A real warm mess: Talks, music, baked goods planned for 100th anniversary of the Great Molasses Flood

Stephen Puleo, who literally wrote the book about the 1919 Great Molasses Flood (Dark Tide), will give a talk on the deadly, brown, gooey tsunami at the BPL on Jan. 15 - 100 years to the day after a shoddy, 50-foot-tall molasses tank on Commercial Street in the North End exploded, sending a deep river of warm molasses along the waterfront at 35 m.p.h., killing 21 people and several horses, demolishing a fire house and warping the elevated tracks that then ran above the street.

Puleo speaks at 6 p.m. in the Rabb Lecture Hall at the BPL main library in Copley Square.

If you miss Puleo there, you can see him in a panel discussion on Jan. 31 at the Old South Meeting House, discussing "The Great Molasses Flood Revisited: Misremembered Molasses:"

The Great Molasses Flood of 1919, when remembered, is often interpreted in a dismissive, comical manner. How does this case compare with other incidences of historical events that are interpreted or "curated" at the expense of accuracy and respect for human experience? How can we bring complexity back to events that have long been relegated to the realm of local folklore? Local scholars will discuss the question of misunderstood history by looking at the Great Molasses Flood, the fight for women's suffrage and Leif Erickson.

This session begins at 6 p.m.; free registration is required.

Also on Jan. 15, the Model Cafe in Allston will host the Boston Molasses Disaster 100th Anniversary Remembrance Party:

On the 100th year anniversary of the Boston Molasses Disaster,
join us at the Model Cafe for a night of comedy, music, poetry, photography, and molasses filled baked goods.

Starts at 7 p.m.

Boston Harbor Now holds a Molasses Flood walk at 10 a.m. on Jan. 19.

Earlier:
Remember the Great Molasses Flood - in Lego.
Cool air made Great Molasses Flood extra deadly, Harvard researchers say.
Up to their knees in molasses, looking for victims.
The physics of the Great Molasses Flood: Those pesky non-Newtonian fluids.
It made all the papers.