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Under the leadership of John Winthrop (see John Winthrop (1587–1649)), English Puritans moved from overcrowded Charlestown and colonized the Shawmut Peninsula. Permission was granted from its sole English inhabitant, Anglican cleric William Blaxton. Their city on the hill was named Boston in honor of the native English town of their leaders.

Boston’s Puritan leaders established a college at Newtowne (later Cambridge) to educate future generations of clergy. When young Charlestown minister John Harvard died two years later and left his books and half his money to the college, it was renamed Harvard (see Harvard University).

Friction between colonists and the British crown had been building for more than a decade when British troops marched on Lexington to confiscate rebel weapons. Forewarned by Paul Revere (see Paul Revere (1735–1818)), local militia, known as the Minute Men, skirmished with British regulars on Lexington Green. During the second confrontation at Concord, the shot heard round the world marked the beginning of the Revolution, which ended in American independence with the 1783 Treaty of Paris.

Irish fleeing the potato famine arrived in Boston in tens of thousands, many eventually settling in the south of the city. By 1900, the Irish were the dominant ethnic group in Boston. They flexed their political muscle accordingly, culminating in the election of John F. Kennedy (see John F. Kennedy (1917–1963)) as president in 1960.

The Boston Public Library was established as the first publicly supported municipal library in the US. In 1895 the library moved into the Italianate “palace of the people” on Copley Square (see Boston Public Library).

Following decades of agitation to abolish slavery, the city sent the country’s first African-American regiment to join Union forces in the Civil War. The regiment was honored by the Shaw Memorial on Boston Common (see Shaw Memorial).

Boston assumed its modern form with the filling in of Back Bay (see Around Newbury Street) and the completion of Franklin Park, the final link in the Emerald Necklace (see Faneuil Hall Marketplace).

The Tremont Street subway, the first underground in the US, was opened on September 1 to ease road congestion. It cost $4.4 million to construct and the initial fare was five cents. This single line grew into the Metropolitan Boston Transit Authority (MBTA) with 181 routes and 252 stations.

This historical walking tour was established, with its familiar red brick and paint connecting the city’s sights. It was based on a 1951 Boston Herald Traveler column by William Scofield, and was the first of its kind in the US.