Made by Hand: a celebration of exceptional work from the North Bennet Street School – Examples of hand-crafted work by school students and alumni of North Bennet Street School. The exhibit features dozens of examples of elegant furniture and cabinetry, musical instruments, one-of-a-kind jewelry, hand-bound books and more.

When:  Monday, May 7 through Friday May 18, 8:00 am – 8:00 pm

Where:  In the main lobby of 125 High Street, Boston financial district.

Free admission.
For more information, call  617-227-0155 or visit
http://www.nbss.edu/alumni/alumni-and-student-exhibit/index.aspx

First you might want to click here  >>Feast Schedule << to check out which days are Processions Only and which days have Feasts and Processions.  You’ll also find the Feast Schedule under “Visit, Summer Feasts.”  You’ll have a grand time listening to the music, sampling the food and getting into the “I’m having a good-time-spirit.”

Then, try practicing your “Itanglish.” This Four Part series can also be found by going to “Our North End, North End Today.”    Might come in handy when you’re hungry and want to order a “sungweech” or a piece of “la kekka.”  Have fun.

Have you walked by the new offices of designer Andie Day on Hanover Street recently – just past the Fire Station? It’s a visual delight to behold. Either by day or night, the office is aglow with colorful fabrics and glass, flashy laptops, photos … and activity. This is Andie Day’s home-away-from-home.

Design for Life is not exclusively about the elderly. “It is a multi-generational approach to living well”. For example, Day refers to recent demographic reports that indicate that over the next few decades, the number of Americans 65-and-older will double. By 2030, they will comprise almost 34% of the national population. And today, many middle-agers are coming to realize that they still have almost one-third of their lives ahead of them. “This is why we consider our Design for Life approach as multi-generational,” she says.

Briana moves easily across several different music genres. She sings hit Italian favorites by Mina, Mariella Nava, Giorgia Todrani, and Eros Ramazzotti – to name several – as well as pop American tunes, and of course her own unique original songs. No matter what genre she performs, Briana Cash delivers the voice of an angel – oftentimes sweet and enthralling, but at other times, hard-edged, and angry – as she taps out the cadence on the strings of her guitar.

LISTEN TO: Il Cielo in Una Stanza

In June 2008, Briana released her first CD album, “All I Want” – a collection of strong pop-acoustic influences with a jazzy, intimate vibe. The album has received considerable acclaim, impressive airplay around Boston and on college radio, and is available online at iTunes, CDbaby and Amazon.com.

“Take a Walk with Me” – one of the favorites on this debut album – has also made a persuasive contribution beyond the world of music. A strong advocate and supporter of womens’ health and education charities, Briana has recorded three Public Service Announcements for “Susan G. Komen for the Cure”, the global leader of the breast cancer movement. She donated her award-winning song, “Take a Walk with Me” to the global organization.

In October 2009, Briana performed at Boston’s Hard Rock Café benefit concert, Pinktober Celebration, “Take a Walk with Me – Susan G. Komen Benefit Concert”, where she autographed a pink guitar donated by First Act Guitars as part of a benefit raffle.

In addition, Briana has been representing The River-92.5 FM radio for many events including “The City of Lights Parade” in Lowell, “The Going Green Expo” at the Bayside Expo Center and “The Down to Earth Expo” at the Hynes Convention Center. She was one of the top 10 finalists selected in 92.5 FM’s “The River Rising Star Contest.”

A 2004 graduate of Boston’s Berklee College of Music, she received Berklee’s “BEST” Scholarship and performed at The Berklee Performance Center Women’s Show (2002) with an original song she wrote, selected from several hundred submissions.

Briana enjoys working with other artists and has been writing music for boy bands. She is currently working on new material for her forthcoming album as well as some upcoming singles and projects slated for release in 2011.

To learn more about Briana Cash and hear her music, visit the official Briana Cash web site (www.brianacash.com), Myspace (www.myspace.com/brianacash) and Facebook (www.facebook.com/BrianaCashMusic).

by Guild Nichols

January 15th marked the day ninety-two years ago when a torrent of molasses flooded Boston’s North End waterfront killing 21 people and injuring 150. Two years later, the State Legislature voted to avert still another potential disaster – by removing a massive illuminating gas tank on Prince Street in the heart of the neighborhood – that threatened the lives of tens of thousands of residents.

Now, nine decades later, the City government and State Legislature are confronted with another pending disaster – the threat posed by truckloads of explosive materials, hazardous chemicals and toxic wastes that are transported daily through the North End, the City center and Boston’s financial district. Are there lessons to be learned over these past 92 years and, if so, what are they?

Sticky Business

Although the “Great Molasses Flood” entered into Boston folklore almost a century ago, its full historical dimension has only recently been told with the publication of Dark Tide (2003) by Stephen Puleo.

As Puleo documents in his account of the disaster and the subsequent judicial investigation, the tank’s collapse was not the object of a terrorist attack (read: anarchist sabotage), but was due to structural weakness in its original construction. U.S. Industrial Alcohol (USIA) had built the tank hastily with inferior steel plates. When it leaked from the seams, the company failed to shore up the structure.

In the final analysis and after five years of incriminating testimony, USIA was found to be liable for the disaster and agreed to an out-of-court settlement of $628,000 or the equivalent of more than $60 million today – still a relatively small sum given the company’s extreme negligence and culpability.

The Gassy

Just as this molasses investigation was getting underway in late 1919, neighborhood heads and furor turned to “The  Gassy” where a five-story gas holder tank (called a “gasometer”) stood at the corner of Prince and Snow Hill streets.

“The huge gasometer in the North End which overshadows nearby houses crowded with persons who fear it will collapse like the molasses tank at North End Park.” (Boston Traveler, February 11, 1919)

Built and operated by the Boston Consolidated Gas Company, the massive North End tank was just one of 18 other gasometers located in Boston. And had it not been for the January 1919 molasses disaster, it is possible that community concern about the dangers posed by such a lethal industrial behemoth in its midst might have been slower to awaken. As it was, it took the forceful words of a local Italian newspaper editor and an outspoken 32-year-old lawyer (and future Superior Court judge) to galvanize public opinion.

I am grateful to Victor Brogna who has shared with me several long-lost articles from LA GAZZETTA DEL MASSACHUSETTS (the forerunner of today’s North End POST-GAZETTE). The first story appeared just after the molasses disaster under the headline: “Il Sentimento Italiano Per La Rimozione Del Gassometro Dal N. End” (“Italian Feeling for the Removal of the North End Gasometer”).

James V. Donnaruma, founder of this Italian language newspaper, along with Vincent Brogna from Montefalcione, a recent law school graduate from Boston University, played instrumental roles in shaping public opinion for the removal of the gas tank from the North End.

By early February 1st, emotions had come to a boil. As the Boston Traveler reported, “On Saturday the citizens choked the streets of the North End. They hired bands and were planning to storm the State House and City Hall to protest. With the help of the police, the leaders dispersed the thousands and the parade was sidetracked for the time being.”

Brogna and Donnamura decided to organize a protest committee –“Comizio di Protesta Per Rimuovere La Gas Tank Dal North End” – and called for a public meeting to be held on Sunday, February 9th, at the North Bennet Street Industrial School. “The school was packed to the doors with protesting citizens and the movement against the gas tank gained tremendous momentum,” the Boston Traveler reported.

Donnaruma said, “Everyone down here is bitterly against the tank remaining. It is in the very heart of the residential section. We have 20,000 signatures of protest today and they are coming in with every mail.”

Brogna added, “I believe the chances are very small that such a tank will explode, but such a thing is remotely possible. If that element of possibility exists and the people are terrorized, there is only one thing to do, and that is to have it removed to a point of safety. If anything did happen as things are today, it would wreck the entire district.”

He concluded: “Aside from the possible danger, the tank is a great nuisance.  It is extremely noisy when it is filling, and besides, a terrible odor is arising from it … Who was there whoever expected that a harmless tank of molasses would blow up?  Manmade things are not infallible.”

W. A. Wood, chief engineer of the Boston Consolidated Gas Company, said that the chances of a gas holder exploding were “practically nil.” “While this particular tank is a newer one, we have one tank in that locality which has been there practically one hundred years without the slightest kind of an accident … The risk is so near nothing that the gas company does not even insure such tanks.”

[Note:  Seven years later, on November 14, 1927, a huge cylindrical gasometer – the largest in the world at that time - containing 5 million cubic feet of natural gas, exploded in the heart of an industrial zone in Pittsburgh, PA leaving 28 people dead, hundreds injured, and a square-mile of devastation.]

“Gasometers” (c. 1930) by Cyril E. Power (1872-1951), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

As a result of these and other public meetings, two bills were introduced in the Legislature, one calling for the immediate withdrawal of all gas from the North End tank and the other for the removal of all gas tanks “within 100 rods [1650 feet] of a dwelling house”. This latter House Bill No. 1891 further stipulated that “any person, firm or corporation who violates the provisions of [this bill] shall be punished by a fine of one thousand dollars for each day that such violation continues.”

Lessons Learned

One of the primary lessons learned from the molasses disaster was the need for stronger regulations with respect to construction safety standards, which in turn influenced the adoption of engineering certification laws nationwide. The investigation marked, as Puleo notes, a “symbolic turning point in the country’s attitudes toward Big Business” and the need for new governmental regulations to safeguard the public. The events also highlighted the central importance of active citizen involvement in matters of community concern.

The molasses disaster had literally “hit” the North End without warning, yet served to activate the neighborhood as no prior event had ever done. In the debate over “The Gassy”, community leaders played a number of crucial roles: shaping the public debate about removal of the gas tank, informing the community about its dangers and publicizing the extreme seriousness of the threat. And by capturing the attention of the general news media, they succeeded in transforming what was inherently a local neighborhood issue into matters of serious State concern.

In this way, they also succeeded in restoring some measure of public faith in the political process. By reaching out to elected and appointed City officials and to the State legislature, they sought to counter prevailing concerns that economic and political power rested too much in the hands of too few.

How we confront today’s issues surrounding the transportation of hazardous materials throughout our City (Hazmat) and the conveyance of liquid natural gas (LNG) through our harbor will depend upon: our learning the lessons from the past; our abilities to surmount special, narrow political interests; the strength, character and commitment of our elected leaders; and, above all else, an informed, concerned and active citizen involvement.

Where: the Nazzaro Center, 30 North Bennet Street, in Boston’s North End

Who: All ages 15 to 105 are welcome to audition.

Young men or women who can believably portray a male 15-year-old are especially encouraged. No preparation required. All inquiries should be made to callmelbn@gmail.com.

11 George Street Somerville, MA 02145 (Founded 1905)

Click here to visit the web site of Madonna Di Anzano.  The image of the Madonna was discovered 400 years ago in a small village known as Anzano. It all began one day when a young farmer’s cow wandered away. As the farmer was searching for it, he happened upon some shrubs. As he got closer, he noticed a beam of light shining through… Click here for the full story.

Societá San Giuseppe DiRiesi Saint Joseph Society

9 Charter Street Boston,MA 02113 Tel. 617-720-1368 (Established 1925)

The Saint Joseph’s Society originated in 1925 at the instigation of North End Italian immigrants and their descendants from the Riesi area of Cantana, Italy. Tradition has it that Saint Joseph was much older than Mary. He was a carpenter and apparently did not seek the limelight. He did what he had to do and what he knew was the right thing to do. He unquestionably married Mary when she was with Child and he unquestionably fled to Egypt and remained there with Mary and the baby Jesus until it was safe to return.Click here for the full story.

St. Agrippina Di Mineo Society

459 Hanover Street Boston, MA 02113 (Founded 1914)

A Brief History of Saint AgrippinaSaint Agrippina Di Mineo was a beautiful blond princess who was unmercifully tortured to death by the Emperor Valerian in 256 AD. After her death, her body was taken from Rome to Mineo, Sicily, by three holy women; Bassa, Paula and Agatonica. The story of their journey is full of the miraculous.Click here for the full story.

Madonna Della Cava Society

3 Battery Street Boston, MA 02109 Tel.617-523-8842The Miracle of the Madonna Della Cavaby Ellen M. Johnston

In the early 13th century, in the village of Trapani, in the northwest corner of Sicily lived a young mute boy. He had lost the ability to speak at birth. One night, the Madonna Della Cava visited him in a dream. She said to him: “Come in and uncover me from the ground”. The Madonna told the young boy where she lay buried, in the nearby town of Ronzi in the central province of Enna. The next morning, the boy awoke and tried to tell his mother about his dream. But the mother dismissed his story, thinking it to be only his imagination.Click here for the full story of Madonna Della Cava.

The Fisherman’s Society Madonna Del Soccorso di Sciacca Society of Boston

11 Lewis Street Boston, MA 02113

The Fisherman’s Feast is an annual event that began in Boston in 1911 and is based on a tradition that goes back to the 16th century in Sciacca Sicily. The Feast is based on the devotion of the fishermen from Sciacca to the Madonna del Soccorso (Our Lady of Help). When the fishermen immigrated to America in the early 1900′s, they brought their traditions with them. The current Feast is organized by the descendants of those original immigrants and still includes a procession of the Madonna through the streets of the North End.Click here to visit the Fisherman’s Feast Society web site.

San Antonio Di Padova Da Montefalcione, Inc.

201-203 Endicott Street Boston, MA 02113 (Founded 1919)
Saint Anthony’s Feast is celebrated each year in the North End of Boston on the weekend of the last Sunday of August. Begun by Italian immigrants from Montefalcione, Italy, in 1919, it has become the largest Italian Religious Festival in New England. Italian foods, religious services, parades, festivities, games and live music and entertainment highlight this exceptional Feast on the beautifully-decorated Endicott and Thatcher streets in the heart of Boston’s historic North End. Click here to visit the Saint Anthony’s Feast web site.

Maria delle Grazie Society, Boston, MA 02113

St. Lucy Society

201-203 Endicott Street Boston, MA 02113 (Founded 1920)

Click here to visit the Saint Lucy Society web site

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Santa Rosalia Di Palermo Society

Sacred Heart Parish North Square Boston, MA 02113 (Founded in 1939)

Society of St. Jude Thaddeus of Boston

328 Hanover Street Boston, MA 02113