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Title: Dark Tide : The Great Boston Molasses Flood of 1919 by Stephen Puleo ISBN: 0-8070-5020-2 Publisher: Beacon Press Pub. Date: 02 September, 2003 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $23.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.75 (8 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Engrossing account of a most improbable tragedy
Comment: Having lived less than 50 miles from Boston all of my life, I was startled to pick up this book and learn about the tragic events of January 15, 1919. I had never ever heard about this!!! Stephen Puleo has done a terrific job of reconstructing the events that led up to the collapse of the 50 foot high steel tank that held over two million gallons of all things--molasses. When the dust had cleared 21 people lost their lives and scores more were injured. The entire waterfront area adjacent to the tank was levelled. A portion of the nearby overhead rail had collapsed. Hundreds of family pets and dozens of police horses were lost. Lives were changed forever. We learn about the suffering of many of the victims in these pages. Some of the descriptions of what happened that day are unimaginable.
Puleo paints a fascinating portrait of life in Boston in the late teens and early 1920's and details a number of the events that led up to this grim piece of Boston history. He gives a history of the owner of the tank, the U.S. Industrial Alcohol Co. You will most certainly not be impressed by the way this outfit conducted itself both in the years leading up to the tragedy and in the investigations and inquiry that followed. I was interested to learn of the long history of the molasses trade in the Boston area. And of course when blame for the tragedy was being assigned many pointed their fingers at radical Italian anarchists. Was there any truth in these accusations or were some just holding them up as convenient "patsies"? When you stop and think about what happened on that frigid January day, just imagine what might have happened if the tank had collapsed on a summer day? Imagine the additional health problems that would have been posed by insects and rodents at that time of the year.
Finally, Stephen Puleo devotes several chapters to the legal inquiry into this tragedy and to the three principal players. Prominent Boston attorney Charles Choate was engaged as defense lawyer for U.S. Industrial Alcohol. Damon Hall presented the case for the plaintiffs. And decorated World War I veteran Hugh Ogden was appointed by the Court to oversee the civil lawsuit. See how the six weeks he expected to devote to this case turned into over three years!!! I found this one very hard to put down. Highly recommended!!!
Rating: 5
Summary: W-O-W!!!
Comment: This book is SWEET!!!! It prompted me to build a miniature molasses tank in my backyard. The reinactment didn't go so well though. Suprising! I used to love molasses as a kid strictly for the taste of it, but this book made me see it in an entirely different light. I will never take molasses for granted again!
Rating: 3
Summary: Disappointing
Comment: I was simply disappointed. This is the first book about the molasses flood, and instead of telling what happened and why the author seems to put thoughts into the participants heads, and makes all kinds of maudlin announcements. David and Goliath. Yer breakin' my heart. There is no attempt to understand what happened technically. There are some silly false pronouncements which any 2nd year engineering student could have corrected. It is good to give the social and political background but the author seems to have consulted with everyone except those who could have explained what happened technically. Good guys and bad guys that's what the book is about. But reading the previous reviewers that is apparently what some people seem to want. Sad. And the author seems to find a need for a hero - Colonel Hugh W. Ogden - fighting the forces of evil. And he was a war hero - he won the war in Europe for America - as a lawyer. Gimme a break. Why did it take Ogden 18 months after final testimony to write a report? Silence. Did he get paid for his 5 years of time interupted by many trips to Europe while all those poor slobs waited for some kind of compensation. Not a word. What really happened? That is what such a book should try to determine.
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Title: Sudden Sea : The Great Hurricane of 1938 by R.A. Scotti ISBN: 0316739111 Publisher: Little Brown & Company Pub. Date: 03 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: Triangle: The Fire That Changed America by David Von Drehle ISBN: 0871138743 Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Press Pub. Date: August, 2003 List Price(USD): $25.00 |
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Title: Boston on Fire: A History of Fires and Firefighting in Boston by Stephanie Schorow ISBN: 1889833444 Publisher: Commonwealth Editions Pub. Date: August, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: Ship Ablaze : The Tragedy of the Steamboat General Slocum by Edward T. O'Donnell ISBN: 0767909054 Publisher: Broadway Pub. Date: 10 June, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: Firestorm at Peshtigo: A Town, Its People, and the Deadliest Fire in American History by William Lutz, Denise Gess ISBN: 0805067809 Publisher: Henry Holt & Company, Inc. Pub. Date: 02 August, 2002 List Price(USD): $26.00 |
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