There really is no length to which we will not go to bring you all the agrobiodiversity news that’s fit to print. Case in point coming up. Jeremy gets a heads-up from his Google Alert on sorghum. It’s from an unlikely — even suspicious — source, but he dutifully clicks on the link and is rewarded with a reference to the “Sorghum Molasses Purity Act of 1837.” He dismisses it as a joke, but also shares the link with me, knowing I’m in need of a laugh after a heavy week wrestling with a recalcitrant donor report. Being of a more trusting disposition, and never having run across error, humour or misinformation on the internet, I quickly google, fully expecting to hit a learned wikipedia article on the said piece of legislation, surely a notorious example of anti-diversity agricultural protectionism of the most egregious kind.
Right. No such thing, of course. Google knows nothing of any Sorghum Molasses Purity Acts, of 1837 or any other date. But my efforts on your behalf are most emphatically not totally wasted. For now I — and you — know about the
Great Boston Molasses Flood of January 1919 when a molasses storage tank owned by the Purity Distilling Company burst, sending a two-story-high wave of molasses through the streets of the North End of Boston.
And who wouldn’t give up a slice of lunchtime to be able to quote such a fact?
Oh, and by the way. There may not have been a Sorghum Molasses Purity Act of 1837, but there was a Sugar and Molasses Act of 1733, which seems to be an example of agricultural protectionism of the most egregious kind.