Boston

Boston is one of the oldest municipalities in America, founded on the Shawmut Peninsula in 1630 by Puritan settlers from the English town of the same name.^[12][13] It was the scene of several key events of the American Revolution and the nation's founding, such as the Boston Massacre, the Boston Tea Party, the Battle of Bunker Hill, and the siege of Boston. Upon American independence from Great Britain, the city continued to be an important port and manufacturing hub as well as a center for education and culture.^[14][15] The city has expanded beyond the original peninsula through land reclamation and municipal annexation. Its rich history attracts many tourists, with Faneuil Hall alone drawing more than 20 million visitors per year.^[16] Boston's many firsts include the United States' first public park (Boston Common, 1634), first public or state school (Boston Latin School, 1635)^[17] first subway system (Tremont Street subway, 1897),^[18] and first large public library (Boston Public Library, 1848).

Today, Boston is a center of scientific research; the area's many

Indigenous era

Prior to

Being surrounded by foul-smelling mudflats during the temperate part of the year, the Shawmut Peninsula itself was more sparsely occupied than its surroundings before the arrival of Europeans. Nevertheless, archeological excavations have revealed one of the oldest fishweirs in New England on Boylston Street. Native people constructed this weir to trap fish as early as 7,000 years before European arrival in the Western Hemisphere.^[28][27][29]

Founding by Europeans

The first European to live in what would become Boston was a Cambridge-educated Episcopalian cleric named William Blaxton. He was the person most directly responsible for the foundation of Boston by Puritan colonizers in 1630. This occurred after Blaxton invited one of their leaders, Isaac Johnson to cross Back Bay from the failing colony of Charlestown and share the peninsula. This the Puritans did in September 1630.^[30][31][32]

The name "Boston"

Before dying on September 30, 1630, one of Johnson's last official acts as the leader of the Charlestown community was to name their new settlement across the river "Boston”. He named the settlement after his hometown in Lincolnshire, the place from which he, his wife (namesake of the Arbella) and John Cotton (grandfather of Cotton Mather) had emigrated to New England. The name of the English town ultimately derives from its patron saint, St. Botolph, in whose church John Cotton served as the rector until his emigration with Johnson. In early sources the Lincolnshire Boston was known as "St. Botolph's town", later contracted to "Boston". Before this renaming the settlement on the peninsula had been known as "Shawmut" by Blaxton and "Trimountain" by the Puritan settlers he had invited.^{[33][34][35][36][37][38]}

Puritan occupation

The Puritan influence on Boston began even before its foundation, with the 1629 Cambridge Agreement. This document created the Massachusetts Bay Colony and was signed by its first governor John Winthrop. Puritan ethics and their focus on education influenced the early history of the city. America's first public school, Boston Latin School, was founded in Boston in 1635.^[17][39]

Boston was the largest town in the

In 1773, a group of angered Bostonian citizens threw a shipment of tea by the East India Company into Boston Harbor in protest of the Tea Act, an event known as the Boston Tea Party that escalated the American Revolution

.

Map showing a British

tactical evaluation of Boston in 1775

Many crucial events of the American Revolution^[44] occurred in or near Boston. The city's mob presence along with the colonists' growing lack of faith in either Britain or its Parliament fostered a revolutionary spirit in the city.^[41] When the British parliament passed the Stamp Act in 1765, a Boston mob ravaged the homes of Andrew Oliver, the official tasked with enforcing the Act, and Thomas Hutchinson, then the Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts.^[41][45] The British sent two regiments to Boston in 1768 in an attempt to quell the angry colonists. This did not sit well with the colonists. In 1770, during the Boston Massacre, British troops shot into a crowd that had started to violently harass them. The colonists compelled the British to withdraw their troops. The event was widely publicized and fueled a revolutionary movement in America.^[42]

In 1773, Parliament passed the Tea Act. Many of the colonists saw the act as an attempt to force them to accept the taxes established by the Townshend Acts. The act prompted the Boston Tea Party, where a group of angered Bostonian citizens threw an entire shipment of tea sent by the East India Company into Boston Harbor. The Boston Tea Party was a key event leading up to the revolution, as the British government responded furiously with the Coercive Acts, demanding compensation for the destroyed tea from the Bostonians.^[41] This angered the colonists further and led to the American Revolutionary War. The war began in the area surrounding Boston with the Battles of Lexington and Concord.^[41][46]

Boston itself was besieged for almost a year during the siege of Boston, which began on April 19, 1775. The New England militia impeded the movement of the British Army. Sir William Howe, then the commander-in-chief of the British forces in North America, led the British army in the siege. On June 17, the British captured the Charlestown peninsula in Boston, during the Battle of Bunker Hill. The British army outnumbered the militia stationed there, but it was a pyrrhic victory for the British because their army suffered irreplaceable casualties. It was also a testament to the skill and training of the militia, as their stubborn defence made it difficult for the British to capture Charlestown without suffering further irreplaceable casualties.^[47][48]

Several weeks later, George Washington took over the militia after the Continental Congress established the Continental Army to unify the revolutionary effort. Both sides faced difficulties and supply shortages in the siege, and the fighting was limited to small-scale raids and skirmishes. The narrow Boston Neck, which at that time was only about a hundred feet wide, impeded Washington's ability to invade Boston, and a long stalemate ensued. A young officer, Rufus Putnam, came up with a plan to make portable fortifications out of wood that could be erected on the frozen ground under cover of darkness. Putnam supervised this effort, which successfully installed both the fortifications and dozens of cannon on Dorchester Heights that Henry Knox had laboriously brought through the snow from Fort Ticonderoga. The astonished British awoke the next morning to see a large array of cannons bearing down on them. General Howe is believed to have said that the Americans had done more in one night than his army could have done in six months. The British Army attempted a cannon barrage for two hours, but their shot could not reach the colonists' cannons at such a height. The British gave up, boarded their ships and sailed away. Boston still celebrates "Evacuation Day" each year. Washington was so impressed, he made Rufus Putnam his chief engineer.^[46][47][49]

Post-revolution and the War of 1812

Boston, as the Eagle and the Wild Goose See It, an 1860 photograph by James Wallace Black

, was the first recorded aerial photograph

State Street

in 1801

During this period, Boston flourished culturally, as well, admired for its rarefied literary life and generous artistic patronage,^[51][52] with members of old Boston families—eventually dubbed Boston Brahmins—coming to be regarded as the nation's social and cultural elites.^[53] They are often associated with the American upper class, Harvard University;^[54] and the Episcopal Church.^[55][56]

Boston was an early port of the Atlantic triangular slave trade in the New England colonies, but was soon overtaken by Salem, Massachusetts and Newport, Rhode Island.^[57] Boston eventually became a center of the abolitionist movement.^[58] The city reacted strongly to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850,^[59] contributing to President Franklin Pierce's attempt to make an example of Boston after the Anthony Burns Fugitive Slave Case.^[60][61]

In 1822,^[14] the citizens of Boston voted to change the official name from the "Town of Boston" to the "City of Boston", and on March 19, 1822, the people of Boston accepted the charter incorporating the city.^[62] At the time Boston was chartered as a city, the population was about 46,226, while the area of the city was only 4.8 sq mi (12 km²).^[62]

19th century

Downtown Boston from Dorchester Heights

in 1841

Tremont Street

in 1843

The Old City Hall

was home to the Boston city council from 1865 to 1969.

View of Boston by J. J. Hawes

, c. 1860s–1880s

Haymarket Square

in 1909

In the 1820s, Boston's population grew rapidly, and the city's ethnic composition changed dramatically with the first wave of European immigrants. Irish immigrants dominated the first wave of newcomers during this period, especially following the Great Famine; by 1850, about 35,000 Irish lived in Boston.^[63] In the latter half of the 19th century, the city saw increasing numbers of Irish, Germans, Lebanese, Syrians,^[64] French Canadians, and Russian and Polish Jews settling in the city. By the end of the 19th century, Boston's core neighborhoods had become enclaves of ethnically distinct immigrants with their residence yielding lasting cultural change. Italians became the largest inhabitants of the North End,^[65] Irish dominated South Boston and Charlestown, and Russian Jews lived in the West End. Irish and Italian immigrants brought with them Roman Catholicism. Currently, Catholics make up Boston's largest religious community,^[66] and the Irish have played a major role in Boston politics since the early 20th century; prominent figures include the Kennedys, Tip O'Neill, and John F. Fitzgerald.^[67]

Between 1631 and 1890, the city tripled its area through land reclamation by filling in marshes, mud flats, and gaps between wharves along the waterfront. Reclamation projects in the middle of the century created significant parts of the South End, the West End, the Financial District, and Chinatown.^[68]

After the

Fenway Park, home of the Boston Red Sox, opened in 1912.^[74] 

Many architecturally significant buildings were built during these early years of the 20th century:

Logan International Airport opened on September 8, 1923.^[82] The Boston Bruins were founded in 1924 and played their first game at Boston Garden in November 1928.^[83]

Boston went into decline by the early to mid-20th century, as factories became old and obsolete and businesses moved out of the region for cheaper labor elsewhere.

The Charles River in front of Boston's Back Bay

neighborhood

Boston is an intellectual, technological, and political center but has lost some important regional institutions,[90] including the loss to mergers and acquisitions of local financial institutions such as FleetBoston Financial, which was acquired by Charlotte-based Bank of America in 2004.^[91] Boston-based department stores Jordan Marsh and Filene's have both merged into the New York City–based Macy's.^[92] The 1993 acquisition of The Boston Globe by The New York Times^[93] was reversed in 2013 when it was re-sold to Boston businessman John W. Henry. In 2016, it was announced General Electric would be moving its corporate headquarters from Connecticut to the Seaport District in Boston, joining many other companies in this rapidly developing neighborhood.

Boston has experienced gentrification in the latter half of the 20th century,^[94] with housing prices increasing sharply since the 1990s.^[95]

On April 15, 2013, two Chechen Islamist brothers detonated a pair of bombs near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, killing three people and injuring roughly 264.^[96]

In 2016, Boston briefly

Boston as seen from Sentinel-2 with Boston Harbor

(center), which has made Boston a major shipping port since its founding.

An 1877 panoramic map of Boston

John Hancock Tower at 200 Clarendon Street is the tallest building in Boston with a roof height

of 790 ft (240 m).

Climate

Boston's skyline in the background with fall foliage

in the foreground

A graph of cumulative winter snowfall at Logan International Airport from 1938 to 2015. The four winters with the most snowfall are highlighted. The snowfall data, which was collected by NOAA

, is from the weather station at the airport.

The hottest month is July, with a mean temperature of 74.1 °F (23.4 °C). The coldest month is January, with a mean temperature of 29.9 °F (−1.2 °C). Periods exceeding 90 °F (32 °C) in summer and below freezing in winter are not uncommon but rarely extended, with about 13 and 25 days per year seeing each, respectively.[111] Sub- 0 °F (−18 °C) readings usually occur every 3 to 5 years.^[112] The most recent sub- 0 °F (−18 °C) reading occurred on February 4, 2023, when the temperature dipped down to −10 °F (−23 °C); the lowest temperature reading in the city since 1957.^[111] In addition, several decades may pass between 100 °F (38 °C) readings, with the most recent such occurrence on July 24, 2022, when the temperature reached 100 °F (38 °C).^[111] The city's average window for freezing temperatures is November 9 through April 5.^[111][b] Official temperature records have ranged from −18 °F (−28 °C) on February 9, 1934, up to 104 °F (40 °C) on July 4, 1911. The record cold daily maximum is 2 °F (−17 °C) on December 30, 1917, while, conversely, the record warm daily minimum is 83 °F (28 °C) on August 2, 1975, and July 21, 2019.^[113][111]

Boston's coastal location on the North Atlantic moderates its temperature but makes the city very prone to

Fog is fairly common, particularly in spring and early summer. Due to its location along the North Atlantic, the city often receives sea breezes, especially in the late spring, when water temperatures are still quite cold and temperatures at the coast can be more than 20 °F (11 °C) colder than a few miles inland, sometimes dropping by that amount near midday.[116]^[117] Thunderstorms occur from May to September, which are occasionally severe with large hail, damaging winds, and heavy downpours.^[109] Although downtown Boston has never been struck by a violent tornado, the city itself has experienced many tornado warnings. Damaging storms are more common to areas north, west, and northwest of the city.^[118] Boston has a relatively sunny climate for a coastal city at its latitude, averaging over 2,600 hours of sunshine per annum.

See or edit raw graph data.

Cityscapes

Sailboats on the Charles River overlook the Boston skyline, as seen from Cambridge

From left to right: Boston City Hall, the West End, the North End, Charlestown, Boston Harbor, and East Boston

Sunset view of the Boston skyline

and Charles River

Per capita income in the Greater Boston

area by U.S. Census block group as of 2000. The dashed line shows the boundary of the City of Boston.

Map of racial distribution in Boston as of the 2010 U.S. Census. Each dot is 25 people: ⬤ White ⬤ Black ⬤ Asian ⬤ Hispanic ⬤ Other

In 2020, Boston was estimated to have 691,531 residents living in 266,724 households[3]—a 12% population increase over 2010. The city is the third-most densely populated large U.S. city of over half a million residents, and the most densely populated state capital. Some 1.2 million persons may be within Boston's boundaries during work hours, and as many as 2 million during special events. This fluctuation of people is caused by hundreds of thousands of suburban residents who travel to the city for work, education, health care, and special events.^[136]

In the city, the population was spread out, with 21.9% at age 19 and under, 14.3% from 20 to 24, 33.2% from 25 to 44, 20.4% from 45 to 64, and 10.1% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 30.8 years. For every 100 females, there were 92.0 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 89.9 males.^[137] There were 252,699 households, of which 20.4% had children under the age of 18 living in them, 25.5% were married couples living together, 16.3% had a female householder with no husband present, and 54.0% were non-families. 37.1% of all households were made up of individuals, and 9.0% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.26 and the average family size was 3.08.^[137] From an estimate in 2005, Boston has one of the

The

Chinatown with its paifang gate is home to several Chinese and Vietnamese

restaurants.

U.S. Navy sailors march in Boston's annual Saint Patrick's Day parade. Irish Americans

constitute the largest ethnicity in Boston.

Boston LGBT pride

march held annually in June

People of Irish descent form the largest single ethnic group in the city, making up 15.8% of the population, followed by Italians, accounting for 8.3% of the population. People of West Indian and Caribbean ancestry are another sizable group, at over 15%.^[146]

In Greater Boston, these numbers grew significantly, with 150,000 Dominicans according to 2018 estimates, 134,000 Puerto Ricans, 57,500 Salvadorans, 39,000 Guatemalans, 36,000 Mexicans, and over 35,000 Colombians.

Over 27,000 Chinese Americans made their home in Boston city proper in 2013.^[149]

Ancestry

According to the 2012–2016 American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates, the largest ancestry groups in Boston, Massachusetts are:^[150][151]

Demographic breakdown by ZIP Code

Income

Data is from the 2008–2012 American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates.^{[152][153][154]}

Religion

Old South Church, a United Church of Christ

congregation first organized in 1669

According to a 2014 study by the Pew Research Center, 57% of the population of the city identified themselves as Christians, with 25% attending a variety of Protestant churches and 29% professing Roman Catholic beliefs;^[155][156] 33% claim no religious affiliation, while the remaining 10% are composed of adherents of Judaism, Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, Baháʼí and other faiths.

As of 2010^[update], the Catholic Church had the highest number of adherents as a single denomination in the Greater Boston area, with more than two million members and 339 churches, followed by the Episcopal Church with 58,000 adherents in 160 churches. The United Church of Christ had 55,000 members and 213 churches.^[157]

The city has a Jewish population of an estimated 248,000 Jews within the Boston metro area.^[158] More than half of Jewish households in the Greater Boston area reside in the city itself, Brookline, Newton, Cambridge, Somerville, or adjacent towns.^[158]

Economy

A global city, Boston is placed among the top 30 most economically powerful cities in the world.^[161] Encompassing $363 billion, the Greater Boston metropolitan area has the sixth-largest economy in the country and 12th-largest in the world.^[162]

Boston's colleges and universities exert a significant impact on the regional economy. Boston attracts more than 350,000 college students from around the world, who contribute more than US$4.8 billion annually to the city's economy.^[163][164] The area's schools are major employers and attract industries to the city and surrounding region. The city is home to a number of technology companies and is a hub for biotechnology, with the Milken Institute rating Boston as the top life sciences cluster in the country.^[165] Boston receives the highest absolute amount of annual funding from the National Institutes of Health of all cities in the United States.^[166]

The city is considered highly innovative for a variety of reasons, including the presence of

Tourism also composes a large part of Boston's economy, with 21.2 million domestic and international visitors spending $8.3 billion in 2011.^[169] Excluding visitors from Canada and Mexico, over 1.4 million international tourists visited Boston in 2014, with those from China and the United Kingdom leading the list.^[170] Boston's status as a state capital as well as the regional home of federal agencies has rendered law and government to be another major component of the city's economy.^[171] The city is a major seaport along the East Coast of the United States and the oldest continuously operated industrial and fishing port in the Western Hemisphere.^[172]

In the 2018

In 2019, a yearly ranking of time wasted in traffic listed Boston area drivers lost approximately 164 hours a year in lost productivity due to the area's traffic congestion. This amounted to $2,300 a year per driver in costs.[181]

Education

Primary and secondary education

Boston Latin School

was established in 1635 and is the oldest public high school in the U.S.

The Boston Public Schools enroll 57,000 students attending 145 schools, including the renowned Boston Latin Academy, John D. O'Bryant School of Math & Science, and Boston Latin School. The Boston Latin School was established in 1635 and is the oldest public high school in the US. Boston also operates the United States' second-oldest public high school and its oldest public elementary school.^[17] The system's students are 40% Hispanic or Latino, 35% Black or African American, 13% White, and 9% Asian.^[182] There are private, parochial, and charter schools as well, and approximately 3,300 minority students attend participating suburban schools through the Metropolitan Educational Opportunity Council.^[183] In September 2019, the city formally inaugurated Boston Saves, a program that provides every child enrolled in the city's kindergarten system a savings account containing $50 to be used toward college or career training.^[184]

Higher education

Map of Boston-area universities

Harvard Business School, one of the country's top business schools^[185]

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) originated in Boston and was long known as "Boston Tech"; it moved across the river to Cambridge in 1916.^[189] Tufts University's main campus is north of the city in Somerville and Medford, though it locates its medical and dental schools in Boston's Chinatown at Tufts Medical Center.^[190]

Five members of the Association of American Universities are in Greater Boston (more than any other metropolitan area): Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Tufts University, Boston University, and Brandeis University.^[191] Furthermore, Greater Boston contains seven Highest Research Activity (R1) Universities as per the Carnegie Classification. This includes, in addition to the aforementioned five, Boston College, and Northeastern University. This is, by a large margin, the highest concentration of such institutions in a single metropolitan area. Hospitals, universities, and research institutions in Greater Boston received more than $1.77 billion in National Institutes of Health grants in 2013, more money than any other American metropolitan area.^[192] This high density of research institutes also contributes to Boston's high density of early career researchers, which, due to high housing costs in the region, have been shown to face housing stress.^[193][194]

Harvard Medical School

, one of the world's most prestigious medical schools

Many of Boston's medical facilities are associated with universities. The Longwood Medical and Academic Area, adjacent to the Fenway, district, is home to a large number of medical and research facilities, including Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston Children's Hospital, Dana–Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Medical School, Harvard School of Dental Medicine, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Joslin Diabetes Center, and the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences.^[205] Prominent medical facilities, including

Public safety

A Boston Police cruiser on Beacon Street

Boston included $414 million in spending on the Boston Police Department in the fiscal 2021 budget. This is the second largest allocation of funding by the city after the allocation to Boston Public Schools.^[211]

Like many major American cities, Boston has experienced a great reduction in violent crime since the early 1990s. Boston's low crime rate since the 1990s has been credited to the Boston Police Department's collaboration with neighborhood groups and church parishes to prevent youths from joining gangs, as well as involvement from the United States Attorney and District Attorney's offices. This helped lead in part to what has been touted as the "Boston Miracle". Murders in the city dropped from 152 in 1990 (for a murder rate of 26.5 per 100,000 people) to just 31—not one of them a juvenile—in 1999 (for a murder rate of 5.26 per 100,000).^[212]

In 2008, there were 62 reported homicides.^[213] Through December 30, 2016, major crime was down seven percent and there were 46 homicides compared to 40 in 2015.^[214]

Culture

The Old State House, a museum on the Freedom Trail near the site of the Boston Massacre