CultureNOW - Whittier Street, Roxbury: Peter Vanderwarker

Whittier Street, Roxbury

There are no podcasts available.

Description

ABOUT THE HISTORICAL PHOTOGRAPHS
Like many Boston disasters, the Roxbury Flood of 1886 was the result of a public improvement project that went awry. Stony, or Stoney, Brook once meandered through Roxbury on its way to the Muddy River and the Charles. During the 1880s, the city buried it in culverts beneath the streets, announcing that "the immediate result
secured to the abutters ... is a (probably) complete immunity from danger by floods."
But the culverts proved too small. A three day rain in February 1886, which melted snow
and ice on the ground, was enough to overflow them. The water rose as high as 7 feet and trapped some families on upper floors for three days. After the flood, an investigation concluded that the recent "improvement" had been "money thrown away."
We're looking up Culvert Street, today called Whittier Street, toward Tremont. The
boat probably belongs to a rescue squad from the harbor police. The tallest building is the boiler shop of the Whittier Machine Co. This part of lower Roxbury was a mix of
factories and cheap company housing.

Historian Sam Bass Warner, in his classic Streetcar Suburbs, calls it a "zone of emergence," a place "where fIrst - and second generation immigrant families moved from their original ethnic centers and began to take their place in the general life of the American middle class.» It was about half Irish, with a mix of Germans, Canadians, and other groups, later changing to Jewish during the 1890s.

Today's view is from the same spot, yet not a single molecule of the old scene appears to have survived. Nevertheless, the neighborhood is still a steppingstone for recent arrivals. We are in the Whittier Street Housing. The arch of Ruggles Station is visible just to the right of the flagpole. The arch marks the entry to the MBTA station, which is designed as a bridge. It crosses the tracks to Northeastern University, linking Roxbury to the Fenway, to the Charles, and to Cambridge.

In the foreground is a group of students from the nearby John D. Q'Bryant High School of Mathematics and Science. They are (from left) Yen Ngo, Xun Doan, Hong Nguyen, and Dat Ngo. With them is Tom Beddall, an architect with Stull & Lee, the firm that designed Ruggles Station.

-Robert Campbell and Peter Vanderwarker, "CITYSCAPES - Whittier Street, Roxbury", Boston Globe, 1994

map not available at this time.

Location

Tremont St & Whittier St
Boston, MA 02120
United States

Nearby Items

Ruggles Street Station		665 feet
Harriet Tubman a.k.a. Moses		0.3 miles
Four Letters Home		0.3 miles
Geometree		0.3 miles
Stony Brook Dance		0.3 miles
Massachusetts Avenue Station		0.3 miles
Helion / Lollipop		0.4 miles