If the really radical protesting began in 1967, here we are having an historical reunion of sorts fifty years later. In Cambridge, I was the editor of the Catalyst, the newspaper of the Graduate Student Council at MIT. I covered two of the Harvard Square riots, as I recall in 1969 and in May 1970. In 1969, the radicals came … Read More
The Cyclotron by Bruce Irving
For nearly 65 years, the corner of Oxford and Hammond streets was the home of a nuclear family quite unlike the others in the neighborhood. This one was large, mostly male, heavy on the PhD’s (with a few Nobel Prize winners thrown in), and housed in a pair of buildings called the Harvard Cyclotron Laboratory (HCL). Demolished in 2003, the … Read More
Washington Elm Debate Rages On: Fact or Legend?
The Washington Elm Tradition by Samuel Francis Batchelder The famous Washington Elm, standing in the middle of Garden Street at its junction with Mason Street, was the first of a line of six magnificent elms planted along Garden Street, the westerly border of the “Cow Commons,” about 1700. The second stood at the corner of the present Waterhouse Street, and … Read More
The Makings of City Streets By Michael Kenney
As we lean into this year’s theme of “What Does Cambridge Make?”, a look at street names reveals a product–filled past. Porter Square was Union Square until 1899, when it was renamed in honor of Zachariah B. Porter, the proprietor of Porter’s Hotel; many claim he lent his name to the specialty of the house, the Porterhouse steak. Porter’s Hotel … Read More
Cars in Cambridge by Doug Brown
With air bags, anti–lock brakes, traction control, and GPS, the Uber driver of today operates a very different machine from the family chauffeur’s open–topped horseless carriage of 100 years ago. But regardless of the generation, Cantabrigians have always loved working on cars. Today that tinkering is just as likely to occur in a university lab as in a backyard … Read More
Chestnut Trees in Cambridge by Jason Weksner, Arborist
American chestnut trees (Castanea dentata) have all but vanished from Massachusetts landscapes, thanks to the fungal pathogen Cryphonectria parasitica, commonly known as chestnut blight. The lovely horse chestnut (Aesculus hippocastanum) from Europe, although a different genus from our native chestnut tree, has now established itself in the local landscape. While smaller than the American chestnut, the horse chestnut has … Read More
Lights, camera, action… (From our summer 2007 newsletter)
On a rainy weekend in April, the Chandler Room at the Hooper-Lee-Nichols House was transformed into a movie set. With its pine paneling and open hearth, it became the Charlestown home of John Harvard and his wife, Ann, for a reenactment of the final hours of Harvard’s life on September 14, 1638. The film, John Harvard, was written and produced … Read More
Looking Backward: Club 47 and the 1960s Folk Music Revival by Jennifer Hance
Bob Dylan never made it in Cambridge. This was one of many fascinating stories told by folklorist Millie Rahn, who travels around the country to collect and document the history of the folk music movement. Closer to home, Millie is the folklorist for Club Passim and other regional folk music venues. She produced a documentary on Club 47 for WGBH … Read More
The Remarkable John “Jack” Emerson: Founder of the J. H. Emerson Company by Daphne Abeel
When Will and George Emerson begin to talk about their family background and their father, who founded the J. H. Emerson Company, they mention somewhat offhandedly that they are descended from a brother of Ralph Waldo Emerson and that their paternal grandfather was related to the artist Maxfield Parrish. But it is only when they begin to describe their father, … Read More
Bob Dylan went electric in Cambridge
Did you know Cambridge is also known for making music? Bob Dylan went electric here!