City preview · Greater Boston
Greater Boston’s history lives beyond brick walls and monuments. It is marked on a bridge measured with a student, a milk bottle that arrived by barge, a channel cut across watersheds, and a giant kettle above the street.
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01 · Harvard Bridge
The bridge is 364.4 smoots, plus or minus one ear.
In 1958, MIT students used freshman Oliver Smoot as a measuring stick, laying him down repeatedly and painting each mark. The numbers still run along the Boston-side walkway.
Source: MIT News
02 · Court Street
Eight boys and one adult climbed into this giant kettle in 1875.
The city sealer of weights and measures then recorded a capacity of 227 gallons. After Scollay Square disappeared, the kettle moved to Court Street in the 1960s and still hangs above the sidewalk.
Source: Boston.com
03 · Museum Wharf
This 40-foot milk bottle came to Boston by barge in 1977.
Built in 1934, it began as a roadside ice cream stand in Taunton. After Hood restored and donated it, the giant bottle crossed Boston Harbor to its place outside the children’s museum.
Source: Boston Children’s Museum
04 · Dedham
Mother Brook has diverted water across watersheds since 1639.
The channel later powered mills and industry along its course. A public path in Reservation Road Park overlooks the channel, wetland, and the direction of the engineered flow.
City of Boston ↗Mass.gov ↗All images on this page are City Whisper editorial illustrations, not historical photographs, news photographs, or evidence.
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