Page "Folklore of the United States" Paragraph 61

* Boston Tea Party was a political protest by the Sons of Liberty in Boston, a town in the British colony of Massachusetts, against the British government and the monopolistic East India Company that controlled all the tea imported into the colonies.

On December 16, 1773, after officials in Boston refused to return three shiploads of taxed tea to Britain, a group of colonists boarded the ships and destroyed the tea by throwing it into Boston Harbor.

The incident remains an iconic event of American history, and other political protests often refer to it.

The Boston Tea Party was a key event in the growth of the American Revolution.