Walking Tours of Boston’s Made Land. Nancy S. Seasholes
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Walking Tours of Boston’s Made Land. Nancy S. Seasholes
Walking Tours of Boston’s Made Land. Nancy S. Seasholes. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2006. 212 pages. $18.95 (paperback).
Walking Tours of Boston’s Made Land is a collection of twelve illustrated walking tours focusing on the areas of man-made land in the city. It is a travel book made for historians, Bostonians, and walkers, with interests as diverse as culture, architecture, and civil engineering. It is not, nor does it sell itself as, an all-encompassing tourist guide. For a novice to the city it should be viewed as a supplement to, rather than a replacement of, the typical Lonely Planet type travel guide.
Because of the book’s unique focus, the reader will encounter many, but not all of the major historical and tourist attractions of the city. Parts of the Freedom Trail, the Harbor Walk, etc., are included in these tours. However, the book is true to its title, concentrating on the one sixth of the city that was actually physically man-made. This was usually done by building seawalls out into the tidal flats and filling in the resulting areas with dirt, often obtained by leveling the hills of other parts of the city. If an attraction is in or close to one of these areas then it is included in the tours, if not, you will not find it in the book. The flip side of this is that the walks often bring you to hidden historical gems that you would never find on the beaten path, such as the Charles River Dam in Walk 11. For this reason alone, this fascinating, inexpensive little book should be owned by any serious student of Boston. But the casual tourist with only a weekend in the city will want to first explore the more traditional venues such as the Freedom Trail or the African American Heritage Trail and would be better served by a more traditional tourist tome.
As a practicable travel guide, this book has many points in its favor. After reading the book I took Walk 11 so that it could be reviewed from the traveller’s perspective. As stated in the preface, the authors aim was to provide a travel book that is easy to carry around. Mission accomplished, as it is lightweight and easily fits into a small bag or larger coat pocket. The maps are excellent, the directions precise and easy to follow. The book avoids a major pitfall of some travel guides by numbering, bolding, and segmenting the directions from the descriptive text. A really nice feature is the end flaps on both covers, which give you two ready-made bookmarks for your trip, one for the map and one for your point on the walk, so that you don’t need to fold the pages of your book. Other excellent travel features are the noting of public restrooms, MBTA stops, mileage, and estimated time frames for the walks. In addition, I found the optional detours not to be missed unless you have a pressing time constraint or some other reason to hurry along.
As for Walk 11 itself, it includes a number of historical wonders that everyone who lives in or visits Boston should see at some point in their lives. Some, like the USS Constitution and the dry docks, are fixtures of the Freedom Trail. I found the dry docks particularly impressive, as it is one thing to read about or see a photograph of them and it’s quite another thing to see a massive US Navy ship displayed entirely out of the water. Many other points of interest are unique to this tour, including Harvard Mall, the Charles River Dam, the very touching Korean War memorial, the Historic Monument Area along the pedestrian only 2nd Avenue, and the incredibly long Ropewalk Building.
Throughout the entire tour, the real points of interest within the book were the neighborhoods and the transformations that they went through over time. Ms. Seasholes never loses focus of the main premise of the book, which is to highlight the man-made land of Boston and the communities that grew up upon it. This provides the real value added element to the text that will be appreciated by any serious student of Boston and that makes this book a unique addition to the travel literature of New England.
Stephen Donnelly is a consultant for the insurance industry and a Westfield State College alumnus.
Walking Tours of Boston’s Made Land is a collection of twelve illustrated walking tours focusing on the areas of man-made land in the city. It is a travel book made for historians, Bostonians, and walkers, with interests as diverse as culture, architecture, and civil engineering. It is not, nor does it sell itself as, an all-encompassing tourist guide. For a novice to the city it should be viewed as a supplement to, rather than a replacement of, the typical Lonely Planet type travel guide.
Because of the book’s unique focus, the reader will encounter many, but not all of the major historical and tourist attractions of the city. Parts of the Freedom Trail, the Harbor Walk, etc., are included in these tours. However, the book is true to its title, concentrating on the one sixth of the city that was actually physically man-made. This was usually done by building seawalls out into the tidal flats and filling in the resulting areas with dirt, often obtained by leveling the hills of other parts of the city. If an attraction is in or close to one of these areas then it is included in the tours, if not, you will not find it in the book. The flip side of this is that the walks often bring you to hidden historical gems that you would never find on the beaten path, such as the Charles River Dam in Walk 11. For this reason alone, this fascinating, inexpensive little book should be owned by any serious student of Boston. But the casual tourist with only a weekend in the city will want to first explore the more traditional venues such as the Freedom Trail or the African American Heritage Trail and would be better served by a more traditional tourist tome.
As a practicable travel guide, this book has many points in its favor. After reading the book I took Walk 11 so that it could be reviewed from the traveller’s perspective. As stated in the preface, the authors aim was to provide a travel book that is easy to carry around. Mission accomplished, as it is lightweight and easily fits into a small bag or larger coat pocket. The maps are excellent, the directions precise and easy to follow. The book avoids a major pitfall of some travel guides by numbering, bolding, and segmenting the directions from the descriptive text. A really nice feature is the end flaps on both covers, which give you two ready-made bookmarks for your trip, one for the map and one for your point on the walk, so that you don’t need to fold the pages of your book. Other excellent travel features are the noting of public restrooms, MBTA stops, mileage, and estimated time frames for the walks. In addition, I found the optional detours not to be missed unless you have a pressing time constraint or some other reason to hurry along.
As for Walk 11 itself, it includes a number of historical wonders that everyone who lives in or visits Boston should see at some point in their lives. Some, like the USS Constitution and the dry docks, are fixtures of the Freedom Trail. I found the dry docks particularly impressive, as it is one thing to read about or see a photograph of them and it’s quite another thing to see a massive US Navy ship displayed entirely out of the water. Many other points of interest are unique to this tour, including Harvard Mall, the Charles River Dam, the very touching Korean War memorial, the Historic Monument Area along the pedestrian only 2nd Avenue, and the incredibly long Ropewalk Building.
Throughout the entire tour, the real points of interest within the book were the neighborhoods and the transformations that they went through over time. Ms. Seasholes never loses focus of the main premise of the book, which is to highlight the man-made land of Boston and the communities that grew up upon it. This provides the real value added element to the text that will be appreciated by any serious student of Boston and that makes this book a unique addition to the travel literature of New England.
Stephen Donnelly is a consultant for the insurance industry and a Westfield State College alumnus.
