Later, Purity transferred the molasses by its pipeline to its ethanol plant in nearby Cambridge. On Boston’s Commercial Street, the tank received molasses from ships coming into Boston Harbor. The company used the molasses in the tank to make ethanol, which in turn helped create munitions for World War I and alcohol that eventually found its way into beverages like beer, wine, and brandy. The Purity Distilling Company built the molasses tank in 1915 and made it large: 50 feet high by 90 feet wide. The Molasses Tank on Boston’s Commercial Street ( source/PD) In the century-plus since that molasses tank burst on January 15, 1919, the Boston Molasses Disaster has become part of Boston lore, but … Why did Boston have a 2.3 million gallon tank of molasses in the North End? And for decades, Bostonians said that the streets near the disaster site smelled like molasses on hot summer days. Pedestrians tracked the molasses everywhere they went.įor weeks, all of Boston was sticky. Crews sprayed salt water to remove the molasses from every surface imaginable–subway platforms, inside streetcars, pay telephones, even inside public buildings. The molasses had so much force that it thrust a truck into Boston Harbor, knocked a streetcar off its tracks, and pushed houses off their foundations.īoston’s Great Molasses Flood claimed 21 lives and injured over 150 people. The wave of molasses reached at least 15 feet high at one point and raced towards its victims at 35 mph.
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