Boston Trip - Part One

I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to fly back to Boston, MA for a National School Board conference. While there I attended many classes and heard some interesting speakers. One day and a few afternoons (even if it was pouring rain) we went sightseeing. So here are some photos of the things I saw. This is Part ONE of my pictures.  



 On Friday we had the entire day for a 7 hour bus tour. Truly it was the only way to see so much in such a short time. One of our stops was at Harvard University.  I never imagined I would ever be at Harvard. It was amazing.  The photo above is one of the many gates that surround the campus. So stately!

 This is one of the original buildings of Harvard! Notice all the windows for each floor. They all open up. Harvard was founded in 1636 by vote of the Great and General Court of the Massachusetts
Bay Colony and named for its first donor, the Reverend John Harvard, who left his personal
library and half his estate to the new institution. The charter granted to Harvard by the Colony in 1650, with amendments and John Adams’s further definition in the fifth chapter of the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780, is the authority under which the University of today operates.

For its first two hundred years Harvard College followed a set curriculum consistent with the instructional style of the period. It emphasized rhetorical principles, rote learning, and constant drilling. The faculty was very small, yet already distinguished. John Winthrop (AB 1732), who held the Hollis Professorship and taught mathematics and natural philosophy from 1738 to 1779, was in the colonial era one of America’s greatest men of science.

Harvard’s oldest buildings date from the eighteenth century. Massachusetts Hall (1720), Wadsworth House (1726), and Holden Chapel (1744) are the earliest. Hollis Hall has been a dormitory since it was built in 1763. Harvard Hall (1766) stands on the site of a seventeenth century building of the same name. It burned down one wintry night in 1764, destroying the 5,000-volume college library (then the largest in North America). But I was told that a lady and her son were on the Titanic. He was a great swimmer. But drowned when only his mother was allowed in a life boat.  She donated his inheritance in 1912 or 1913 to Harvard to provide books to the Library there. It is once again the largest Library of any University in the USA.

 While driving north of Beacon Hill were many homes dating back to mid 1770's. With the Revolutionary War going, citizens would paint their chimney stacks so people would know if they were for the Crown of England - white with a black band at the top, like the photo to the left.

OR, if they were a Patriot and friend to breaking from England - neutral color chimney stacks as photo left shows.  The thing that impressed me most was there was NO MIDDLE ground. You were on one side or the other and EVERYONE knew it.

The photo on left was taken at Lexington-Green. This is where the first shots fired in the Revolutionary War. I also toured the Massachusetts State Capitol (in Boston) and saw the original musket (I think that is what the gun was called) that was fired here by Captain John Parker. When the patriots fired it killed the British General. They also grabbed his gun and it is also hanging in the Capitol building.  Now, who would have thought to grab those two amazing pieces of history!!!

The yellow building below is of Brickman Tavern located next to Lexington-Green. This is where the farmers waited for the British Soldiers to arrive for the fight.  Paul Revere made it this far to warn the Minuteman (farmers) that they were coming.  So many of the men got tired of waiting on the British there were only 77 of them still there when the British arrived - 700 Brits! We were out numbered  10 times greater! Yet, we won that first battle. 

 In the surrounding areas of  Concord, MA are many famous authors. We drove past Louisa May Alcott and Ralph Waldo Emerson homes. Famous writer Nathaniel Hawthorne is best known for The Scarlet Letter.

The Wayside Inn is the photo on the left! It really exists.

Old Manse (what he called his home) is still the home to his family's furniture, including his writing desk. The former home of famous writer Henry Wadsworth Longfellow also served as "headquarters for General George Washington during the Siege of Boston, July 1775 - April 1777.

The photo below of Walden Pond. Yes, it's that Walden Pond, the one where Henry David Thoreau lived. Thoreau, best known for writing Walden, as well as his 1849 essay, "Civil Disobedience" lived at this location from July 1845 to September 1847. It needs a lot of work to restore it, but was fun to see.

The photo below is called Fanueil Hall. It is an old building, first built in 1742, sits at the site of the old town dock. Town meetings, held here between 1764 and 1774, heard Samuel Adams and others lead cries of protest against the imposition of taxes on the colonies.  This was  referred to as "the Cradle of Liberty".  I had family who participated in such discussions as part of the Sons of Liberty. So being there was thrilling!

On November 6, 1979, Faneuil Hall was the site of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy's speech declaring his candidacy for president. On November 3, 2004, Faneuil Hall was the site of Senator John Kerry's concession speech in the 2004 presidential election.












The Old State House built in 1713, is an historic landmark served as a merchants' exchange as well as the seat of colonial and state governments. In 1761 James Otis opposed the Writs of Assistance here, inspiring John Adams to state "then and there the child independence was born." A cobblestone circle beneath its balcony marks the site of the 1770 Boston Massacre when British soldiers fired into a crowd of Bostonians. Fugitive slave Crispus Attucks was among the five victims who died that day.  Wow!
 

 We also drove along the freeway and low and behold what do we see outside the window! The LDS Boston Temple! I sure wish I could have gotten closer or had time to do a session. 

We went to see the USS Constitution. A ship! It was also known as "Old Ironsides". Constitution is most famous for her actions during the War of 1812 against Great Britain, when she captured numerous merchant ships and defeated five British warships: HMS Guerriere, Java, Pictou, Cyane and Levant. The battle with Guerriere earned her the nickname of "Old Ironsides" and public adoration that has repeatedly saved her from scrapping. She continued to actively serve the nation as flagship in the Mediterranean and African squadrons, and circled the world in the 1840s. During the American Civil War she served as a training ship for the United States Naval Academy. Retired from active service in 1881, she served as a receiving ship until designated a museum ship in 1907. In 1931 she started a three-year, 90-port tour of the nation, and in 1997 she finally sailed again under her own power for her 200th birthday.

As a fully commissioned US Navy ship, her crew of 60 officers and sailors participate in ceremonies, educational programs, and special events while keeping the ship open to visitors year round and providing free tours. The officers and crew are all active-duty US Navy personnel and the assignment is considered special duty in the Navy. Every 4th of July they sail her out into Boston Harbor, fire her cannons (yes they still work!) and then sail back to dock at the end of the day.

 

 

 

I walked over to the "Old North Church" built in 1723.  It is Boston's oldest church building and still an active Episcopal Church. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow memorialized Old North's role at the start of the Revolutionary War in his poem, "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere." On the night of April 18, 1775, sexton Robert Newman hung two lanterns in the steeple to warn Charlestown patriots of the advance of British soldiers. When Mr. Newman got ready to leave the building the British soldiers were at the front doors, so he ran up through the center of the church and escaped through this window. This is a replica of the lanterns hung. 

So stay tuned, the Part Two will be coming shortly.