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Lindsey Graham (6:27)

From noiser and airshift I'm lindsey graham and this is history. Daily. History is made every day on this podcast. Every day we tell the true stories of the people and events that shaped our world. Today is January 15th, 1919. The Boston molasses disaster. It's late December 1915 in Boston's North End, three years before the molasses tank collapses. 40 year old Arthur P. Gel shouts over the wind as it whips spray across the docks. It's so cold that Arthur can't feel his fingers, but right now, numb hands are the least of his worries. He's under pressure to finish his very first engineering project. Above him, workmen hurry across swaying scaffolds, hammering large steel plates into position. In just a few days, this enormous storage tank will be filled with thousands of gallons of molasses. Molasses is a byproduct of sugar production, and Boston has been a hub of the trade for centuries. American companies import it from the Caribbean and use it to manufacture industrial alcohol. That in turn is made into cleaning products, solvents and even munitions. Recently, demand has risen so high that US Industrial Alcohol Company has commissioned a new molasses storage tank in Boston, the largest anywhere in the city. It stands 50ft high and will have a capacity of more than 2 million gallons. The tank should have been finished months ago, but construction has been slow. Material delays and labor shortages have stalled the project, and now time's running out. The first Shipment of molasses for the tank is due to arrive from Cuba in just a few days. So with the clock ticking, US Industrial Alcohol has brought in Arthur to finish the job. He's not an obvious choice. He isn't an engineer, he's the company's treasurer. But his precise accounting skills are just what the company needs to get the tank finished. He's squeezed every spare hour from the schedule and hired additional men to meet deadline. 30 laborers now toil away day and night, hammering in the last few rivets. And now Arthur clenches his fingers and stamps his feet, trying to stay warm. He longs to retreat to his office, not just because of the freezing weather. The North End was once one of Boston's most fashionable areas, but it slowly turned into a slum with overcrowded tenements and widespread poverty. Arthur has no desire to linger here. Still, the area's deprivation has one benefit. There's no one here with any real influence who can object to the company's new tank. Arthur has spent the holidays on site, watching closely to make sure the men don't knock off early. And even then, he's had to cut corners to meet deadline. And when the tank is finished, he decides not to fill it with lighter water to test it for leaks. Instead, he inspects it visually. And just hours before the first shipment of molasses arrives, he declares the tank ready. Arthur watches While the first 700,000 gallons of molasses are pumped inside. The steel of the tank groans as the viscous liquid pushes against the panels. The thick syrup even seeps through several weak joints. But Arthur isn't worried about losing a few pints here and there. And when he returns to the office, his colleagues congratulate him on a job well done. Over the next three years, demand for industrial alcohol skyrockets. When the United States enters World War I, it becomes a crucial raw material for munitions production. But every time the tank in Boston is topped up with another delivery, the panels groan as the rivets strain. Under increasing pressure, the leaks grow steadily worse. Brown liquid seeps down the curved steel walls and drips onto the ground below. Local children start to play in the puddles, giggling with delight as they throw congealed clumps of molasses at each other. But rather than draining the tank to fix the joints, at first Arthur just opts to disguise the problem. He hires guards to chase the children away and pays laborers to paint the steel panels a rust brown color to hide the streaks of molasses on them. But these are only cosmetic Solutions. The leaks continue, and the puddles of molasses under the tank merge into a pool. By December 1918, the problem can no longer be ignored, so the company drains the tank until it's almost empty, and workers re caulk and reseal the panels before filling it up again with a fresh shipment of molasses. So when Arthur heads to work on January 15, 1919, he's confident that the problems with the storage tank are a thing of the past. But just after midday, the tank will suddenly collapse, and more than 2 million gallons of molasses will sweep through the North End like a tidal wave, and the resulting fallout will change the neighborhood forever.

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Lindsey Graham (14:08)

It's 1:45pm on January 15, 1919, on Commercial street in Boston, one hour after the molasses tank collapsed. The car skids to a halt in the thick brown sludge and Arthur P. Gel jumps out. His polished shoes sink and squelch as he steps onto the street. He stares, stunned by what he sees. The devastation is worse than anything he imagined only an hour ago. Arthur was enjoying lunch in the company cafeteria when his secretary rushed in. Her face drained color. She told him the stunning news that the molasses storage tank in the North End had collapsed. Arthur jumped to his feet, his meal instantly forgotten. But before making his way to the site of the accident, he first telephoned US Industrial Alcohol's headquarters in New York City. His superiors there gave him clear instructions. Arthur should keep law enforcement and city inspectors away from the tank until the company can secure the site. And if necessary, he should conceal any evidence of wrongdoing. But now that he's here, where the tank once stood, Arthur realizes how impossible that task is. Dozens of buildings have disappeared, swept away by the flood. Others are just barely standing, their walls leaning precariously moments from collapse. Floorboards, furniture and shattered door frames protrude from molasses like debris after a storm. The elevated railway has buckle and one of its support pillars is toppled on its side. Box cars and automobiles are crushed against the dangling track, all bent and broken as if made of tin. Arthur then flinches as gunshots ring out across the street. Men are shooting horses that are trapped in the brown syrup, putting them out of their misery. Nearby, rescuers dig through the remains of a collapsed building. Arthur watches, his stomach hollow as it takes four, four men to pull a single body from the thick ooze. Arthur lifts his feet and steps carefully through the sludge toward the twisted wreckage of the storage tank itself. The sweet and sickly smell is overwhelming but before he can go any further, a hand grabs his arm. A police officer tells him he can't go any closer if the tank is a crime scene. Arthur hesitates for a moment. He considers identifying himself, explaining who he is and why he's here. But another thought intrudes. Doing that could make him the one held responsible. So instead, he shrugs his shoulders and turns away. He'll come back tomorrow, and he'll make sure he has the company's lawyers with him. Meanwhile, in Arthur's absence, the rescue operation continues. By nightfall, 11 people are confirmed dead, but nearly as many remain missing, swept into the harbor or buried beneath collapsed buildings. Over the next few days, an enormous operation is launched to find the remaining bodies. Hundreds of workers scour the waterfront, combing the debris in search of the dead. Eventually, 21 bodies are recovered, and the effort shifts from recovery to cleanup. Laborers hack at the hardening molasses with shovels and axes. Firefighters pump seawater through the streets, trying to loosen the congealing liquid. But despite their best efforts, molasses spreads across the city. It sticks to people's clothing and shoes. It ends up on train platforms, in phone booths and on trolley seats. The sickly sweet smell lingers in the air. And as the slow cleanup continues, attention also turns to what caused the disaster. US Industrial Alcohol moves quickly to shape the narrative, claiming that the tank was bombed by anarchists. There's no evidence to support this claim, but there's also no evidence disproving it either. The day after the disaster, company workers cleared away what remained of the tank and disposed of all of it before investigators could properly examine the wreckage. That seems to be enough to protect the company. A few weeks after the disaster, a preliminary investigation places the blame on inadequate building regulations and the chronic underfunding of the city's inspectors. But the story doesn't end there. Many Bostonians have doubts about the investigation, and local reporters soon uncover the truth. Interviewing residents and workers from the North End, they hear all about the tank's rushed construction and how it groaned and leaked from the moment it was filled. Steadily, a different picture emerges, one of a company that prioritized profits over safety. There's still not enough concrete evidence to file criminal charges against the US Industrial Alcohol Company. But the people of North End refuse to let the matter rest. They'll file one of the largest civil lawsuits in American history. And eventually they'll get their day in court. And those responsible for the Boston molasses disaster will have to pay for what they did.

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Lindsey Graham (21:11)

It's April 28, 1925, at a hotel in Revere, Massachusetts, six years after the Boston molasses disaster. Martin Cloherty picks up the Boston Globe and reads the headline. A wave of emotion hits him Sorrow mixed with relief. After years of hearings, delays and testimony, the civil lawsuit against US Industrial Alcohol has finally come to an end. After the disaster that claimed the life of his mother, Martin never returned to the North End. Instead, he opened a small hotel here in Revere and tried to rebuild what remained of his life. But the disaster continued to affect his family. His brother Stephen became so terrified another flood might come in the night that he was unable to sleep. His mental health deteriorated, and he was eventually committed to an asylum. There he contracted tuberculosis and died. Now the grieving Martin studies the newspaper processing the details of the verdict. The judgment is unequivocal. US Industrial Alcohol was responsible for the collapse of the molasses tank. The court has rejected the company's claims of anarchist sabotage. Instead, it's highlighted weaknesses in the tank's design, as well as the company's decision to place the inexperienced Arthur P. Jell in charge of the final construction. As a result of the of those actions, the judge has said the molasses tank was doomed from the start. Faced with such a damning verdict, US Industrial Alcohol settles with the survivors. Martin and his sister are awarded more than $6,000 each. It's a substantial sum, but it can't replace what they've lost. Neither the Cloherty family nor Boston's North End will ever be the same, and Martin will be long dead when the disaster's causes are fully understood. Almost a century later, modern engineers will revisit the case. They will conclude that the tank was an accident waiting to happen. Its walls were too thin and the steel used became brittle in cold weather. But neither of those triggered the flood. The deadly accident was likely sparked by a fresh shipment of warm molasses mixing with cold leftovers already in the tank. The temperature difference may have triggered increased fermentation. And over the next two days, pressure built up until the weak steel walls could no longer hold it back. US industrial alcohol's reckless mismanagement cost 21 people their lives and devastated an entire neighborhood. Even now, more than 100 years on, it's said that on hot summer days, Boston's north end still smells faintly of molasses. An eerie reminder of the terrible disaster that hit the city on January 15, 1919. Next on History Daily, 1-16-27 BCE Octavian is granted the title Augustus, marking the beginning of the Roman Empire. From Nouser and airship this is History Daily Hosted, edited and executive produced by me, Lindsey Graham Audio editing by Mohammad Shahzi Sound design by Molly Bach Music by Thrum this episode is written and researched By Angus Gavin McCarr Edited by Scott Reeves Managing Producer Emily Burke Executive producers are William Simpson for Airship and Pascal Hughes for Noiser.

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