Back Bay’s Historical Real Estate
Please call Frank Knotts @ Coldwell Banker to purchase Real Estate in Back Bay and surrounding areas of Boston, MA. Frank Knotts - Voicemail # 617-796-7415
Back Bay’s Historical Real Estate –
Detailed Information about the neighborhood for purchasing real estate.
Back Bay – Boston’s Centrally located Neighborhood
The boundaries of the Back Bay, as defined by the Neighborhood Association of Back Bay, are “the Charles River on the North; Arlington Street to Park Square on the East; Columbus Avenue to the ‘New York, New Haven, & Hartford’ right-of-way (south of Stuart Street and Copley Place), Huntington Avenue, Dalton Street, and the Massachusetts Turnpike on the South; and Charlesgate East on the West.” The block between Charlesgate and Kenmore Square is often included as it retains Commonwealth Avenue’s central park and pedestrial mall.
The Back Bay Architectural District, which is much smaller, was established by state law in 1966, and is bounded by “the centerlines of Back Street on the north, Embankment Road and Arlington Street on the east, Boylston Street on the south, and Charlesgate East on the west”.[2]
History:
The neighborhood gained its name because the area was, in fact, before it was filled in, literally the “Back Bay” for Boston. To the west of the Shawmut Peninsula, on the far side from Boston Harbor, a wide bay opened between Boston and Cambridge, with the Charles River entering at the west side. As with all of the New England coast, the bay was tidal, with water rising and falling several feet over the course of the day. At low water, part of the bottom of the bay was exposed.
In 1814, the Boston and Roxbury Mill Corporation was chartered to construct a mill dam, which would also serve as a toll road connecting Boston to Watertown, bypassing Boston Neck. The dam was later buried under present-day Beacon Street.[3]
The Back Bay neighborhood was created when a parcel of land was created by filling the tidewater flats of the Charles River. This massive project was begun in 1857. The filling of present-day Back Bay was completed by 1882; filling reached Kenmore Square in 1890, and finished in the Fens in 1900. The project was the largest of a number of land reclamation projects, beginning in 1820, which, over the course of time, more than doubled the size of the original Boston peninsula. It is frequently observed that this would have been impossible under modern environmental regulations.
Effect of landfill on size of Boston.Back Bay’s development was planned by architect Arthur Gilman with Gridley James Fox Bryant. Strict regulations produced a uniform and well-integrated architecture, consisting mostly of dignified three- and four-story residential (or once-residential) brownstones.
Greatly influenced by Haussmann’s renovation of Paris in the mid-to-late 19th century, the main thoroughfares of Back Bay emphasize order, with wide, parallel, tree-lined avenues and more homogenous architectural styles. Five east and west corridors run the length of the Back Bay: Beacon Street (closest to the Charles River), Marlborough Street, Commonwealth Avenue, Newbury Street, and Boylston Street. With the exception of Commonwealth Avenue, the wide central thoroughfare, these streets are one-way and intersect with north-south cross streets at regular intervals. The north-south cross streets, also one-way, are named alphabetically starting at the Public Garden, and a 1903 guidebook notes an alternation of trisyllabic and bisyllabic names: Arlington, Berkeley, Clarendon, Dartmouth, Exeter, Fairfield, Gloucester, and Hereford. (This same set of street names is used for the long East-West main streets in the center of Gladstone, Oregon, but the origin of this connection is unknown).
Perspectives on Back Bay:
William Dean Howells, writing of memories of his first visit to Boston, recalled, “There are the narrow streets, stretching saltworks to the docks, which I haunted for their quaintness… There is Beacon Street, with the Hancock House where it is incredibly no more, and there are the beginnings of Commonwealth Avenue, and the other streets of the Back Bay, laid out with their basements left hollowed in the made land, which the gravel trains were yet making out of the westward hills.”
To the W. C. Fields character, con artist Cuthbert W. Twillie, it came as naturally as breathing to feign that he was “one of the Back Bay Twillies.” However, there was a subtle social distinction between the Back Bay neighborhood and the older Beacon Hill district. A 1921 novel, By Advice of Counsel, characterizes one Bostonian by saying:
“William Montague Pepperill was a very intense young person, twenty-six years old, out of Boston by Harvard College. … There had been an aloof serenity about his life within the bulging front of the paternal residence with its ancient glass window panes—faintly tinged with blue, just as the blood in the Pepperill veins was also faintly tinged with the same color… For W.M.P. the only real Americans lived on Beacon Hill, though a few perhaps might be found accidentally across Charles Street upon the made land of the Back Bay. A real American must necessarily also be a graduate of Harvard, a Unitarian, an allopath, belong to the Somerset Club and date back ancestrally at least to King Philip’s War.” By 1900, most of the building up of Back Bay was done, as noted by the architectural historian Bainbridge Bunting in 1967:
“By 1900 the Back Bay residential area had almost ceased to grow. After 1910 only thirty new houses were constructed, after 1917 none at all. Instead of paying high prices for filled land on which to erect a home within walking distance of his office, the potential home builder escaped to the suburbs on the electric trolley or in his automobile. This flight from the city left empty much of the area west of Kenmore Square and adjacent to Fenway Park, and only later was it occupied by non-descript and closely-built apartments.”
Back Bay today:
Main streets of Back Bay.Culturally speaking, the Back Bay is known for being the home of the wealthy and the upper middle class. It is best-known for its expensive housing and shopping areas. Most stores are located on Newbury and Boylston Streets, with the ends closer to the Boston Public Garden traditionally more expensive. The Back Bay is dense with luxury hotels that include The Colonnade Hotel, Westin Copley Place, Fairmont Copley Plaza, and the largest hotel in the city, the Marriott Copley. The new Mandarin Oriental, Boston is due to open in June 2008, with an arcade area housing a number of upscale designer boutiques and restaurants.
The Copley Square area is close to the Back Bay railroad terminal, and is the eastern nexus of a system of hotels and shopping centers connected by a set of glassed-in pedestrian overpasses.
The large Copley Place mall includes the first Neiman Marcus opened in the New England area. The system of overpasses extends over half a mile[citation needed] to the Prudential Center and the shops surrounding it. The 52-story Prudential Tower, thought a marvel in 1964, is now considered ugly by some.[4] However, the Prudential Skywalk observatory offers wonderful views of Back Bay, Boston, and surrounding areas.
The Architecture of Back Bay:
The residential streets of Back Bay are some of the best preserved examples of late 19th century urban architecture in the US. Copley Square, bounded by Clarendon, Boylston, Dartmouth, and St. James streets, includes Trinity Church, the Boston Public Library, the John Hancock Tower, and other notable examples of architecture. The “Back Bay Historic District” was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on August 14, 1973.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
“Back Bay, Beacon Hill and South End neighborhoods are some of the best places to live in Boston !” If you are interested in receiving more detailed information about these neighborhoods please give me a call to discuss moving purchasing or renting in Boston. Franklin Knotts, Coldwell Banker Voicemail, # 617-796-7416
Loading ...
