It was intended to open a new window when linking from the "directory" post, but going from post-to-post in sequence shouldn't open 31 new tabs. They were posted one-at-a-time, so I didn't realize what would happen when being viewed as a set of 31.
A rather cringe-worthy oversight, I would say. It was indeed a Tumblr theme setting, which I changed, and also 31 instances of hand-editing the html of the articles, which was super fun. ;)
Apologies to everyone who suffered and thank you for the feedback. I just wish I had noticed sooner!