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Boston. Boston (US: / ˈbɔːstən / ⓘ [9]) is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the Northeastern United States.
- Overview
- Character of the city
- Landscape
- Area of the colonial town
Boston, city, capital of the commonwealth of Massachusetts, and seat of Suffolk county, in the northeastern United States. It lies on Massachusetts Bay, an arm of the Atlantic Ocean. The city proper has an unusually small area for a major city, and more than one-fourth of the total—including part of the Charles River, Boston Harbor, and a portion o...
The area, the people, and the institutions within its political boundaries can only begin to define the essence of Boston. Its nickname “Beantown” has its origin in colonial times, when Boston, as a stop on a major trade route with the West Indies, had a steady supply of molasses from the Caribbean, thus leading to the creation of a popular dish th...
The Boston region’s topography was largely shaped by the glaciers that covered the land during the last ice age. The city and its sheltered deepwater harbour sit in a basin that extends to Lynn in the north and Quincy in the south and is ringed by modest hills: the Middlesex Fells (north) to the Blue Hills (south). There are harder, higher surface rocks (mostly granites) on those northern and southern edges, while inside the basin the lower-lying rocks—commonly known as pudding stone—are found mostly below the surface in such areas as Roxbury, Newton, Brookline, Mattapan, West Roxbury, and Dorchester. The land, enormously compressed by the vast accumulation of glacial ice on it, has since been rebounding (rising up) at an extremely gradual rate.
Numerous drumlins (mounds of glacial debris) form low hills in the city and islands that dot the harbour. At the beginning of English settlement in the 17th century, the Shawmut Peninsula was called Trimountain (or Tramount) because of its dominating three-topped hill on the northwest corner near the mouth of the Charles River. Beacon Hill is its only surviving, though greatly reduced, remnant. The other portions were leveled to become landfill that added to the city’s area in the 19th century.
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The hilly Shawmut Peninsula, upon which Boston was settled, originally was almost completely surrounded by water. It was connected with mainland Roxbury to the south by a narrow neck of land along the line of present-day Washington Street. To the west of the neck were great reaches of mudflats and salt marshes that were covered by water at high tide and known collectively as the Back Bay. The Charles River flowed through the Back Bay to Boston Harbor and separated the peninsula from the mainland to the north and west. To the east, Town Cove indented Boston’s harbour front and divided the city into the North End and the South End. The centre of the colonial town was at the Old State House (built 1711–47).
Although that original centre and the colonial South End have long been given over to offices and retail stores, a few 18th-century buildings remain: Faneuil Hall (1742–1805), the Old Corner Bookstore (1718), the Old South Meeting House (1729), and King’s Chapel (1750). The North End is the only part of the early town that has remained residential since the 1630 settlement. Colonial survivals such as the Paul Revere House (c. 1680) and Christ Church (1723)—the Old North Church from which lanterns revealed the route of the British march to Lexington in 1775—coexist with the busy life of a traditionally Italian American community.
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Apr 9, 2022 · Boston is a city in the northeastern United States that serves as the capital of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the seat of Suffolk County. It has an area of 46 square miles and is located on Massachusetts Bay , a branch of the Atlantic Ocean .
- Map of Boston, 1723. The Boston we see in this first map hardly resembles the city we know today. An English captain named John Bonner originally created the map in 1721, and it was revised many times throughout the 18th century.
- Boston Begins “Wharfing Out,” 1708. Colonial Boston depended on the ocean for trade, food, and a constant influx of settlers from England. But the shallow water surrounding much of the city was a problem for loading and unloading ships.
- Bulfinch Triangle, 1807. European colonists wanted to build lumber and grist mills, but they were stymied by the physical geography of Eastern Massachusetts, which has few fast-running rivers, and therefore few good sites for mills.
- Back Bay, 1855. Filling in land behind tidal dams not only provided room for new neighborhoods, it also solved an urban planning challenge. Many of the mill dam ponds had become smelly, dirty blights after the dams cut off the natural circulation of water from the ocean, and city residents started using the flats as sewer dumps.
Dec 22, 2023 · This map shows where Boston is located on the World Map. You may download, print or use the above map for educational, personal and non-commercial purposes. Attribution is required.
Aug 16, 2017 · Boston is the capital and largest city in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and also the largest city in New England region of USA. Known as The 'Cradle of Liberty', it is a city of venerable neighborhoods, of history intertwined with modernity, of New England literary icons referred as Boston Brahmins, and of American firsts—first public ...
Location: City of Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts, New England, United States, North America; View on OpenStreetMap