Fichter on Tea in Lexington and Boston

In this sestercentennial season of the Boston Tea Party, I like to remind people how tea came to North America from the other side of the world.

To get to a colonist’s breakfast table, that tea traveled across trade routes negotiated by diplomats, managed by merchants using a worldwide credit system, backed up by a navy. Of all the commodities the British Empire might tax to pay for the benefits it brought British subjects, tea is a logical choice.

Another thing coming from the other side of the world is James R. Fichter, professor at the University of Hong Kong and author of the just published Tea: Consumption, Politics, and Revolution, 1773–1776.

And as long as he’s in Massachusetts this month, the logical choice is for him to speak in as many venues as he can.

I’ve already mentioned Fichter’s appearance at Revolutionary Spaces’ Old South Meeting House on 11 December and in the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts Masons symposium on 16 December. (I’m on that second bill as well.)

Here are three more chances to hear Prof. Fichter talk tea.

Thursday, 14 December, 7:00 to 8:30 P.M.
Lexington Historical Society
Lexington Depot

The Boston Tea Party we think we know is a product of post-independence public memory and propaganda. The real Boston Tea Party was divisive, and it did not even destroy all the East India Company’s tea. A shipload survived from the William, safely stored in Castle William in Boston Harbor, where it warped Boston politics until it was consumed in 1775.

Tickets are $15, $10 for society members. Register here.

Sunday, 17 December, 1:00 to 3:00 P.M.
Paul Revere House
North Square, Boston

Paul Revere’s first documented political ride happened on 17 Dec 1773 as he set off with local news for other ports. Michael Lepage will give three performances as Revere, describing that mission as “the Express that went from hence...after the Destruction of the Tea.” Fichter, whose book describes how those other ports dealt with their own tea shipments, will be signing copies. Both events are accessible with regular museum admission. 

Thursday, 21 December, 3:00 P.M.
Colonial Society of Massachusetts
87 Mount Vernon Street, Boston

Fichter will present his book’s thesis, tracing how the power of consumerism (as the term is used by eighteenth-century historians) outlasted the boycott of tea that North American Whigs promoted for political reasons.

This is a regular monthly meeting of the society, and the public can attend or tune into the C.S.M. live stream.

Tea: Consumption, Politics, and Revolution, 1773–1776 is published by Cornell University Press at a university press price. For a limited time folks can receive a 30% discount by ordering online direct from the press and using the promotion code 09BCARD.