Click here to download a PDF of our poster

2010 If This House Could Talk...

What happened in your neighborhood two, twenty, two hundred years ago?
For eight days, October 2-10, Cambridgeport residents, businesses and non-profits posted signs in front of their properties telling interesting tidbits from their recent or distant, personal or public past.

In October of 2009 over seventy signs cropped up for the first “If This House Could Talk…” In 2010 we had over 100 participants. Signs told about whatever local residents found interesting:

  • Residents, including writers, social activists, Shakers, and “regular people”;
  • Houses extensively renovated or virtually untouched, built as wedding gifts or boarding houses;
  • A church where Martin Luther King and J.F.K. once spoke; and
  • Gardens that grow potatoes for homemade fries or colorful dahlias--and plots that grew wartime vegetables.
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We hope you will take part this year. Participation is easy:

  • Contact Cathie Zusy (cathzusy@aol.com or 617-868-0489), and let her know you are interested.
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If you want to research your building, please visit our handly list of resources, available here: "If this house could talk..." Resources

“If This House Could Talk…” is part of Cambridgeport History Day, organized by the Cambridgeport History Project, and is sponsored in part by the Cambridge Trust Company, the Cambridge Savings Bank, and the Riverside Boat Club

Thank you to all the businesses and individuals who made our Celebration of Cambridgeport History possible!

ITHCT Sign-writers Toscanini's
Cambridge Trust Company Grace Methodist Church
Cambridge Savings Bank Whole Foods
Ames Safety Envelope Company Trader Joes
Reproman Reprographics Shaw's
Classic Graphx Middle East

Jeff Gardner, Mitch Ryerson, David Torrey, Ann Lynch, Howard Brightman, Grace McCabe and Sam Kendall

This event was organized by the Cambridgeport History Project, co-chaired by Henrietta Davis and Michael Kenney. Participating institutions: Cambridge Historical Society, Cambridge Historical Commission, Cambridgeport Neighborhood Association, Gallery 263, Cambridge Arts Council and Riverside Boat Club. Individual members: Cathie Zusy, Ross Miller, Madeline Drexler, and Dan Harkins.

 

Read an article from: History News:
The magazine of the American Association for State and Local History
on last year's "If this House Could Talk..."

"If This House Could Talk..."

Cambridgeport History Map

My Cambridgeport Map Project

Cambridgeport History Day

CHS home page