Boston walking tour: history and highlights in the genesis of the New World

Let’s make tracks along our own version of Boston’s freedom trail in this ode to one of America’s truly great, historical cities. On this self-guided walking tour from Copp’s Hill Burying Ground to the George Washington Statue in the Boston Public Garden, you’ll unlock the story behind the nation’s beginnings, through the city’s landmark buildings and monuments.

Our walk begins in one of Boston’s oldest neighborhoods, the North End, where I’ll share tidbits from the Colonial and Revolutionary history of the area. We’ll travel as far back as 1692 with a visit to the grave of Cotton Mather, the minister at the hysterical heart of the Salem Witch Trials. Then we’ll journey to the Old North Church and the pre-Revolution years, when Paul Revere organized the midnight riders so they could alert the Minutemen: ”The British are coming!” Next, you’ll waft past the aromas of Little Italy’s restaurants and bakeries to get to the Paul Revere House, before enjoying a stroll along the Rose Kennedy Greenway while I tell you about Boston’s ”Big Dig.”

Take a moment to shop around Quincy Market or catch some of the area’s regular street performers while I tell you about Faneuil Hall and one of America’s fiercest proponents of liberty, Samuel Adams. You’ll stop by the Old State House to hear how future president John Adams magnanimously defended perpetrators of the Boston Massacre, but also recognised that “it was then and there that the foundation of American Liberty was laid.” I’ll tell you about the two choices that Irish families faced in the 1800s while we pass by the Boston Irish Famine Memorial en route to visit Adams’ grave, where he lies in good company with John Hancock and Paul Revere in the Granary Burying Ground.

Some questions I’ll answer along the way include:

• Who sent the signal from the Old North Church steeple to Paul Revere?
• What did Revere do after the American Revolution?
• Why did Italian Heritage bloom in the North End?
• How did 2 million gallons of sugary molasses congeal the whole North End back in 1919?
• Did Samuel Adams really brew beer? (The answer is a bit tricky)
• What led to the creation of America’s first public park, the Boston Common?
• How did the Massachusetts 54th Regiment, featured in the 1989 film Glory contribute to the Union during the American Civil War?

Give yourself 90 minutes or take your time to answer these and many more questions on this tour of free-America’s urban cradle.