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Podcast: New Books in Economic and Business History
Episode: James R. Fichter, "Tea: Consumption, Politics, and Revolution, 1773–1776" (Cornell UP, 2023)
Description: In Tea: Consumption, Politics, and Revolution, 1773–1776 (Cornell University Press, 2023), Dr. James R. Fichter reveals that despite the so-called Boston Tea Party in 1773, two large shipments of tea from the East India Company survived and were ultimately drunk in North America. Their survival shaped the politics of the years ahead, impeded efforts to reimburse the company for the tea lost in Boston Harbor, and hinted at the enduring potency of consumerism in revolutionary politics.Tea protests were widespread in 1774, but so were tea advertisements and tea sales, Fichter argues. The protests were noisy and sometimes misleading performances, not clea...