What to Expect from the Boston Tea Party Museum
Overview
Using several intricately designed exhibits, the museum takes you through the events of the Boston Tea Party and provides insight into its aftermath.
Detailed Guide
The Town Hall
Things kick off with a town hall meeting held by an impassioned Samuel Adams impersonator. The British have arrived with several ships full of tea and plans to monopolize the tea industry. And people are not happy about it.
In NYC, Philadephia and Charlestown similar shipments have been turned way, sent packing by protests, but Boston's governor is refusing to listen to his townspeople's complaints. He will not let the ships out of the harbour, and the townspeople will not let them unload. They have been disrupting things for 20 days already. Things are rapidly approaching boiling point.
Tea Party Ships
After Adam's speech ends members of the paramilitary group the Sons of Liberty board the ships, and you join them. You even throw chests of unwanted tea into the same waters the real Sons of Liberty threw them in 1773.
Griffin's Wharf
Once the thrill of the Boston Tea Party Museum's reenactment is over, you exit onto an open air deck made to look like the Boston of 1773. Here you learn more about the Sons of Liberty and their actions before and after the Tea Party, including their raid on a nearby tea warehouse.
The Boston Tea Party Museum Debate
Next, you witness a 3D debate between a Loyalist and a Patriot, discovering the arguments on both sides and the risks that resistance and revolution brought with them. The Tea Party was met with several clampdowns from the British. These inspired further rebellion across the country but could things have gone differently?
The Robinson Tea Chest
After that, you experience a genuine artefact from this momentous uprising: The Robinson Tea Chest. This is one of the chests the Sons of Liberty threw overboard in 1773. It was found later that year by 15 year old John Robinson while he was walking the nearby coastline. It was then passed from generation to generation before finally making its way to the museum.
The Boston Tea Party Museum's Look at the Revolution
Having given you the Tea Party from every angle, the museum tour finishes with an award-winning documentary on the events of April 19 1995, when open warfare broke out between the British and the American Revolutionaries.
This multi-sensory film rounds out the day perfectly, detailing a pivotal moment in the nation's history that without the Tea Party may not have happened.
After that there is only one thing left to do: enjoy a cup of free-market tea at the museum's tearoom and browse the gift shop!
Interested in finding more places like this? Try one of our Boston Scavenger Hunts- untangle cryptic clues as a team, as you are taken on a journey to the most unique, unusual and bizarre corners of Boston and beyond!
