Watertown, Massachusetts Explained

Watertown, Massachusetts
Settlement Type:City
Mapsize:250px
Pushpin Map:Boston Metro#Massachusetts#USA
Pushpin Label:Watertown
Subdivision Type:Country
Subdivision Name:United States
Subdivision Type1:State
Subdivision Name1:Massachusetts
Subdivision Type2:County
Subdivision Name2:Middlesex
Established Title:Settled
Established Date:July 1630
Established Title2:Incorporated
Established Date2:September 7, 1630
Government Type:Council-manager
Leader Title:City Manager
Leader Name:George Proakis
Area Total Km2:10.68
Area Total Sq Mi:4.12
Area Land Km2:10.35
Area Land Sq Mi:4.00
Area Water Km2:0.33
Area Water Sq Mi:0.13
Population As Of:2020
Population Total:35329
Population Density Km2:3413.41
Population Density Sq Mi:8841.09
Elevation M:11
Elevation Ft:36
Timezone:Eastern
Utc Offset:−5
Timezone Dst:Eastern
Utc Offset Dst:−4
Coordinates:42.3708°N -71.1833°W
Website:www.watertown-ma.gov
Postal Code Type:ZIP Code
Postal Code:02472
Area Code:617/857
Blank Name:FIPS code
Blank Info:25-73440
Blank1 Name:GNIS feature ID
Blank1 Info:0612401
Unit Pref:Imperial
Area Footnotes:[1]

Watertown is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, part of Greater Boston. The population was 35,329 in the 2020 census. Its neighborhoods include Bemis, Coolidge Square, East Watertown, Watertown Square, and the West End.

Watertown was one of the first Massachusetts Bay Colony settlements organized by Puritan settlers in 1630. The city is home to the Perkins School for the Blind, the Armenian Library and Museum of America, and the historic Watertown Arsenal, which produced military armaments from 1816 through World War II.

History

Archeological evidence suggests that Watertown was inhabited for thousands of years before colonization. In the 1600s, two groups of Massachusett, the Pequossette and the Nonantum, had settlements on the banks of the river later called the Charles,[2] and a contemporary source lists "Pigsgusset" as the native name of "Water towne."[3] The Pequossette built a fishing weir to trap herring at the site of the current Watertown Dam. The annual fish migration, as both alewife and blueback herring swim upstream from their adult home in the sea to spawn in the fresh water where they were hatched, still occurs every spring.[4]

Watertown, first known to settlers as Saltonstall Plantation, was one of the earliest of the Massachusetts Bay Colony settlements. Founded in early 1630 by a group of settlers led by Richard Saltonstall and George Phillips, it was officially incorporated that same year. The alternate spelling "Waterton" is seen in some early documents.[5]

The first buildings were upon land now included within the limits of Cambridge known as Gerry's Landing. For its first quarter century Watertown ranked next to Boston in population and area. Since then its limits have been greatly reduced. Thrice portions have been added to Cambridge, and it has contributed territory to form the new towns of Weston (1712), Waltham (1738), Lincoln (1754) and Belmont (1859). In 1632 the residents of Watertown protested against being compelled to pay a tax for the erection of a stockade fort at Cambridge; this was the first protest in America against taxation without representation and led to the establishment of representative democracy in the colony. As early as the close of the 17th century, Watertown was the chief horse and cattle market in New England and was known for its fertile gardens and fine estates. Here about 1632 was erected the first gristmill in the colony, and in 1662 one of the first woolen mills in America was built here. The first burying ground, on Arlington Street, was established in the 1660s. It contains a monument to Joseph Coolidge, the only Watertown resident killed during the British retreat from Concord in April 1775.

Revolutionary War era

Much excitement was generated in Watertown towards the start of the American Revolutionary War period. In 1773, many of its citizens were engaged with the Sons of Liberty in another tax protest, this time against the British Tea Tax which resulted in the famous Boston Tea Party protest.[6]

Then later (April 1775), some 134 Watertown minutemen responded to the alarm from Lexington to rout the British soldiers from their march to Concord. Thereafter many of these citizen soldiers were part of the first battle line formed at the Siege of Boston. Another Watertown citizen, Israel Bissel, was the first rider to take the news of the British attack and rode all the way to Connecticut, New York and Philadelphia.[7] [8]

The Massachusetts Provincial Congress, after adjournment from Concord, met from April to July 1775 in the First Parish Church, the site of which is marked by a monument. On July 3, George Washington was greeted in Watertown; the following day he took command of the Army in Cambridge.[9] The Massachusetts General Court held its sessions here from 1775 to 1778. Committees met in the nearby Edmund Fowle House. Boston town meetings were held here during the siege of Boston, when many Boston families made their homes in the neighborhood. For several months early in the American Revolution the committees of safety and committee of correspondence made Watertown their headquarters and it was from here that General Joseph Warren set out for Bunker Hill.[10]

The Treaty of Watertown, the first treaty signed between the newly formed United States of America and a foreign power, the St. John's and Mi'kmaq First Nations of Nova Scotia, was signed in this house.[11] [12]

The Coolidge Tavern, built in 1742, was frequented by minutemen during the war. Here, Washington was entertained on his New England tour in 1789. The tavern was demolished in 1918 to make way for a trolley terminal.[13]

Industrial era

From 1832 to 1834, Theodore Parker conducted a private school and his name is still preserved in the Parker School, though the building no longer operates as a public school.

Mount Auburn Cemetery was founded in 1831, creating the first garden cemetery in the United States. The landscape of Mount Auburn provided inspiration for the nation's first public parks and picturesque suburbs designed by the early generations of American landscape architects. Mount Auburn has been recognized as one of the most significant designed landscapes in the country. Although perceived as a Cambridge institution, almost all of the cemetery is actually in Watertown.

The Watertown Arsenal operated continuously as a military munitions and research facility from 1816 until 1995, when the Army sold the property, by then known as the Army Materials Technology Laboratory,[14] to the town of Watertown. The Arsenal is notable for being the site of a 1911 strike prompted by the management methods of operations research pioneer Frederick Winslow Taylor (Taylor and 1911 Watertown Arsenal Strike). Taylor's method, which he dubbed "Scientific Management," broke tasks down into smaller components. Workers no longer completed whole items; instead, they were timed using stopwatches as they did small tasks repetitively, as Taylor attempted to find the balance of tasks that resulted in the maximum output from workers. The strike and its causes were controversial enough that they resulted in Congressional hearings in 1911; Congress passed a law in 1915 banning the method in government owned arsenals. Taylor's methods spread widely, influencing such industrialists as Henry Ford, and the idea is one of the underlying inspirations of the factory (assembly) line industrial method. The Watertown Arsenal was the site of a major superfund clean-up in the 1990s, and has now become a center for shopping, dining and the arts, with the opening of several restaurants and a new theatre. The site includes the Arsenal Center for the Arts, a regional arts center that opened in 2005. The Arsenal is now owned by athenahealth. Arsenal Street features two shopping malls across the street from one another, with the Watertown Mall on one side and Arsenal Yards on the other.

The Stanley Brothers built the first of their steam-powered cars, which came to be known as Stanley Steamers, in Watertown in 1897.[15]

The Locomobile Company of America, founded in 1899, also produced steam-powered cars in Watertown until the company moved to Bridgeport, Connecticut.

21st century

Shortly after midnight of April 18–19, 2013, the two suspects in the Boston Marathon bombing engaged in a protracted battle with police, in Watertown involving the use of firearms and explosives. Tamerlan Tsarnaev was critically wounded and later pronounced dead and the town was completely locked down for hours as police, FBI, and Army National Guard personnel patrolled it, looking for the remaining suspect, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who was captured wounded but alive in a boat shortly after the lockdown ended on the following evening.

In the November 2021 Election, the citizens voted to amend the official name of the city to "The City of Watertown"[16] (from "The City Known as the Town of Watertown")

Geography

Watertown is located at 42.3714°N -71.1819°W (42.37139, −71.18194).[17] To the north, it is bordered by the town of Belmont, along Belmont Street; to the south, it is bordered by the city of Newton. The city of Boston's Brighton neighborhood also lies to the south and east—the border being largely formed by the Charles River. Though the majority of the town lies north of the Charles, from Watertown Square, the nexus of the town, the town's border extends south of the Charles to encompass the neighborhood surrounding Casey Playground. To the east lies the City of Cambridge, the border to which is almost entirely the well-known Mount Auburn Cemetery, most of which is actually in Watertown. To the west lies the more expansive city of Waltham, but there is no distinct geographic feature or major road dividing the two municipalities.

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 4.2sqmi, of which 4.1sqmi is land and 0.1 square miles (0.1 km or 1.20%) is water.

Adjacent cities and towns

Demographics

See also: List of Massachusetts locations by per capita income. As of the census[18] of 2000, there were 32,986 people, 14,629 households, and 7,329 families residing in the city. The population density was 8025.7sp=usNaNsp=us. There were 15,008 housing units at an average density of 3651.5sp=usNaNsp=us. The racial makeup of the city was 91.42% White, 1.73% African American, 0.16% Native American, 3.87% Asian, 0.02% Pacific Islander, 0.85% from other races, and 1.95% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 2.68% of the population.

There were 14,629 households, out of which 17.8% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 37.9% were married couples living together, 8.7% had a female householder with no husband present, and 49.9% were non-families. 34.1% of all households were made up of individuals, and 12.4% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.17 and the average family size was 2.86.

In the city, the population was spread out, with 14.1% under the age of 18, 9.4% from 18 to 24, 39.8% from 25 to 44, 20.0% from 45 to 64, and 16.7% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 37 years. For every 100 females, there were 86.1 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 83.8 males.

The median income for a household in the city was $59,764, and the median income for a family was $67,441. Males had a median income of $46,642 versus $39,840 for females. The per capita income for the city was $33,262. About 4.5% of families and 6.3% of the population were below the poverty line, including 8.6% of those under age 18 and 7.5% of those age 65 or over.

Armenian population

Watertown is a major center of the Armenian diaspora in the United States, with the third-largest Armenian community in the United States, estimated as numbering 7,000[19] to over 8,000[20] as of 2007.[21] Watertown ranks only behind the California cities of Glendale and Fresno.Watertown is also the venue for the publication of long-running Armenian newspapers in English and Armenian, including:

Several Armenian grocery stores are found in East Watertown that sell produce and imported Armenian and Mediterranean products.[22]

Economy

Major employers based in Watertown include the Tufts Health Plan, New England Sports Network, the Perkins School for the Blind, Exergen Corporation,[23] Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, Inc., and athenahealth.[24]

Transportation

Watertown borders Soldiers Field Road and the Massachusetts Turnpike, major arteries into downtown Boston. Watertown is served by several MBTA bus and formerly trackless trolley routes. Most of them pass through or terminate in Watertown Square or Watertown Yard. The former A-Watertown branch of the MBTA's Green Line ran to Watertown until 1969.

Education

Public schooling is provided for approximately 2,600 students by Watertown Public Schools, which operates three elementary schools, one middle school, and one high school (Watertown High School).[25] [26]

Private day schools:

There is also a supplementary Armenian language school, St. James Erebuni Armenian School (Armenian: Սբ. Հակոբ Էրեբունի հայկական դպրոց), affiliated with the, which teaches both Western Armenian and Eastern Armenian to children. It originated as a solely Eastern Armenian supplementary school established in 1988 by the Armenian Society of Boston (Iranahye Miutyun); it was Greater Boston's first Eastern Armenian supplementary school. It became church-affiliated in 2015, and it merged with a Western Armenian school,[27] St. Sahag & St. Mesrob Armenian School, in September of that year.[28]

Notable people

Culture

See also

Further reading

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: 2020 U.S. Gazetteer Files. United States Census Bureau. May 21, 2022.
  2. Web site: History & Tourism – Watertown, MA – Official Website. www.ci.watertown.ma.us.
  3. Book: Wood, William. Wood's Vocabulary of Massachusett. Evolution Publishing: American Language Reprints. 2002. 978-1-889758-97-8. Merchantsville, NJ. 14.
  4. Web site: Watertown Tab "Zubrowski: The herring run through Watertown from Mother's Day to Father's Day" (June 10, 2009). Wicked Local. October 7, 2014.
  5. Young, Alexander (1846). Chronicles of the First Planters of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay, 1623–1636, pp. 313–14. Boston: Charles C. Little and James Brown.
  6. Web site: Watertown Tour. maintour.com.
  7. "Bissell Outrode Paul Revere But History Left Him in the Dust", Hartford Courant, April 16, 2007
  8. Web site: The Five Riders. www.constitutionfacts.com.
  9. Web site: Did You Know? Watertown, MA – Official Website. www.ci.watertown.ma.us. February 14, 2020.
  10. Hodges, Maud deLeigh. 1980. Crossroads on the Charles. Phoenix Publishing, Canaan, NH
  11. Web site: Documentary history of the state of Maine ... Maine Historical Society. Portland. Internet Archive.
  12. Book: Paul, Daniel N.. Daniel N. Paul. We Were Not the Savages: A Mi'kmaq Perspective on the Collision Between European and Native American Civilizations. 2nd. 2000. Fernwood. 978-1-55266-039-3. 169–170. (includes full text of both treaties).
  13. Web site: Reddit Lost Architecture Coolidge Tavern . sverdrupian . November 13, 2019 . February 14, 2020.
  14. Web site: History of the AMTL. John Pike. October 7, 2014.
  15. Web site: 1906 Stanley Steamer Rocket Images, Information and History . Conceptcarz.com . January 19, 2013.
  16. Web site: Breitrose . Charlie . 2021-11-03 . See Precinct Results for 2021 Town Council, School Committee, Library Trustees Races and the Charter Questions . 2023-08-03 . Watertown News . en-US.
  17. Web site: US Gazetteer files: 2010, 2000, and 1990. United States Census Bureau. April 23, 2011. February 12, 2011.
  18. Web site: U.S. Census website. United States Census Bureau. January 31, 2008.
  19. http://www.hayk.net/destinations/watertown-ma/ Armenians in Watertown, MA
  20. http://www.armeniapedia.org/index.php?title=Watertown Watertown
  21. Keith O'Brien, "ADL local leader fired on Armenian issue", The Boston Globe, August 18, 2007.
  22. Web site: Chudy . Katie . 2015-07-15 . An Armenian Food Treasure Trove in Watertown: Lamejun, Boregs, and More . 2023-07-03 . Eater Boston . en.
  23. Web site: Changing The Way The World Takes Temperature. Exergen. November 28, 2017.
  24. Web site: Labor Market Information . December 16, 2014 .
  25. Web site: Schools . Town of Watertown . December 27, 2018.
  26. Web site: About Us . Watertown Public Schools . December 27, 2018.
  27. News: Erebuni School at St. James Celebrates 30th Anniversary. Armenian Mirror-Spectator. April 19, 2018. June 18, 2019.
  28. Web site: St. James Erebuni Armenian School. St. James Armenian Church. June 18, 2019.
  29. Web site: Today at the WFPL. October 7, 2014.
  30. Web site: Plumbing Museum Leaving Space in Watertown .
  31. Web site: David J. Russo . 2023-07-03 . www.davidjrusso.com.
  32. Web site: HSW . 2023-07-03 . www.historicalsocietyofwatertownma.org.
  33. Web site: Washington Tower | Mount Auburn Cemetery .