Historic Island Figure Mrs. Sarah Allen Hosts Tea and Politics
Saturday, December 16, at 3:00 PM, on the 250th Anniversary of The Boston Tea Party: Historic Island Figure Mrs. Sarah Allen Hosts Tea and Politics at The Chilmark Public Library.
With the passage of the Tea Act, political tensions are high on Martha’s Vineyard - and nowhere more so than in the busy port of Holmes Hole, where Mrs. Sarah (Chase Daggett) Allen is raising her blended family and running a tavern on the waterfront. What will happen to the Colony’s economy with all of these new tariffs and taxes being imposed by the Crown? How will Island families be affected by the growing unrest among the New Englanders with divided loyalties? Mrs. Allen will make the arduous trek to Chilmark to host an 18th-century tea at the Chilmark Public Library, where she will discuss the events surrounding one of the most notorious episodes of Revolutionary War history on the 250th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party. Bohea Lapsang, the tea dumped into Boston Harbor, will be served in 1773 style.
Norah Van Riper is a current resident of Holmes Hole and lives right down the street from where the Allen house originally stood. She has been in the living history business for more than twenty years, portraying a variety of women (known and unknown) from the Middle Ages through the American Civil War and has personally thrown tea into Boston Harbor on December 16th. She will be available to answer questions as a modern historian following the in-character portion of the program.
In person. Email tthorpe@clamsnet.org for more information.
Free. Sponsored by the Friends of the Chilmark Library. 508-645-3360