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In: Architectural, Artifacts, Roxbury, Tessil Collins
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Saint Cyprian’s Church, the humble brick and stone shadowed edifice at Melnea Cass Boulevard, Tremont Street, and St. Cyprian’s Place (formerly Walpole Street) holds a secure legacy in the story of West Indian immigrants, their role and settlement in Roxbury and Boston racial activism. An enduring part of the building are its stained glass windows and the honor they pay to saints, rectors and civil rights leaders. This post is a homage to the church of my birth, baptism, confirmation and youth. Our thanks to Cynthia Staples for allowing us to republish this post from her Word+Images blog. We are preparing companion posts reflecting theRead More →

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In: Architectural, Forest Hills, Rosalyn Delores Elder, Roxbury, South End
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In 1948, a master highway plan for metropolitan Boston was developed, the Southwest Expressway, also known as the South West Corridor Project. The implementation of that highway plan is an example of how structural racism pervades so many aspects of our daily life. This plan was part of a proposed nation-wide system of highways and it included extending an eight to twelve lane highway, Interstate 95, through Boston and Cambridge. The impetus for a nationwide system had been building since the 1930s, but was postponed by two momentous events, the Great Depression in the 1930s and World War II in the early 1940s. After WWII,Read More →

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In: Architectural, Dr. Shirley Zavin, Historic Boston, Nubian Square
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This post is an except from a 1978 proposal by Dr. Shirley Zavin, Executive Director of Boston 350.Historic Boston, Inc. has worked tirelessly over the years with developers on this parcel of land that includes the Nawn Factory, Eliot Burial Ground and Eustis Street Firehouse. On the north perimeter of the Burying Ground is a large brick factory building constructed ca. 1868 by Owen Nawn.  The site, however, has a much longer history of commercial and industrial use.  A soap boiler was active here by 1815; subsequently a large wood factory building was constructed and occupied by a “morroco dresser.”  As previously mentioned, tanning was one ofRead More →

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In: Architectural, Dr. Shirley Zavin, Historic Boston, Nubian Square
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This post is an except from a 1978 proposal by Dr. Shirley Zavin, Executive Director of Boston 350. Historic Boston, Inc. has worked tirelessly over the years with developers on this parcel of land that includes the Nawn Factory, Eliot Burial Ground and Eustis Street Firehouse. The Eustis street Firehouse, the oldest standing firehouse in Boston, was built in 1859 on the site of an earlier Greek Revival firehouse dating from 1829.  The earlier fire house, home of Roxbury’s sixth fire company, had in turn replaced a hearse house serving the Burying Ground.  The present brick building, like its predecessor, is two stories high withRead More →

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In: Architectural, Dr. Shirley Zavin, Historic Boston, Nubian Square
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This post is an except from a 1978 proposal by Dr. Shirley Zavin, Executive Director of Boston 350.Historic Boston, Inc. has worked tirelessly over the years with developers on this parcel of land that includes the Nawn Factory, Eliot Burial Ground and Eustis Street Firehouse. The two woodframe, hip-roof Federal style houses at 2066 and 2070 Washington Street are the only remaining pre-19th century buildings on that street in Roxbury. The smaller house (2070 Washington street) was built ca. 1784 by the housewright Josiah Cunningham as his home and workshop.  The larger house next door, which Cunningham built for his neighbor, Captain Jesse Doggett, ca. 1788, wasRead More →

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In: Colonial, Dr. Shirley Zavin, Historic Boston, Landmarks, Nubian Square
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This post is an except from a 1978 proposal by Dr. Shirley Zavin, Executive Director of Boston 350.Historic Boston, Inc. has worked tirelessly over the years with developers on this parcel of land that includes the Nawn Factory, Eliot Burial Ground and Eustis Street Firehouse. The John Eliot Burying ground is one of the three oldest in Boston.  The first recorded burial occurred in 1633: the oldest surviving stone is that of Rev. Samuel Danforth’s infant son, dated 1653. Buried there are many famous early Roxbury citizens, including John Eliot, minister of the First Church of Roxbury; Eliot’s translations of biblical texts into native AmericanRead More →

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In: Acknowledgements, Dr. Shirley Zavin, Historic Boston, Nubian Square
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This post is an except from a 1978 proposal by Dr. Shirley Zavin, Executive Director of Boston 350. Historic Boston, Inc. has worked tirelessly over the years with developers on this parcel of land that includes the Nawn Factory, Eliot Burial Ground and Eustis Street Firehouse. Located at the interaction of Washington and Eustis Streets in Roxbury, the John Eliot Burying Ground Historic District preserves many important chapters of Boston’s history. Until 1786 and the building of the Charles River Bridge, Washington Street – then called Orange Street – was the only overland route from Boston to the mainland. In linking Roxbury and Boston, WashingtonRead More →

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In: Colonial, Demographics, People
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John Pierpont, to whose home his broken father came for refuge, was the first one of the family to cross the seas. He settled at Roxbury in 1640 and purchased a large tract of land, calling a part of it Dorchester in honor of his second cousin, Henry Pierrepont, in England, who had succeeded his father. Robert, as second Earl of Kingston, and who had received from Charles I the further title of Marquis of Dorchester. 1618-1682 Pierpont began his religious work as a theology student in 1816, first in Baltimore and then at Harvard, afterwards accepting an appointment as pastor at the Hollis Street Church in Boston (1819-1845). DuringRead More →

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In: Architectural, Areas, Art & Culture, Landmarks, Washington Park
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Thank you Richard “Deme5” Gomez and Thomas “Kwest” Burns for your love of Roxbury. From ‘Roxbury Love’ Mural Reduced To Rubble As Development Starts On Apartment Complex by WBUR’s Amelia Mason The ‘Roxbury Love’ mural by street artists Richard “Deme5” Gomez and Thomas “Kwest” Burns, was commissioned by the nonprofit Alliger Arts as part of the city’s “Pop Up! Dudley Connections” program in 2014. The image of Mandela pays homage to the South African anti-apartheid leader’s visit to Boston in 1990. The mural quickly earned an iconic status in the neighborhood, helping usher in an explosion of public art in a city once notorious forRead More →