-
It's that time of year again - our ISP is asking for money. If you have some spare change, please click the Donate link... Thanks!
- About Us
- Search
- Need Help?
- Donate
- Login/Register
Latest Entries
Actions Menu
Blog Roll
- 4F Facebook Page
- Turn Up The Night with Kenny Pick
- Stephanie Miller Show
- The Tim Corrimal Show
- The Rachel Maddow Show
- Angry Americans with Paul Rieckhoff
- Thom Hartmann Program
- Turnips! Fans of Turn Up the Night Facebook Page
- Snopes.com
- Factcheck.org
- Official White House Page, if you must.
- The Brad Blog / Green News Report
- The Poorly Written Political Blog (Joe Santorsa)
No one ever is to blame.
Author: TriSec
Date: 05/15/2010 11:53:00
Good Morning!
I read a very interesting newspaper article last night. It was about blame, and where the responsibility lies for an industrial disaster.
The writer goes on to note;
Was it the President of the United States?
Perhaps a Governor of a Gulf state, looking for someone to pay for the cleanup?
Nay, it was Judge Wilfred Bolster, Chief Justice, Municipal Court of the City of Boston. The article in question was published on Saturday, February 8, 1919 in the Boston Globe.
Frequent readers of this blog have seen many references to the little-known Boston Molasses Disaster. I'm reading a book about it now, by the name of Dark Tide, written by historian Stephen Puleo.
I've found it to be a remarkable picture of what was happening in and around Boston at the end of WWI. As it turns out, we were a hotbed of Italian anarchy and radicalism...there were multiple assasinations, bombings, threats, and a whole host of other things going on. (In that climate, small wonder Sacco & Vanzetti were railroaded.)
You all probably know that the North End was, and still is, the primary Italian enclave in this city. While in 2010, an Italian is the mayor, a hundred years ago, Italians were the Mexicans of the day. Dark skinned, speaking a strange language, many here illegally, and doing all the dirty and menial tasks that no "American" wanted to do.
The company that owned the molasses tank built it in the middle of the North End for two reasons....first, for economics. It was right on the waterfront and had a rail line running right alongside. Perfect for logistics. Second, it was smack in the middle of the Italian neighborhood....where there would be little opposition to it, as they had not political power.
The tank was built in less than a month; was never inspected or tested, and was a disaster waiting to happen from day one. Days before the flood, it was filled to near maximum capacity, as United States Industrial Alcohol was taking a desperate gamble. At the end of WWI, all of the munitions contracts were cut back, and they were going to quickly switch to distillation for the rum industry, which was about to go away through the Volstead act.
Of course you know they failed...and this was the result.
21 people were killed that day, including 2 children, and 150 injured...many of them for life.
It wasn't an environmental disaster, but it could have been. The Spanish Flu was just winding down in the city, and the disaster fortunately happened in January. Imagine if it had been July. (Rats - Flies - Roaches - etc.) During the cleanup, it was discovered that freshwater did nothing against the molasses in the cold, and the city wound up spraying millions of gallons of sea water over the North End to break down the molasses and wash it into the sea. Something you just can't do with oil.
There isn't a decent picture of it, but here is the site today.
I wonder what the Gulf Coast will look like in 90 years?
I read a very interesting newspaper article last night. It was about blame, and where the responsibility lies for an industrial disaster.
The chief blame rests upon the public itself. This single accident has cost more in material damage alone than all the supposed economics in the building department. Laws are cheap of passage, costly of enforcement. They do not execute themselves. A public which, with one eye on the tax rate, provides itself with an adminstrative equipment 50 percent qualified, has no right to complain that it does not get a 100 percent product - and so far as it accepts political influence as the equivalent of scientific positions which demand such attanment in a high degree, so long it must expect breakdowns in its machinery.
The writer goes on to note;
The only assignable crime involved is manslaughter, through negligence. My conclusion from all the evidence is that this rig was wholly insufficient in point of structural strength to handle its load, insufficient to meet either legal or engineering requirements. This structure being maintained in violation of the law, the lessee has incurred the penalty which is absolute...
Was it the President of the United States?
Perhaps a Governor of a Gulf state, looking for someone to pay for the cleanup?
Nay, it was Judge Wilfred Bolster, Chief Justice, Municipal Court of the City of Boston. The article in question was published on Saturday, February 8, 1919 in the Boston Globe.
Frequent readers of this blog have seen many references to the little-known Boston Molasses Disaster. I'm reading a book about it now, by the name of Dark Tide, written by historian Stephen Puleo.
I've found it to be a remarkable picture of what was happening in and around Boston at the end of WWI. As it turns out, we were a hotbed of Italian anarchy and radicalism...there were multiple assasinations, bombings, threats, and a whole host of other things going on. (In that climate, small wonder Sacco & Vanzetti were railroaded.)
You all probably know that the North End was, and still is, the primary Italian enclave in this city. While in 2010, an Italian is the mayor, a hundred years ago, Italians were the Mexicans of the day. Dark skinned, speaking a strange language, many here illegally, and doing all the dirty and menial tasks that no "American" wanted to do.
The company that owned the molasses tank built it in the middle of the North End for two reasons....first, for economics. It was right on the waterfront and had a rail line running right alongside. Perfect for logistics. Second, it was smack in the middle of the Italian neighborhood....where there would be little opposition to it, as they had not political power.
The tank was built in less than a month; was never inspected or tested, and was a disaster waiting to happen from day one. Days before the flood, it was filled to near maximum capacity, as United States Industrial Alcohol was taking a desperate gamble. At the end of WWI, all of the munitions contracts were cut back, and they were going to quickly switch to distillation for the rum industry, which was about to go away through the Volstead act.
Of course you know they failed...and this was the result.
21 people were killed that day, including 2 children, and 150 injured...many of them for life.
It wasn't an environmental disaster, but it could have been. The Spanish Flu was just winding down in the city, and the disaster fortunately happened in January. Imagine if it had been July. (Rats - Flies - Roaches - etc.) During the cleanup, it was discovered that freshwater did nothing against the molasses in the cold, and the city wound up spraying millions of gallons of sea water over the North End to break down the molasses and wash it into the sea. Something you just can't do with oil.
There isn't a decent picture of it, but here is the site today.
I wonder what the Gulf Coast will look like in 90 years?
