NFPA Journal - May/June 2017 - 6

Editor's Note by Scott Sutherland

Executive Editor, NFPA Journal

EXECUTIVE EDITOR

Scott Sutherland
ssutherland@nfpa.org

A Walk in Boston

ne of my favorite Boston neighborhoods is Bay Village, a tiny, leafy
enclave of red-brick row houses
tucked between the city's Back Bay and South
End neighborhoods. If you're in Boston for
NFPA's annual conference in June, I urge you
to take a break from the convention center
and the Seaport and explore Bay Village,
along with the city's other distinctive neighborhoods, on foot. Everything that makes
the city hell for motorists-the density, the
serpentine streets, the lopsided logic of its
patchwork layout-can also make it a pedestrian's dream. Do yourself a favor and get out
for a stroll.
In Bay Village, open up a maps app on
your phone and navigate to the corner of
Piedmont Street and Cocoanut Grove Lane,
which is near the location of the main
entrance to the former Cocoanut Grove
nightclub. In the fall of 1942, Cocoanut
Grove became the site of what remains
the deadliest nightclub fire in American
history-492 people perished in the blaze,
many of them near the spot of that main
(and only) entrance, which was served by a
revolving door. The door quickly jammed in
the crush of people desperate to escape, and
for most there was nowhere else to go.
In our lead "Dispatches" piece, "Chased
by Flames," on page 12, we look at an ongoing effort to explain the peculiar dynamics

of the Cocoanut Grove fire and how it was
able to move so quickly; an overview of that
effort is the topic of a conference education
session. Despite the advancements of the
best fire-modeling tools, aspects of the fire
remain as puzzling and compelling as they
were 75 years ago.
The fire's history is asserting itself in
other ways, too. Last summer, a local to-do
erupted when the Bay Village Neighborhood Association voted to move a Cocoanut
Grove commemorative plaque, located on
the sidewalk along Piedmont Street, down
the block, ostensibly to protect the privacy
of homeowners who'd purchased newly built
condominiums located partly on the former
Cocoanut Grove site. In a letter to the association, condo owners expressed their desire
to "enjoy our homes in peace, without tragic
memories." Relatives of Cocoanut Grove victims and survivors were incensed. The reality
is that it's hard to take more than four steps
anywhere in Boston without running into
some kind of history, tragic or otherwise.
Faulkner's maxim about history, that "the
past is never dead-it's not even past," is
especially apt when applied to fire history,
which seems to demand that we learn painful lessons over and over again. Walk the
brick sidewalks of Bay Village and see for
yourself-Cocoanut Grove is still with us,
and it isn't going anywhere.

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