Shiploads of Shipworms: Mussel-power and the Industrial Revolution

This boring mollusc is anything but boring

Photo by Zoltan Tasi on Unsplash

On New Year’s Eve, 1731, a storm swept in from the North Sea. Whipped up by gales, waves ripped away timber piles from protective dikes along the coast of Holland and West-Friesland. Without the wooden breakwaters, the earthworks were in danger of collapse. When the wardens inspected the damage, they found…