Where the streets have no name
Last time I was up in Maine, my mother handed me an old book my aunt had salvaged from the library where she works. “Boston Ways: High, By, and Folk” by George Weston.
The copyright is 1957, so in addition to being half a century old, it predates all the changes of Boston’s modern era: the razing of the West End to make way for “urban renewal”, the emasculation of the Charles River embankment by running Storrow Drive right through the middle of it, the erection of the brutal Government Center where Scolley Square once stood, and the swath of destruction created when the elevated Central Artery cut its way straight through the heart of the city.
It provides a slightly distant perspective on some familiar landmarks, and I thought I’d share a couple things I noted. I won’t vouch for their veracity, save to say that these are what the book said.
Boston was named after an English town of the same name in Lincolnshire. The original name was “Botolph’s town”, after St. Botolph. St. Botolph’s feast day is June 17th. That’s also the same day as the Revolutionary War’s Battle of Bunker Hill, and the 1972 fire at my condo (the former Hotel Vendome) that killed nine firefighters.
According to the book, in Puritan times, marriage was considered a purely civic affair, to the extent that it was illegal for clergy to officiate at weddings. Which provides an interesting contrast to the whinings of the religious right about marriage being primarily a religious institution.
Even in 1950 people were falsely saying that Boston’s chaotic streets were paved-over cowpaths. In truth, the few streets that are descended from actual cowpaths are among the straightest in town: Winter Street, Park Street, Bromfield Street, and High Street.
John Rowe, for whom Rowe’s Wharf is named, was part owner of the Elanor, one of the ships looted in the Boston Tea Party, and was also one of the instigators of the infamous act of revolt.
I used to work on Canal Street. Canal Street is called that because it was the site of a canal that ran from the old Mill Pond (North Station) to Dock Square (where Faneuil Hall is).
Boylston Street was originally named Frogg Lane, after the frogs that lived noisily along the shoreline.
The Boston Public Library, the oldest such institution in the United States, has the names of famous artists running around the outside of the building. Originally, these were ordered in a way that their initials spelled out the names of the building’s architects: McKim, Mead, and White.
The First Baptist Church (aka Brattle Square Church) at the corner of Comm Ave and Clarendon was informally known as the “Church of the Holy Bean-Blowers” because of the angels with trumpets at the corners of its tower. The frieze that includes the bean-blowers was done by Frederic Bartholdi-the same man who designed the Statue of Liberty.
The campanile of the New Old South Church (just outside my bay window) used to be 260 feet high. However, by 1920 it was more than three feet off plumb, and had to be rebuilt. In the process, its height was also reduced by 14 feet.
There was a fountain in Post Office Square dedicated to George Angell, founder of the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. Not sure if it’s still there or not.
Finally, in a fine example of how language has changed in the past fifty years, consider this citation.
The typical Bostonian is pictured as cold, remote, and unemotional. Never believe it! […] Sometimes the most staid and proper citizen will become involved in an orgy through no fault of his own. This is always unfortunate and frequently amusing.
Amusing, indeed! Don’t you just hate when that happens?