Introduction
The Great Molasses Flood of 1919 was a tragedy that struck Boston in January of 1919. This story is greatly intertwined with the text structure of Cause and Effect. The negligence of a company with a storehouse of molasses, who still wanted to make money, is one of the greatest disasters of greed ever recorded in the history of our nation. To make this event even more tragic, it occured in Boston's north end, which was the neighborhood of many immigrant families already living on the edges of desperation and poverty. Our nation itself was recovering from the two tragedies of World War I and the influenza (flu) epidemic of 1918. As if losing our men to the war was not enough, this flu raged through our nation claiming the lives of 600,0000 Americans. Turning the tide of these national tragedies was difficult, but at the beginning of 1919 things began to look up once again and the United States seemed to be on its road to recovery.This webquest will have you visiting different websites that will help you learn about this event. It was brought about by greed and was one of the most notorious cases of neglect and reform for the way that companies put the public at risk for their own bottom line profit. History is a lesson for us to never put the lives of the American people at risk for money or to think that one American life is more valued than another. The lesson of history does not have to be relearned if we become the safeguards for our nation and the people who guard against injustice and inhumanity that leads to death and tragedy. Explore this webquest with me as we turn the pages of our history to see one event that changed the course of the city of Boston forever. Even today, many say that in the hot summer months the faint smell of molasses still lingers in the air as a reminder to never let the history of greed repeat itself.
Task
https://www.history.com/news/the-great-molasses-flood-of-1919
Using the above website, answer the questions that follow:
1. "The construction of the tank had been rushed and haphazard." The word haphazard means "rushed and marked by a lack of plan, order and direction." Answer the following questions about the tank:
a. How tall was the tank? ____________________
b. The molasses in the tank was "used for _________________________ and __________________________ manufacturing."
Define the word "munitions." ____________________________________________________________________
Click on the below website for the next group of questions:
https://www.history.com/news/great-molasses-flood-science?li_source=LI&li_medium=m2m-rcw-history
1. How many gallons of liquid poured out on Boston's North End streets? _______________________________
2. The four factors that combined together to make this tragedy happen were "flawed steel, safety _________________, fluctuating air temperatures and the principles of fluid dynamics."
3. How many times had the tank been filled before it overflowed onto the streets of Boston? _______________________ times
4. The poorly designed tank that was 50 feet tall and 90 feet wide and held enough molasses to fill ______________________ Olympic size swimming pools.
5. The tank held molasses, which at the time was used "to make ____________________________ and other explosives during World War I."
6. What should have been the first test before the engineers filled the tank with molasses, to see if it was strong enough to hold something heavier? (Choose one answer)
a. they should have tested the tank with oil
b. they should have tested the tank with grain (wheat, barley, rice)
c. they should have tested the tank with water
d. they should have tested the tank with sea water from Boston Harbor
7. Before it blew, "children would bring _______________________ to fill with sweet molasses that dripped out of it."
8. "What engineers didn't know at the time was that the steel had been mixed with too little ____________________________. That
gave it a high transition temperature, making the metal ______________________ when it cooled below _________________ degrees
fahrenheit. On the day of this disaster, the tank had cooled to a temperature of _____________________ degrees fahrenheit. Its
brittleness may have been the final straw."
9. "The final straw" is an idiom (figurative language) What does "the final straw" mean? (Use Google)
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________
10. After the disaster happened and sent a wave of molasses, like a tsunami, across the city, the cold night temperatures of Boston in January made the molasses more viscous and kept people trapped underneath the tank, making it nearly impossible for rescue workers to get them out. Define the word "viscous."
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
11. If this accident would have happened in the month of July, the molasses would have thinned out and moved further out from the tank. Scroll back to the top of this webpage and fill in the "effect" part of this disaster brought about by this company who failed to follow safety guidelines and protect the citizens of Boston:
a. Flooded streets, crushed _______________________ and trapped _____________________
b. Killed ___________________ people and
c. Injured _______________________________.
Click on the Scholastic link below to answer the rest of the questions for this webquest:
Cause and Effect Chart. Complete the following chart about the events that happened in history.
Cause Effect
1. By the 1900s sugar prices had dropped. 1. Most Americans no longer needed to sweeten their foods with molasses.
2. New uses were were found for molasses. 2. Through distillation, molasses became the key ingredient for
__________________________ in the war against Germany.
3. An enormous tank was built in a poor 3. "Blotted out the ___________________ and blocked the view of the
Boston neighborhood. harbor."
4. The sound of "rat a tat tat" filled 4. "Thousands of steel ______________________ (bolts) were popping
the air that fateful day in January. out of place."
5. The tank seemed to crack apart 5. "The molasses formed a gigantic brown wave 15 feet high, _______
like a massive egg. feet wide and traveling at a staggering __________________ mph."
6. The wave pulled Anthony under. 6. "He crashed into a ____________________ lamppost."
7. The rescue teams could not use 7. "They had to use __________________ water to scour the goo from
regular water to wash away the thick molasses. the streets."
8. USIA refused to take responsibility for this 8. "The trial dragged on for years, but finally the company was forced to
disaster and it seemed like they might get pay ______________________ million, equal to about 7 million today
away with it. The citizens demanded justice. to the poor immigrants of North End Boston."
9. Anthony di Stasio's limp body was taken 9. "He woke up to the sound of his ___________________ voice calling
to a large building used to store the bodies him. Anthony tried to answer, but his mouth was filled with molasses.
of those who had died. His body was covered Finally he woke up and was surrounded by his _________________,
with a sheet, but he wasn't dead, just unconscious. a lucky survivor of one of the strangest disasters in American history."
Process
Please use a Google Document for your answers, since this webquest is for "View Only" and only editable by the creator (myself). Once you have completed the webquest, share your answers with me by attaching your document to the Google Classroom or simply sharing your answers directly on a Google document through email. Through this snapshot in history, I hope you have enjoyed learning this fascinating story that has been the study of engineers, physics majors and many other investigative journalists. Greed is never the answer and deserves to be spotlighted, so that we never repeat lessons like this from our nation's past.
Evaluation
Please do not forget to use the Control "F" key to find your answers, since this will keep you from having to read every single page of the websites and pdf files I am using. Unless you are like me and read every word because I wanted to get a complete view of the picture of this day in our nation's history. You will be evaluated on the correctness of your answers and your ability to locate information from online media resources.
Conclusion
Here is youtube video that describes this disaster. Please watch as some details I might have left out are shared.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMNo7IwwXDQ