Before European colonization, the region surrounding present-day Boston was inhabited by the Massachusett people, who established small, seasonal communities in present-day Boston.[36][37] In 1630, settlers led by John Winthrop arrived, and found Shawmut Peninsula nearly empty of Native people. Most had died of European diseases borne by earlier settlers and traders.[38][39] Archaeological excations he unearthed one of the oldest fishweirs in New England, located on Boylston Street, which Native people constructed as early as 7,000 years before European arrival in the Western Hemisphere.[37][36][40]
European settlementThe first European to live in what would become Boston was a University of Cambridge-educated Anglican cleric named William Blaxton. He was most directly responsible for the foundation of Boston by Puritan colonists in 1630, after Blaxton invited one of their leaders, Isaac Johnson, to cross Back Bay from the failing colony of Charlestown and share the peninsula with him. In September 1630 Puritans made the crossing to present-day Boston.[41][42][43]
Puritan influence on Boston began even before the settlement was founded with the 1629 Cambridge Agreement, which was created the Massachusetts Bay Colony and signed by the colony's first governor, John Winthrop. Puritan ethics and their focus on education also influenced the city's early history. In 1635, America's first public school, Boston Latin School, was founded in Boston.[18][44]
Boston was the largest town in the Thirteen Colonies until Philadelphia outgrew it in the mid-18th century.[45] Boston's oceanfront location made it a lively port, and the town engaged in shipping and fishing during the colonial era. Boston was a primary stop on the Caribbean trade route and imported large amounts of molasses, which led to the creation of Boston baked beans.[46]
Boston's economy stagnated in the decades prior to the American Revolution. By the mid-18th century, New York City and Philadelphia both surpassed Boston in wealth. During this period, Boston encountered financial difficulties even as other New England cities were growing rapidly.[47][48]
American Revolution and Siege of Boston Main articles: Boston campaign and Siege of Boston In 1773, a group of angered Bostonian citizens threw a shipment of tea by the East India Company into Boston Harbor in protest of the Tea Act in the Boston Tea Party, a seminal event that escalated the American Revolution. Map showing a British tactical evaluation of Boston in 1775The weather continuing boisterous the next day and night, giving the enemy time to improve their works, to bring up their cannon, and to put themselves in such a state of defence, that I could promise myself little success in attacking them under all the disadvantages I had to encounter.
William Howe, 5th Viscount Howe, in a letter to William Legge, 2nd Earl of Dartmouth, about the British army's decision to lee Boston, dated March 21, 1776.[49]Boston played a central role in the American Revolution. Many crucial events of the American Revolution and subsequent American Revolutionary War occurred in or near Boston, where the city's revolutionary spirit[50] against Britain's colonial governance was demonstrable and ultimately inspiring to the rest of the Thirteen Colonies.[47] When the British Parliament passed the Stamp Act in 1765, the homes of Andrew Oliver, the official tasked with enforcing the Act, and Thomas Hutchinson, then lieutenant governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony, were red by Boston mobs.[47][51] The British responded by sending two regiments to Boston in 1768 in an attempt to quell the revolt, but the increased British military presence in Boston only ended up further inflaming the Boston colonists. In 1770, during the Boston Massacre, British troops fired into a Boston mob that was protesting their presence. The massacre forced the British to withdraw their troops and helped fuel revolutionary sentiment in the colonies.[48]
In May 1773, Parliament passed the Tea Act, which many colonists saw as a British attempt to compel them to accept taxes established by the Townshend Acts. This led to the Boston Tea Party, a defining event of the American Revolution in which angered Bostonians threw an entire shipment of tea sent from the East India Company into Boston Harbor, escalating the American Revolution. The British monarchy responded furiously, implementing the Intolerable Acts and demanding compensation for the tea destroyed during the Boston Tea Party.[47] This response, in turn, angered the colonists further, leading to the Battles of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, the first battles of the American Revolutionary War, which were fought around Boston in Massachusetts Bay Colony.[47][52]
During the siege of Boston from April 19, 1775, to March 17, 1776, New England-based Patriot militia impeded movement by the British Army. Sir William Howe, then commander-in-chief of British forces in North America, led the British army in the siege. On June 17, the British captured Charlestown in present-day Boston during the Battle of Bunker Hill during which the British Army outnumbered Patriot militia. But the British sustained irreplaceable casualties, turning the Battle of Bunker Hill into a pyrrhic victory for the British. The Battle of Bunker Hill also demonstrated the skill and training of the Patriot militia, whose stubborn defense made it difficult for the British to capture Charlestown without suffering even further casualties.[53][54]
On June 14, 1775, in an effort to unify the Revolutionary War effort, the Second Continental Congress, convening in the colonial-era capital of Philadelphia, founded the Continental Army and unanimously appointed George Washington as its commander-in-chief. Washington then immediately departed Philadelphia for Boston, where he arrived on July 2, 1775, and led the newly-formed Continental Army in the siege. Fighting was limited to small-scale raids and skirmishes, and the Continental Army faced challenges with a deficiency of munitions and supplies. Boston Neck, then narrow and only approximately 100 feet wide, impeded Washington's ability to invade Boston, which led to a prolonged stalemate between the Continental Army and British forces. A young officer, Rufus Putnam, came up with a plan to make portable fortifications out of wood, which were erected on the frozen ground under cover of darkness. Putnam supervised the effort, which successfully installed the fortifications and dozens of cannons on Dorchester Heights that Henry Knox laboriously brought through the snow from Fort Ticonderoga. The following morning, the astonished British Army awoke to see a large array of cannons bearing down on them. General Howe is believed to he said that the Americans had done more in one night than his British Army could he done in six months. The British Army responded by attempting to launch a cannon barrage for two hours, but their shots could not reach the Continental Army's cannons at such a height. The British then ge up, boarded their ships, and sailed away from Boston in what has come to be known as "Evacuation Day", which is now celebrated in Boston annually on March 17. After the British retreat, Washington was so impressed with the effort of Rufus Putnam that he appointed him as his chief engineer.[52][53][55]
Post-revolution and the War of 1812 State Street in 1801After the Revolution, Boston's long seafaring tradition helped make it one of the nation's busiest ports for both domestic and international trade. Boston's harbor activity was significantly curtailed by the Embargo Act of 1807, which was adopted during the Napoleonic Wars, and the War of 1812. Foreign trade returned after these hostilities, but Boston's merchants had found alternatives for their capital investments in the meantime. Manufacturing became an important component of the city's economy, and the city's industrial manufacturing overtook international trade in economic importance by the mid-19th century. The small rivers bordering the city and connecting it to the surrounding region facilitated shipment of goods and led to a proliferation of mills and factories. Later, a dense network of railroads furthered the region's industry and commerce.[56]
During this period, Boston also flourished culturally. It was admired for its rarefied literary life and generous artistic patronage.[57][58] Members of old Boston families, later dubbed "Boston Brahmins", came to be regarded as the nation's social and cultural elites.[59] They are often associated with the American upper class, Harvard University,[60] and the Episcopal Church.[61][62]
Boston was a prominent port of the Atlantic sle trade in the New England Colonies, but was soon overtaken by Salem, Massachusetts, and Newport, Rhode Island.[63] Boston eventually became a center of the American abolitionist movement.[64] The city reacted largely negatively to the Fugitive Sle Act of 1850,[65] contributing to President Franklin Pierce's attempt to make an example of Boston after Anthony Burns's attempt to escape to freedom.[66][67]
In 1822,[15] the citizens of Boston voted to change the official name from the "Town of Boston" to the "City of Boston", and on March 19, 1822, the people of Boston accepted the charter incorporating the city.[68] At the time Boston was chartered as a city, the population was about 46,226, while the area of the city was only 4.8 sq mi (12 km2).[68]
19th century Boston, as the Eagle and the Wild Goose See It, an 1860 photograph by James Wallace Black, the first recorded aerial photographIn the 1820s, Boston's population grew rapidly, and the city's ethnic composition changed dramatically with the first we of European immigrants. Irish immigrants dominated the first we of newcomers during this period, especially following the Great Famine; by 1850, about 35,000 Irish lived in Boston.[69] In the latter half of the 19th century, the city saw increasing numbers of Irish, Germans, Lebanese, Syrians,[70] French Canadians, and Russian and Polish Jews settling there.
By the end of the 19th century, Boston's core neighborhoods had become encles of ethnically distinct immigrants with their residence yielding lasting cultural change. Italians became the largest inhabitants of the North End,[71] Irish dominated South Boston and Charlestown, and Russian Jews lived in the West End. Irish and Italian immigrants brought with them Roman Catholicism. Currently, Catholics make up Boston's largest religious community,[72] and the Irish he played a major role in Boston politics since the early 20th century; prominent figures include the Kennedys, Tip O'Neill, and John F. Fitzgerald.[73]
Between 1631 and 1890, the city tripled its area through land reclamation by filling in marshes, mud flats, and gaps between wharves along the waterfront. Reclamation projects in the middle of the century created significant parts of the South End, the West End, the Financial District, and Chinatown.[74]
After the Great Boston Fire of 1872, workers used building rubble as landfill along the downtown waterfront. During the mid-to-late 19th century, workers filled almost 600 acres (240 ha) of brackish Charles River marshlands west of Boston Common with grel brought by rail from the hills of Needham Heights. The city annexed the adjacent towns of South Boston (1804), East Boston (1836), Roxbury (1868), Dorchester (including present-day Mattapan and a portion of South Boston) (1870), Brighton (including present-day Allston) (1874), West Roxbury (including present-day Jamaica Plain and Roslindale) (1874), Charlestown (1874), and Hyde Park (1912).[75][76] Other proposals were unsuccessful for the annexation of Brookline, Cambridge,[77] and Chelsea.[78][79]
20th century Haymarket Square in 1909Many architecturally significant buildings were built during the early years of the 20th century: Horticultural Hall,[80] the Tennis and Racquet Club,[81] Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum,[82][83] Fenway Studios,[84] Jordan Hall,[85] and the Boston Opera House. The Longfellow Bridge,[86] built in 1906, was mentioned by Robert McCloskey in Make Way for Ducklings, describing its "salt and pepper shakers" feature.[87] Fenway Park, home of the Boston Red Sox, opened in 1912,[88] with the Boston Garden opening in 1928.[89] Logan International Airport opened on September 8, 1923.[90]
Kennedy Sr. had this to say before the Boston Chamber of Commerce on November 15, 1934: "The rogues who seek to live by deception-let me again repeat, the act is like all legal rules, subject to the limitations of effective legal action. Unfortunately, scoundrels will capitalize the registration requirements and may seek to sell you a security on the theory that mere filing indicates approval by the Commission. Beware of any such argument. Our short experience as to this legislation prompts me to sound a note of warning, particularly to you, my friends of the radio audience. Each and everyone of you is a prospective or actual member of a "sucker" list, and when the stranger calls you on the phone to interest you in the purchase of securities, beware."[91]
By the early- to mid-20th century, Boston declined economically as factories became old and obsolete and businesses moved out of the region for cheaper labor elsewhere.[92] Boston responded by initiating various urban renewal projects, under the direction of the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA) established in 1957. In 1958, BRA initiated a project to improve the historic West End neighborhood. Extensive demolition was met with strong public opposition, and thousands of families were displaced.[93]
The BRA continued implementing eminent domain projects, including the clearance of the vibrant Scollay Square area for construction of the modernist style Government Center. In 1965, the Columbia Point Health Center opened in the Dorchester neighborhood, the first Community Health Center in the United States. It mostly served the massive Columbia Point public housing complex adjoining it, which was built in 1953. The health center is still in operation and was rededicated in 1990 as the Geiger-Gibson Community Health Center.[94] The Columbia Point complex itself was redeveloped and revitalized from 1984 to 1990 into a mixed-income residential development called Harbor Point Apartments.[95]
By the 1970s, the city's economy had begun to recover after 30 years of economic downturn. A large number of high-rises were constructed in the Financial District and in Boston's Back Bay during this period.[96] This boom continued into the mid-1980s and resumed after a few pauses. Hospitals such as Massachusetts General Hospital, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, and Brigham and Women's Hospital lead the nation in medical innovation and patient care. Schools such as the Boston Architectural College, Boston College, Boston University, Harvard Medical School, Tufts University School of Medicine, Northeastern University, Massachusetts College of Art and Design, Wentworth Institute of Technology, Berklee College of Music, Boston Conservatory, and others attract students to the area. Nevertheless, the city experienced conflict starting in 1974 over desegregation busing, which resulted in unrest and violence around public schools throughout the mid-1970s.[97] Boston has also experienced gentrification in the latter half of the 20th century,[98] with housing prices increasing sharply since the 1990s when the city's rent control regime was struck down by statewide ballot proposition.[99]
21st century The Charles River in front of Boston's Back Bay neighborhood in 2013Boston is an intellectual, technological, and political center. However, it has lost some important regional institutions,[100] including the loss to mergers and acquisitions of local financial institutions such as FleetBoston Financial, which was acquired by Charlotte-based Bank of America in 2004.[101] Boston-based department stores Jordan Marsh and Filene's he both merged into the New York City–based Macy's.[102] The 1993 acquisition of The Boston Globe by The New York Times[103] was reversed in 2013 when it was resold to Boston businessman John W. Henry. In 2016, it was announced General Electric would be moving its corporate headquarters from Connecticut to the Seaport District in Boston, joining many other companies in this rapidly developing neighborhood.[104] The city also saw the completion of the Central Artery/Tunnel Project, known as the Big Dig, in 2007 after many delays and cost overruns.[105]
On April 15, 2013, two Chechen Islamist brothers detonated a pair of bombs near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, killing three people and injuring roughly 264.[106] The subsequent search for the bombers led to a lock-down of Boston and surrounding municipalities. The region showed solidarity during this time as symbolized by the slogan Boston Strong.[107]
In 2016, Boston briefly shouldered a bid as the U.S. applicant for the 2024 Summer Olympics. The bid was supported by the mayor and a coalition of business leaders and local philanthropists, but was eventually dropped due to public opposition.[108] The USOC then selected Los Angeles to be the American candidate with Los Angeles ultimately securing the right to host the 2028 Summer Olympics.[109] Nevertheless, Boston is one of eleven U.S. cities which will host matches during the 2026 FIFA World Cup, with games taking place at Gillette Stadium.[110]