The Deleterious Effects of Marsh Miasmata (episode 177)

Transcript

Music

Jake:
[0:04] Welcome Toe Hub history, where we go far beyond the Freedom Trail to share our favorite stories from the history of Boston. The Hub of the Universe.
This is Episode 1 77 The Military ISS Effects of Marsh Maya’s Mata Hi, I’m Jake This week. I’m gonna do things a little bit differently.
Instead of profiling a historic Bostonian or bringing you a dramatic story, I’m going to read a letter.
It’s not even a long letter. When it was published in the magazine, it took up less than two pages.
But in those two pages, there’s a lot of action that I find humorous. And there are a lot of details about what Boston’s infrastructure and commercial port will ache right at the turn of the 19th century.
I’m going to read the letter, and along the way I’ll Pepper and some commentary and some information from other sources.
I hope you find this little episode as delightful as I d’oh, but before I talk about the deleterious effects of March Maya’s Mata, it’s time for this week’s Boston Book Club selection and our upcoming historical event.

[1:08] My pick for the Boston Book Club this week is a privately published volume celebrating the centennial of the Long Worf Corporation in 18 73.
For reasons that will become clear in just a few moments, I was really starting around to try and come up with a book that we haven’t already featured. That has something to do with Long Worf.
This is basically the minutes of an annual stockholders meeting, so a lot of it isn’t terribly interesting. There’s some early history of Long Worf, but that isn’t even terribly accurate.
As I was about to give up on it, I found a gym. Oliver Wendell Holmes, senior the doctor, not the Supreme Court justice, wrote and recited a poem for the meeting.
I’ll include about half of it here. The other half is about the joys of stock ownership.
Before reading the poem, holmes was careful to mention the fact that he was a stockholder in the wharf Corporation.

[2:02] I have occasionally been invited Mr President to appear at a banquet where I had reason to suspect I was counted on for a few verses or something of that nature to justify a committee for sending me an invitation.
But tonight I’m happy to say I’m here in my own right.
As a proprietor of Boston, Pierre, I am present as a host and not as a guest.

[2:24] He also mentioned that when he was a young boy in Cambridge, his father dazzle him with tales of the annual stockholders meeting.

[2:32] My father used to bring home accounts of a certain festival he was in the habit of attending, namely the annual dinner of the proprietors of Long Worf.
These dinners were given if I remember right at the exchange coffeehouse, and probably where such as did credit to the establishment.
For it was a point to have the first salmon of the season on the table and the accounts brought back from them. Excited. Not a little my boyish admiration and appetite.

[3:00] I’m not sure exactly how true that is, but it certainly would have ingratiated him with the corporate officers hosting the evening’s festivities here. The bits of his poems that are actually about long Worf.

[3:13] While I turn my fond glance on the monarch of piers, whose throne is stood firm through his eight score of years.
My thought travels backward and reaches the day when they drove the first pile on the edge of the bay.
See the joiner? The ship, right? The smith from this forge, the red coat who shoulders his gun for King George, the Schattman apprentice.
The boys from the lane, the parson, the doctor with gold headed cane come trooping down King Street where now maybe seeing the police and ropes of a mighty machine, the weight rises. Slowly, it drops with a thud and lo the great timber sinks deep in the mud.
They’re gone. The stout craftsman that hammered the piles and the square Total boys and the three cornered tiles that breaches the buckles have faded from view, and the parson’s white wig and ribbon tied Q.
The red coats of vanished. The last grenade, dear, stepped into the boat From the end of our pier.
They found that our hills were not easy to climb and the order came counter march.
Double quick time They’re gone. Friend and foe anchored fast at the pier, whence no vessel brings back its pale passengers here,
but they’re worth like a lily still floats on the flood, its breast in the sunshine, its roots in the mud we drink to the past and the future.
Today, strong right arm of Boston stretched out, or the bay May the winds west, the wealth of all nations to thee and thy dividends flow like the waves of the sea.

[4:39] Luckily, the entire volume is available is a free e book so you can have a chuckle at Old Oliver Windows expense if you’d like.

[4:47] And I’m happy to note that we actually do have an upcoming event to feature this week.
Just last week, I said that our upcoming events segment would be canceled for the duration of our social distancing experiment.
But now a handful of groups have begun scheduling online Virtual Cove in 19 safe events.
The first of these I’d like to feature is a Wikipedia edit a thon.
On Tuesday, March 31st Simmons University is hosting an online meet up to encourage people to research, create and expand Wikipedia entries relating to women’s history.

[5:21] A number of factors contribute to underrepresentation of women’s history on the platform, including the fact that only 10% of Wikipedia, NHS or women meaning that the unconscious biases of male editors can have an outsized effect.
Not only that, but female subjects often face a note ability gap, where articles about even historically significant women are rejected as not being notable enough to justify an article.
This gathering will attempt to offset some of that imbalance by focusing on the women who fought for suffrage and civil rights.
Here’s how they’re meet up Page describes it.
We are co hosting an edit a thon to help make women’s history more visible on Wikipedia.
It’s the second event in our digitizing women’s history. Siri’s marking the 100th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th Amendment are thematic. Focus is on activists, especially suffrage and civil rights activists who were or are women of color.
The event is open to all. Join us whether or not you’ve ever edited Wikipedia entries before.

[6:25] Keep an eye on the meat up pages. The organizer’s ad suggested topics, which includes specific women whose entries need to be expanded or created, as well as organizations and events you can write about.
It includes tips on how to write for Wikipedia, potential sources to use for research and details on how to connect to a zoom video chat with two mentors during the edit a thon.
We’ll link to the page as well as to the E Book of the Long wharf Centennial event and this week’s show notes at hub history dot com slash 177,
Before I move on, I’d like to say a big thank you to Kathy M, our latest sponsor on Patriotic.
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Thanks again, toe all our new and existing supporters.
Now it’s time for this week’s main topic.

[7:41] Like I said, our show this week is all based on one brief letter that was only about two pages long.
This letter appeared in volume to part two of the memoirs of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, published in 18 04,
the American Academy of Arts and Sciences is a learned society that was founded by John Adams and 17 80 still continues today,
after studying the American Philosophical Society, based in Philadelphia, during his years in the Continental Congress, then studying the academic societies of Europe during his time as a diplomat,
Adams became convinced that New England needed its own similar organization.
He publicly floated the idea during a dinner at Harvard in August of 17 79. A bill was introduced into the Massachusetts legislature in December.
It was passed in May of 17 80.
The organization was then chartered to promote and encourage the knowledge of the antiquities of America and of the natural history of the country, and to determine the uses to which the various natural productions of the country may be applied,
to promote and encourage medical discoveries.
Mathematical disquisition sze, philosophical enquiries and experiments.
Astronomical, meteorological and geographical observations,
and improvements in agriculture, arts, manufactures and commerce, and in fine to cultivate every art and science, which may tend to advance the interest on earth, dignity and happiness of a free, independent and virtuous people.

[9:11] The academy’s memoirs, which would later republished as the proceedings and in the 20th century as Data Lis, were first published in 17 85,
allowing learned authors to put papers recording their scientific observations and advances in front of like minded readers.
One of these observations waas an account of the military ISS effects of mephitic air or marshmallows.
Mata experienced by three men July 27th 17 97 in a well on the Boston Pierre,
in a letter to the Reverend Joseph Willard, president of the University in Cambridge and vice president of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences by Reverend John Lathrop.

[9:52] Okay, So who are the players involved? The letter writer Reverend John Lathrop sometimes spelled Lathrop, was the pastor of Second Church.
Second Church was a wooden congregational meeting house located in North Square in the North End, almost across the street from Paul Revere’s house.
Over the century or so before Lathrop took the pulpit, it was noteworthy. Is the Congregation of the Mather Family Increase Cotton and Samuel Mother? It all led the church in years past.
Lathrop took over during interesting times.
His leadership began in 17 68 just as the British Army landed in Boston and began a tense occupation during the years up to and during the Revolution.
Laughter patter. Reputation is a Patriot.
One of his most famous sermons was titled Innocent Blood Crying to God From the Streets of Boston,
a sermon occasion by the horrid murder of Messers, Samuel Grey, Samuel, Maverick, James Caldwell and Crispus addicts with Patrick Car since Dead.
And Christopher Monk, judged irrecoverable and several other badly wounded by a party of troops under the command of Captain Preston on the fifth of March 17 70 and preached the Lord’s Day following.

[11:13] In part because of his reputation as a supporter of the Patriot cause.
British regulars tore down his church building during the hard winter of the 17 75 to 17 76 occupation of Boston.
The soldiers burned his church for firewood.

[11:29] After the war, Lathrop remained in Boston, and he remained at the pulpit of the reconstructed second church until his death in 18 16.
The recipient of our letter was another congregational minister, widely known as an academic and polymath.
Joseph Willard was one of the charter members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
In 17 80 while Lathrop wasn’t inducted until a decade later, and 17 90,
after receiving his education at Harvard and preaching it, the First Congregational Church in Beverly Willard was serving is the president of Harvard, and at the timer letter was written a post he held from 17 81 to 80 No.
Four, and the introduction of the letter the American Academy of Arts and Sciences mentions the Boston Pierre.
This is a reference toe long Worf, which was proposed in 17 10 and built between 17 11 and 17 15.
At that time, the shoreline was much further inland, as you can see from any historic map or by looking down at the ground the next time you walk past the statue of Sam Adams at Faneuil Hall,
a line inscribed on the sidewalk near the statue traces the 18th century shoreline of the showman peninsula at a time when waves would have laughed almost out the foundation of today City Hall.

[12:45] Having by that time a long been the most important port in British North America.
There are already plenty of wars along Boston Harbor.
Carve, the new wharf that was constructed was massive, much longer than its predecessors.
It’s stretched 1/3 of a mile from the foot of King Street, today’s State Street, out into the harbor to reach deep water and allow larger vessels to dock.
Thus the name Long Worf, it was built of stone and wood and landfill have incorporated part of the ruins of the barrack Kado.
The barrack Otto was a defensive wall that had been built around the commercial wars in the harbor when Boston feared an attack by the Dutch in 16 72.
It was a 2200 foot semi circle standing 15 feet above the water and measuring 20 feet across at the top.
It had gaps that a ship could pass through slowly and carefully, but were small enough to keep out the powerful Dutch fleet.
When the expected attack didn’t come to pass, the barrack Otto was left to slowly rot and fall apart.

[13:48] Laughter’s letter will also mention Minos T. Worf. As the name suggests, this smaller wharf stuck off the side of Long wharf nearthe seaward End making a small T.
There are a few warehouses on the tee Worf, and it also stood far enough out into the harbor to be accessible by deep water vessels.

[14:08] Now let’s hear what the Reverend Lathrop has to say about an attempt to dig a well on Long wharf This well like that, which was dug some years ago on Minos T.
A part of the same pier commonly called Long Worf.
It’s holy surrounded with saltwater, against which it is secured with clay and strong boxes.
The workmen had advanced about 27 feet before they experienced any inconvenience. See from bad air.
The several strata through which they passed for good water were first about 15 feet, consisting of the materials of the pier.
Second, about 14 feet consisting of black mud, clay, sand and the heterogeneous substances which have been deposited by the sea.
Third, about four and 1/2 feet, consisting of very black mud, intermixed with the UN consumed roots of marsh grass shells and other marine productions.

[15:03] After passing this stratum, the workmen began to bore forth about 30 feet of light blue clay.
Fifth, about 23 feet of clay mixed with sand.
Sixth, about seven feet of hard and dark blue clay.
Seventh, about three feet of clay, stones and slate.
On the last stratum. The workmen used the drill and having broke through the crust of slate, the water gushed up with great force and rose to about 12 feet from the surface where it has stood ever since.

[15:39] So if it’s not clear from the 18th century language of that description, a work crew was digging a freshwater well for drinking water, unlocking Worf, a spot that’s completely surrounded by the salt water of Boston Harbor.
Digging by hand, they went down about 33 feet below the level of the pier, though the 1st 15 feet was just digging back out.
The fill that have been dumped in to create the war from the first place because they were well over 20 feet below water level, something like a case on a retaining wall was built around their pit and sealed watertight with clay.
Personally, if I was 30 feet in the hole, under the harbor. I’d want a bit more protection from the sea than that, but that’s how they did things back then.

[16:20] After the 1st 33 feet, the crew switched from digging too boring at the time. A shallow well might be created by driving a metal pipe with appointed perforated WellPoint into the ground.
But this well went much too deep for that.
From the bottom of the 33 foot pit, they drilled down over 60 more feet.
The inaugural 1914 edition of the Journal of the Boston Society of Civil Engineers quotes a report from the proprietors of Long Worf that goes into a bit more detail about how this part of the operation was carried out.
At about 30 feet below the surface, they hit a dense layer of clay.
Ah, hand dug shaft, about four feet in diameter, was sunk in the clay and lined with a stone curb to protect the well shaft, much like the wells you’d see in a movie.
Then they began to bore.

[17:11] We first made a hole in the bottom of the curb, 10 and 1/2 inches in diameter, then board into the clay eight feet, with an auger 10 inches in diameter.
We then took a log 15 feet long and 10 inches in diameter, with a hole through it of five inches in diameter, which would put into the hole at the bottom of the curb and drove it with a large iron.
Wait 13 feet, leaving two feet above the bottom of the curb, then, with an auger five inches in diameter, board through the hollow log, 35 feet from the bottom of the well through pure clay.
We then came to sand, from which we had a small quantity of freshwater.
Through this sand, we board about 23 feet and then came to pure clay.
We board through this clay about seven feet and came to Ah hardpan of slaves. On taking up, the auger found the water to rise fast.
We then put a tube four and 1/2 inches in diameter into the whole wheat board.
Which hollow tube extends from the bottom of the well to the hardpan of slate.
We then fixed a drill on the shank of the auger and let it down through the hollow tube and drilled into the hardpan bottom about three feet.
We found we had struck a spring, affording an abundant supply of water.

[18:24] Finally, almost 100 feet below the surface, of Long Worf. The crew hit fresh water.
The pit they dug then became a reservoir, making it easy to access the water supply.
The description says that the water float up the shaft and filled the reservoir to within 12 feet of the original surface.
That means that they created an artesian well, since the water was under enough pressure to rise 84 feet above the level where it was originally found.
To understand how an artesian well works, I dug up an article from the National Groundwater Association.
It says that the work crew must have hit a layer of confined groundwater.

[19:03] Groundwater, separated from atmospheric pressure by relatively impermeable material, is termed confined groundwater.
When such stones air penetrated by wells, the water rises above the point at which it was first found because it confined aquifers under pressure exceeding that of the atmospheric pressure.
The potential metric surfaces an imaginary surface above the aquifer to which the water from an artisan aquifers were would rise in a pipe.
The term potential metric surface means head or potential, indicating surface.
In the early development of some arty Asian basins, the potential metric surface was above the land surface, giving rise to a flowing artesian well.
More commonly, the potential metric surface is above the top of the art Asian aquifer.
But below the land surface, this type of well is referred to simply as an artesian well.

[19:55] 12 feet below the surface of the reservoir. That water stood at the potential metric surface of the aquifer.
We’ll include a diagram from this article in the show notes to illustrate how confined aquifer works now, why go to all this trouble to dig 100 feet into the harbor to create a fresh water?
Well, first of all, this was a period during which Boston was starting to grow rapidly and our water supply was just not keeping up.
Beginning in the late 18th century, but especially in the first half of the 19th century, Boston was desperate for sources of clean drinking water.
The few wells and natural springs in town couldn’t keep up with demand, and they eventually became polluted anyway.
So many residents relied on rainwater captured and cisterns until the constituent reservoir and aqueduct opened in 18 48.
Demand for drinking water always outstrips supply, on top of the underlying demand for drinking water. In Boston, there was a twofold need for water at long Worf in particular.
First, it was by far the largest and busiest pier in what was then one of the busiest ports in North America.
Though bustin would soon see that honored in New York and Philadelphia, the ships landing there needed large stores of freshwater toe keep the crew’s alive as they cross the Atlantic.

[21:12] Second, there was the threat of fire. The dwarves, the ships at the war ves and the large shops and warehouses on and around the wars were all vulnerable to fire.
The Great Boston Fire of 17 60 damage the warehouses at the foot of Long Worf and narrowly missed burning the wharf itself.
In more recent memory, town records show a reimbursement to Timothy Peas of engine number five for dowsing a fire on Long Worf in 17 90.
They also record a fire that began in the rope walks near Milk Street in 17 94 which also minutes the docks.

[21:47] Though the well on Long wharf was a success, it wasn’t the only way the proprietors of Long wharf plan to increase their supply of fresh water.
In 17 97 Salem minister and diarist William Bentley recorded a trip to Boston in September 17 97.
Tow watch. The launch of the USS Constitution, as we discussed on the show before the launch was unsuccessful, as was the 2nd 1 and the frigate only reached the water on the third attempt.
That didn’t stop Bentley from enjoying his time in Boston, and one of the stops was at, As he said, the long Worf, which has now another pump, and the old dwarves are repaired and have very large stores upon them.
What was the second pump on Long wharf? On January 4th of that year, the proprietors of Long wharf, it appeared at a meeting of the town selectman and,
requested permission to open the streets for the purpose of carrying water from some spring near Water Street to the WARF.

[22:48] After hearing from a subcommittee and considering the options, the Selectmen made their response.
On April 28 the proprietors of Boston Pierre, having applied to the Selectmen for Liberty to break up the streets in said town in orderto lay pipes of the purpose of conducting freshwater from some spring in Water Street to the said Worf,
the Selectmen took the same into consideration and conceiving it may be of advantage to the interest of the town in general, in case of fire,
voted that the said proprietors have liberty as their request to open the streets provided that previous to their undertaking it the intern to an agreement in writing.
So to conduct the opening as to be least obstructive to the business of the town,
to put the streets which they shall so open in good repair, to the satisfaction of the Selectmen and from time to time hereafter to make all repairs to the same, we shall become necessary to be made in consequence of such opening,
that the pumper pumps to be placed on, said, dwarfs, shallot all times in the day be free for the use of all the inhabitants of the town, improving the stores or laboring on, said Worf.
And further that if in any future period the town or any of the inhabitants thereof for the general benefit of the town shall think proper to place one or more pumps in ST ST, they shall have the privilege of receiving water from or through this, said pipes.

[24:07] Today, we’d call that a public private partnership. The private company that owned the Worf was allowed to tap into the common property of the town’s water,
tear up the town streets and as long as they fix things up, When they were done, they were allowed to profit from the sales of the water that resulted.
All the city asked for was maintenance access to the water in case of fire and for dock workers to be able to take a drink when they were thirsty.

[24:32] Our letter from Lathrop continues upon entering the third stratum, consisting of black mud intermixed with the roots of marsh grass shells and other marine productions, the workmen perceived an uncommon fetid smell,
faintness and difficulty of breathing succeeded.
And two so great a degree that they left the well and could not be persuaded to go down again some hours later on Mr Tyl Stone, the master workmen.
It was not present when the laborers experienced a difficulty of breathing and left the well, having occasion to measure the width at the bottom in order to fix a curb, insisted on being let down.
He had been at the bottom, but a few minutes before you was seen to fall and remain without motion.

[25:16] Quick update from the editing room and the next sentence. I say the word soldiers, but I should have said the word workers. Sorry about that.
Just to recap, the soldiers dug down into a layer of soil about 30 feet below the surface.
There was made up of swampy materials that hadn’t fully rotted.
That’s not completely unexpected, as it was hermetically sealed, and without air or microbes, the process of decomposition would be suspended.
There was a terrible smell at the bottom of the pit, and the workers had trouble breathing and began to feel dizzy.
They climbed out and they stayed out then, since either nobody warned him or he didn’t listen.
Our Mr Tyl Stone went down into the pit to take some measurements, and he suddenly fell face first on the ground.
Nobody was sure if he was alive or dead at this point in the letter, despite having not read it for I’m sure 30 years I was immediately reminded of Little House on the Prairie.

[26:13] Except for a spate of articles in podcast in the past couple of years and exposed author Laura Ingalls Wilder is a supporter of far right political causes.
I haven’t thought of the Little House books since my father used to read them to me at bedtime.
Nevertheless, I was immediately reminded of a scene in the book that I’ve since learned is from Chapter 12.
A neighbor named Mr Scott is helping Mon Pa dig a new well when the neighbors suddenly collapses at the bottom of the well, Pa immediately jumps down into the well ties the rope around Mr Scott, and then he and Ma haul him up to the surface.
This part of the letter really strikes my fancy because before long, the laborers would try something just like Pa Ingalls did.
Lathrop recalls. His condition alarmed. The other workmen and one of them, whose name was Bunting, was let down with a small rope in his hand to pass about the body of Mr Tyl Stone in order to pull him up.
But before Bunting was able to make the rope fast, he fell.
Although the danger was now known to be very great, the anxiety to save the two men, who are in a dying condition was superior to the danger.
Ah, Mr Hancock, contrary to the advice of all present went down but no sooner reached the bottom. Then he fell with the other two.
There were now three men lying, apparently dead on the bottom of the well.

[27:32] While Pa angles might have scrambled right back out of the well after tying a rope around Mr Scott, things didn’t work out as well for bunting her.
Hancock, a seafaring man whose name is Clark, came to the place at that moment and would have immediately gone down.
Had not Mr Jonathan Ball sh who furnished me with the materials for this communication prevented, um, until by an experiment which he had tried on like occasion, he might lessen the danger.

[28:00] This is the point in Little House on the prairie, when Pa fixes everything by sending a little cloth bag of gunpowder down into the well and lighting it off.
I was never quite clear as a kid, whether this was supposed to burn off all the bad, well, gas, or whether the explosion was supposed to drive all the well gas up and out and let clean air in.
But perhaps the next passage from our letter can shed some light on the subject.
A common matter such as merchants rap about bales of goods was fastened to a rope and let down by working this Matt very quick.
Up and down. The heavy mephitic air was so mixed and diluted with the more pure air in the upper part of the well that the men who lay in a dying condition at the bottom experienced the benefit in a little time. They showed appearances of life by moving their limbs.
Mr. Clark was then let down, and by taking one after another in his arms, he raised him from the horrible pit in which they must have soon died.
Had not timely aid been afforded hm as a side note. Jonathan Boss was a pumping block maker, so it’s likely that he was deeply involved in creating this new well, and he would have understood how to apply the principles of a pump to circulate the air in the well.

[29:10] So before Mr Clark pulled UPA somebody stiff, Matt was lowered into the hole.
I couldn’t find a source to tell us what sort of material this Matt would have been made off.
Then it was pumped up and down vigorously, much like a Southern lady fanning herself in church.
The mat got the air in the pit moving and allowed some fresh air to mix in with the so called mephitic air,
props to Mr Clark, though, for climbing out of a 30 foot pit while carrying three grown men, that would be a pretty impressive accomplishment. Even without the marsh gas.

[29:42] Today we know that marsh gas is a mix of methane, carbon dioxide and sometimes hydrogen sulfide, and it forms in a large volume of vegetative material decomposes in an anaerobic environment, which is exactly what John Lathrop described.
They didn’t have the terminology to know the source of his mephitic air.
Lathrop knew that the stratum of non decomposed swamp material was to blame for the debilitating delay.
The stratum of black mud intermixed with the roots of grass and the relics of the C 12 or 14 feet below.
The present flats is a curious article in natural history and affords evidence that the Peninsula of Boston is now very different in its dimensions, from what it was many ages ago,
with great esteem, I am, sir your most humble servant, John Lathrop.

[30:31] Lathrop supposition that the stratum of mud and swamp grass myth that the Peninsula of Boston had changed over time was exactly correct.
Of course, over the past 400 years, Bostonians have deliberately changed the shape of the shaman peninsula, filling in the millpond, extending the war ves and building a neighborhood where the title Back Bay used to be.
But long before European colonizers landed on these shores and began altering the shoreline, nature was doing the same thing during the last ice age about 10,000 years ago.
Much of what we now know is Boston Harbor was a low, gradually sloping valley.
The mystic and Charles rivers flowed much further into the basin than they do now and the Boston Harbor Islands were a series of hills breaking up the grassy valley.
The shoreline back then may have been a SW. Far out in the harbor is Boston Light, which is now a lonely beacon miles from the downtown shoreline.
As the glaciers receded and global sea levels rose, sediments buried the old title marshes, which were now on the bottom of the harbor, preserving them in an oxygen free environment where the swamp gas formed and late waiting.

[31:43] So how did everything turn out with the new? Well, we’ll give the last word to the proprietors of Long Worf, as quoted by the Journal of the Bust in Society of Civil Engineers in 1914.

[31:56] The well it long Worf was began Monday, June 12th 17 97 began to bore for a spring.
Monday, September 4th I Got to the Spring Wednesday, September 6th at 11 o’clock put in the pump Saturday, September 9th at 12 o’clock, began to receive pay for water. Monday, September 11th.
Being just three months from the time it was begun, the engineers included a note for the modern reader who might wonder what happened to the well it Long wharf.
This well, which was situated about 150 feet east of Atlantic Avenue, was cut off by the East Boston tunnel.

[32:36] To learn more about the marsh bias matter in the well on Longworth, check out this week’s show notes at hub history dot com slash 177 We’ll have a link to the original article in the Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
We’ll also link to the Journal of the Boston Society of Civil engineers the article about artesian wells from the National Groundwater Association and to Reverend William Bentley’s Diary.
We’ll also have a link to city records showing how water was piped from Water Street to the docks to show how Long wharf was the defining characteristic of 18th in early 19th century Boston.
I’ll include a number of historic maps and illustrations as well.
And of course, we’ll have links to information about our upcoming virtual event and the centennial of the Long wharf Corporation, this week’s Boston Book Club pick.

[33:27] If you’d like to leave us some feedback, you can email us at podcast of hub history dot com.
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Jake:
[34:37] That’s all for now. Stay safe out there, listeners.