Yank Masscraff of Old Bosfon
Yank had the hest of all possible rearing-a colonial settler's education and a "college of Cambridge" degree. As a boy he learned to evaporate sea water to obtain the salt needed in the household for preserving fish and curing skins. Using the ashes saved from the fireplace, he learned to leach out the potash so his mother could use the lve, first for washing and later to make candles and soap. H' dug clay from the hanks and helped his sisters burn i t into pottery and bricks. H e found a way to obtain tar and lampblack by burning wood on a sloping clay floor and under a loose cover of soil. From his father he learned to tan skins into leather, using crushed hemlock hark and lime, and to make glue from goat horns. At college he developed deep interests in three areas: women, alcoholic beverages, and alchemy. in the There - - ~ ~ beine - - " little market for his talents and ex~ertise areas of his college specialties a t the time of graduation, Yank used the . ~ r e s t i e eof his deeree and his ~recolleeeeducation to make a living. A month after leavine colleae, he ~ e r s u a d e dthe General C ~ u rro t grant him threLthou&d a&of land in what now is Oumm to set U D a salt works that u,ould make one hundred tons of salt per year from sea water. His plan was to scale up the Drocess used in colonial homes, hut introducina shallow iron'veest!ls and more carcful quality contn)l in the hope of obrainingil hettrr product. Ten yrars later the salt works had yet toout-perform the Hoston housewives; i t had never pn,d u c d one hundred tons (,f salt in any one year, and thequality still left much to he desired. Meanwhile, Tank had become involved in a few other enterprises. Included among these were factories for the manufacture of iron, glass, potash, tar, saltpeter, copper, alum and other chemicals. Also, his interest in alchemy continued. He huilt a laboratory in which he conducted experiments designed to make gold and silver from more common elements; he acquired a library in chemistry and alchemy to rival that of the best colleges. And he pursued with vigor earlier interests in secular activities. Except for the latter, few of these enterprises were more successful than the salt works. All of them yielded products, hut never in the amounts or with the quality expected. Afew created serious problems. One of these was Yank's attempt to build a glass factory and make glass. By 1770,the quality of glass manufactured in New England was only minimally satisfactory, and the costs of imported bottles and other glassware were becoming prohibitive. Taking advantage of his prominence as Boston's leading industrialist, Tank obtained &rmissim from the colonial legiilnture M raise 3000 pounds by lottery. This was to he used to huild a glass fartorv in Sourh Hoston. The lotterv a succc;is. Yank erected a larg'conical kiln of brick, 100 feet iong by 60 feet wide at the foot of Essex Street. I t was a most impressive structure, hut as a kiln for making glass it was a complete failure. Soon it was taken down and replaced with a less pretentious wooden, hut brick-lined, building. Six years later this kiln hegan to produce glass on a regular basis. A major difficulty in manufacturing glass of acceptable quality was obtaining starting materials-sand, limestone, ~~
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Ieditorially potash, soda, etc.-f suitable purity. Therefore,Yank, with characteristic confidence, set about to remedy matters. One step was to manufacture soda from salt by a new French process a t the Q.uincv salt works. When the large amounts of hydrogen chloride fknes produced in the process hegan to annoy the workers, to disintegrate the mortar in the walls of neighboring buildings, and to kill the vegetation in the area, Yank built towers to absorb the gas in water and he pumped the solution into the harbor. The Boston Tea Party came just in time to still the complaints of boatmen that some mysterious agent was causing rivets and nails to drop out of their hnatr
The rapidly approaching war with England, and the colonies' need for a plentiful and continuous supply of saltpeter for gunpowder called for unusual measures. With scarcely a dissenting vote (times were trying and no women were a resent) the General Court of Massachusetts took Yank's advice and issued a decree that "every plantation in the Colony shall erect a house in length about 20 or 30 foote, and 20 foote wide. . .to make saltpeter from urine of men [and from] beasts. mates. hennes, boas and horses'duna." At no time in its longhistory has the ai; of Boston been less hospitable or more volatile. Almost to a citizen, Bostonians turned to spirits for relief. Most, like Yank, preferred the liquid variety, hut as with other colonial products, liquid spirits were destined to be influenced by the Yank Masscraft touch. Although the competition in this area was far greater than in others-in Boston there were 30 distilleries making rum and several licensed breweries making beer and malt-Yank's distillery soon became the pride of the colonies. Yank was proud of i t too, and on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of his graduation from the "college of Camhridge," he provided the drinks a t the commencement. In all. four barrels of beer. one barrel of rum and eighteen gallons of wine were consumed. I t was a real blast; even President Rather's dog was smashed. One good thing came from the affair, however. Yank convinced the President and Overseers that it was time to add a Professor of Chemistry to the faculty. The point was well taken. After all, the college was now 150 years old, and it had benefited considerably from the prosperity chemistry had hrought to the community. Also, industries in the area disliked having to import chemistry graduates from "strange" colleges to run their plants. When Yank reached the ape of 95, Boston held a celebration in his honor. Rising in appreciation, he recited the usual amenities and offered the following eight lines as "just about all of substance I have t o say": Let reason be "our constant rule Fur nillure. trusr me, i5 nt, fool When to uur ken great thoughrs she hrings Help her do the uncommon things Friends, I pray you always savor Ladies' charms, and seek their favor When times are trvine and nace is swift This is providence' sustain& gift WTL
Volume 53, Number 8,August 1976 / 467
