![]() ![]() On December 16, 1773, after a heated debate in this meeting house about the tea tax imposed by Britain, it was Samuel Adams who signaled all to head out to Griffin’s Wharf and dump chests of tea into the harbor in protest. ![]() The Boston Tea party most famously began here. Onward to the eighth site, the (8) Old South Meeting House. We stopped here for something of a brunch, fueling up on “egg and cheese on everything” bagel sandwiches. This location is also a good place to take another break, as Bruegger’s Bagels is nearby. It made me wish I had taken a copy of one of those novels with me to read on the trip, a nice way to take one back into the spirit of those times. The next site is the (7) Old Corner Bookstore, a historical commercial building that once published such well-known American titles like Thoreau’s Walden, Hawthorne’s Scarlett Letter, Alcott’s Little Women and the first American editions of Charles Dickens’ novels. Once rested, we continued to walk past the (6) First Public School Site, a school which five of the signers of the Declaration of Independence attended, although Benjamin Franklin notoriously dropped out. Sitting in this chapel, imagining the centuries of services performed here, it was hard not to feel communion with the spiritual aspect of what it meant to be American and free to worship as one chooses. The bell which was recast by Paul Revere in 1816 after some damage is still used today to ring in church goers. King’s Chapel has the oldest American pulpit still in use today. ![]() We continued to the (5) King’s Chapel and Burying Ground, making a stop to sit inside the pews of the chapel, maybe to rest our legs a little bit and also to take in the somber, religious atmosphere. We walked past the (4) Granary Burying Ground, peering through the iron fence at the tombstones jutting out of the ground where John Hancock, Paul Revere and Samuel Adams are buried. Founded in 1809, it is still an active Evangelical church today. The third stop is the (3) Park Street Church, with its tall white steeple which once could be seen for miles. It will take you to the (2) State House, a white domed building overlooking the park that serves as the seat for the Massachusetts government. At the Visitor’s Center you can also find the beginning point of the trail, marked by a red brick line embedded into the pavement which can be followed throughout the trail. The first place of interest is the (1) Boston Common itself, where you can have a quick snack and relax at one of the park benches as you gather energy for the trek ahead. Here are the highlights of our walk through Boston’s history. You can also take a map of the trail and walk it yourself in about two hours or more (depending on how often you stop and how long you stay at each stop), which is what we did. Visit for information on tours and more. You can take a variety of guided tours, some with costumed guides and some that delve more deeply into certain sites and neighborhoods. The 16 official sites of Boston’s Freedom Trail take you from the oldest public park in the nation, the Boston Common, all the way through the history of the American Revolution to the Bunker Hill Monument, the site of the Battle of Bunker Hill in 1775 which was the first major battle of the Revolutionary War. ![]()
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