http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/Northeast/01/23/molasses.flood.ap/index.html

(Follow the link to see cool photos -- JL)

Great molasses flood remembered

Library exhibit chronicles 1919 disaster

Friday, January 23, 2004 Posted: 12:21 PM EST (1721 GMT)

BOSTON, Massachusetts (AP) -- Danny O'Brien looked at a photograph of firefighters knee-deep in molasses trying to rescue people trapped in a collapsed firehouse, and remembered his grandfather's tales of sticky horror.

"Those stories were something ... horses stuck in this sea of molasses, a lot of cars, people stuck, houses smashed to pieces," said O'Brien, looking through a Boston Public Library exhibit commemorating the 85th anniversary of Boston's Great Molasses Flood, which killed 21 people and injured 150.

His grandfather lived in the city's North End, where on January 15, 1919, a gigantic steel vat exploded, spewing 2.3 million gallons of molten molasses. Thirty-foot waves of gooey liquid plowed through the streets, catching men, women, horses and vermin in its sticky flow, crushing freight cars, wagons and automobiles and reducing entire buildings to broken planks of wood.

"They were smelling it for years after that," said O'Brien, whose grandfather volunteered to help with the months-long cleanup.

[Much more at site...]