cleanup in the immediate area took weeks, with several hundred people contributing to the effort, and it took longer to clean the rest of Greater Boston and its suburbs. Rescue workers, cleanup crews, and sight-seers had tracked molasses through the streets and spread it to subway platforms, to the seats inside trains and streetcars, to pay telephone handsets, into homes, and to countless other places. “Everything that a Bostonian touched was sticky.”

user314 > fintail 01/15/2020 at 15:21

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Sad ly, no:

Molasses, waist deep, covered the street and swirled and bubbled about the wreckage …. Here and there struggled a form—whether it was animal or human being was impossible to tell. Only an upheaval, a thrashing about in the sticky mass, showed where any life was …. Horses died like so many flies on sticky fly-paper. The more they struggled, the deeper in the mess they were ensnared. Human beings—men and women—suffered likewise.

fintail > user314 01/15/2020 at 15:34

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Damn

Rusty Vandura - www.tinyurl.com/keepoppo > user314 01/15/2020 at 15:34

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I actually wasn’t jesting because I’d read something very similar to what you shared, m aybe even the same paragraph, previously. Awful.

kanadanmajava1 > CB 01/15/2020 at 15:40

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This stuff also works for rust remo val. Downsides are slow speed and biological side products (smell and mold).

winterlegacy, here 'till the end > user314 01/15/2020 at 16:50

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Ah yes, today I shall get NIGHTMARE FUEL.

OPPOsaurus WRX > CB 01/15/2020 at 16:56

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my v iew this morning

ranwhenparked > fintail 01/15/2020 at 20:25

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Or an aftermarket electric starter - they became optional on Model Ts sometime during 1919, and wouldn’t be standard equipment until 1920, so all of the ones on the road were hand crank.

fintail > ranwhenparked 01/15/2020 at 20:53

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Some of those were amusing too, belts and pulleys to move things along.

I saw the words “Clifton Vaporizers” in the ad copy, which appears to relate to carbs. Maybe Ts  suffered from vapor lock.

ranwhenparked > fintail 01/15/2020 at 22:01

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Most certainly a carburetor then. Clifton Manufacturing was a pretty big aftermarket auto parts/accessories company, mainly Model T, but other cars as well. 

ranwhenparked > Thomas Donohue 01/15/2020 at 23:02

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Yeah, because everybody definitely stopped drinking once prohibition took effect.

ITA97, now with more Jag @ opposite-lock.com > CB 01/16/2020 at 00:21

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One of my coworkers has a side gig as a field investigator for the medical examiner's office (in addition to being our GIS person for the commission).  Beyond literally getting paid by the body, she has some fantastic stories to tell.  Probably doesn't get invited to parties much either.

CB > ITA97, now with more Jag @ opposite-lock.com 01/16/2020 at 00:23

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Sounds like my kind of party, though!

ITA97, now with more Jag @ opposite-lock.com > winterlegacy, here 'till the end 01/16/2020 at 00:25

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I’ve got the software that models this (overlaid on terrain models) on my office PC at the flood commission. I’d have to adjust some parameters on the fluid, though.

ITA97, now with more Jag @ opposite-lock.com > CB 01/16/2020 at 00:28

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I like taking her to the field with me. Beyond being good help and good company, as we drive around she can share stories of deaths that happened along the way.  

Thomas Donohue > ranwhenparked 01/16/2020 at 07:58

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I was thinking about that last night.  They had a year to stock up and drink up. 1919 must have been a doozy.

ranwhenparked > Thomas Donohue 01/16/2020 at 11:22

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Its like when JFK delayed signing the order for the Cuban embargo until his staff had finished fully stocking up his humidor with his favorite cigars.