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Tea Time

Happy Birthday to the Boston Tea Party! It was on this day 234 years ago that Boston Harbor became very tasty, when the Sons of Liberty destroyed 300 crates of tea from the East India Company.

In a brilliant stunt yesterday, supporters of libertarian Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul staged a reenactment of the Tea Party yesterday. The stunt helped him raise $5 million over the Internet, shattering a record set when he urged his supporters to give him money on Guy Fawkes Day (but that isn't even an American rebellion!).

I am very proud to say that one of my ancestors was present for this event in history. Here's an excerpt from my family genealogy for James Blake (who was 11 at the time):

It is stated that in 1770 [sic], when the tea was thrown overboard in Boston Harbor, he, thinking it might be the last chance his mother would have to secure some good tea, put on his father's course shoes, and scuffing about on the decks of one of the tea ships in the wasted tea from the broken chests, till his shoes were full, ran home and emptied them into his mother's tea can, returning for more till he secured her supplies for the coming tea famine.

What a smart kid! Well apparently, the organizers of the protest were a little more hard core than my great-great * 5 grandfather:

The next morning, after we had cleared the ships of the tea, it was discovered that very considerable quantities of it were floating upon the surface of the water; and to prevent the possibility of any of its being saved for use, a number of small boats were manned by sailors and citizens, who rowed them into those parts of the harbor wherever the tea was visible, and by beating it with oars and paddles so thoroughly drenched it as to render its entire destruction inevitable."

I bet that if the East India Company had a shipment of rum coming into Boston Harbor, the Son's of Liberty would not have been so intent on its destruction. I'm just sayin....

Full post as published by Supreme Dicta on December 17, 2007 (boomark / email).