Boston's financial district is considered the heart of New England's banking and finance. It is a veritable overlay of sleek modern office buildings and elegant high-rise structures of the early twentieth century. In the center of this contemporary skyline is evidence of the financial district's long history. Boston's first skyscraper, the Boston Custom House tower, stands high from where it was built in 1915 on top of the original 1849 custom house building.

Boston's Financial District chronicles the steady change from a romantic neighborhood to numerous banking and business houses. It was...

Originally a narrow, barren strip of land known as the Neck, Boston's South End grew from a lonely sentry post and execution grounds to what is today the largest Victorian neighborhood in the United States. With the filling of the South Cove in the 1830s, the area became one of the greatest planned residential districts of its time, a heritage preserved in unique architectural features such as red brick swell bay facades, elaborate balusters, and fanciful porches.

Few events can be said to have changed the face of Boston forever. Eventually destroying 775 buildings and causing millions of dollars in damage to the commercial section that we now know as Boston's business district, the Great Boston Fire of 1872 was a spectacular conflagration that destroyed "old Boston" and allowed a phoenix to arise from the ashes. This exciting new pictorial history brings to life the drama that began one Saturday evening in 1872 when a fire started in an empty hoop-skirt factory on the corner of Summer and Kingston Streets. At the time, Boston was in the throes of a...

Referred to in its beginning as a "peculiar town," Medford was originally a town but a plantation owned by Governor Matthew Craddock. Known as Meadford at the time of its settlement in 1630, the area was a flourishing village located along the Mystic River that boasted numerous farms, fisheries, and shipbuilding. A small town for the first two centuries after it was settled, Medford was conveniently located only a few miles from Boston. Its prime location soon attracted thousands of residents, and by the turn of the twentieth century, Medford had become a cultural mecca with over 18,000...

Boston is a city rich in the history of residents from all walks of life, every country and every ethnicity imaginable. From 1840 to 1925, Boston's diversity created a city with a thriving nexus of people who wove together a community that reflected their own unique heritage. In this lavishly illustrated book with over 200 thought-provoking and evocative photographs, Anthony Mitchell Sammarco and Michael Price have created an important book chronicling the determination, strength, and often manifold successes of immigrants who arrived in Boston. From the mid-nineteenth century when Boston's...

Jamaica Plain today is one of Bostons great suburban neighborhoods, but it has not always been connected to the city. The area has a rich and colorful history that stretches from its rural, pastoral beginnings in the seventeenth century. Jamaica Plain became a part of Roxbury, and later West Roxbury, and served as a summer playground for influential Bostonians before becoming part of Boston in 1874. Today, the neighborhood is a bustling suburban spot that has preserved its natural beauty and resources. Stories abound as to how Jamaica Plain derived its name; some trace it to the flow of rum...

Originally called Noodle's Island, East Boston was once comprised of five islands connected by marshland. Today, many people identify East Boston as the location of Logan International Airport, but it is really much more than that. From colonial times through the late twentieth century, the neighborhood of East Boston has experienced significant developments in the fields of city planning, transportation, and urban development. Until the nineteenth century, East Boston was a rural community whose land was used for grazing and firewood. The East Boston Company was incorporated by William...