Posted on 04/09/2014 5:32:45 PM PDT by matt04
Boston Fire battled an 8-alarm fire in the city's East Boston section Wednesday evening.
Officials say the fire was reported at 85 Lexington St. just before 7:30 p.m. As of 8 p.m., firefighters were blasting water of the tops of the affected building and surrounding buildings.
There's no word yet on any injuries. It's unknown if anyone was in the building at the time and if it's currently occupied.
Winds are gusting at 30 mph from the northwest, according to NECN's Joe Joyce.
(Excerpt) Read more at necn.com ...
I should have added - Cotton Mather introduced the concept of inoculations Boston. Small pox was a real scourge in those days and it was Cotton’s slave that told him about getting inoculated when he was in Africa - or so the story goes. Cotton tried to get the residents to accept the idea and had some success.
“A lot of Boston folks still feel superior to Southerners feeling, falsely, that northerners would never be slave owners. Of course they are fooling themselves. Northerners owned a lot of slaves. Northerners used cotton in their mills and made a lot of money off the work of slaves. It’s fun to visit the cemetery where he’s buried and tell people he was a slave owner. Of course they won’t believe it.”
I’ve been to his grave but didn’t know he was a slave owner, but being a historian, I wouldn’t be surprised. They were far fewer than in the south though. Most New England farmers worked their own farms with their children and had no servants, etc. (nor extra money to buy them) Though they may have hired slaves here and there, which was done at the time.
I do know that John Adams adamantly refused to either own or hire slaves. He was ahead of his time in recognizing that slavery was a scourge and anti-liberty in the extreme.
I’ve read that there were many many indentured servants up in the north.
I’ve read through a lot of records for the years 1840 and on and just about every farm family had at least one person living in the house who wasn’t related and were either apprenticed or who appeared to work in exchange for room and board. I haven’t looked at records earlier than that though. As a historian, if you have then can you tell me more about those indentured servants? Thanks.
p.s. I found out recently I had ancestors in Lexington and Cambridge who were slave owners. oops - now I’ll have to pay reparations!!
Well, indentured servitude is different from slavery. Indentured servants were either, like you said, apprenticed, or were working something off. Or the compensation for their work was something other than money, like you said, room and board, etc. (earning their keep). Or they had to work off their travel costs, something like that. Sometimes they were contracts, which they would work off over time. These types have been around since ancient times and still exist today. I served in the military and had an eight year contract, I had to do such and such until such and such a date. Officers in the military have contracts. The military pays for their school as long as they serve to pay off the debt but if they resign their commissions they have to pay the govt. back.
Slavery was odious because people were actually owned and sold (as opposed to somebody buying an indentured contract), and were not compensated for their work. They were considered property, like cattle. The very thought is disgusting.
You’re welcome. Really scary thing about this was that the ladder on the fire truck couldn’t quite make it up to the floor he jumped down to, let alone to the floor right above him. Don’t know if they have one with more reach and it just wasn’t available or if they don’t have any that are quite long enough.
Mayor is embroiled in an argument with the Fire Department and has been reducing the availability of some EMT units on a rolling basis. Not sure what it is all about but inadequate fire, EMT and police protection does not bode well for the 4th largest city in the U.S. She is term limited now and has her own agenda which thus far does not appear to be in Houston’s best interests. She wants a civil rights commission appointed to deal with discrimination issues like the one of the cake baker in a western state who wouldn’t bake a cake for a gay wedding. We also have our own local version of Sharpton in the form of Quannell X - a loud mouth Black activist. Difficult to fight off all the constant attacks by him, activist for illegals and all the gay population.
From what I have read the life of the indentured servant could be much worse than the life of a typical apprentice. It was sometimes as bad or worse than the life of a slave. Here is an interesting link
Thank you. It must be the Boston one I was thinking of. Sorry for late reply.
Thank you for the info. Sorry for late reply.
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