Freedom Trail of Boston

Up for some history? Boston is a terrific place for seeing some famous landmarks recorded in American History! From the Tea Party rally on "The Common", it was a short walk over to the golden dome of the state capitol where we found a map and guide for a walking tour of Boston called, "The Freedom Trail". The trail is marked on the sidewalks and streets by either a strip of red bricks or red paint, so it's very easy to follow. The capitol building, although constructed in 1795, is called the 'new' State House by Bostonians. The 'old' State House was the one used by the British government during colonial days. We'll show you a photo later as we pass by.

The Park Street Church was our next milestone. Built in 1809 on the site of a town granary, the church served practical purposes as well as religious. During the War of 1812, the crypt stored gunpowder! Amongst the 'firsts' for this church, were first Sunday School in 1817, prison aid society in 1824, and missionaries to Hawaii in 1819.

Behind the church is the Granary Burying Ground, where many famous Americans are buried. Three signers of the Declaration of Independence, nine governors of Massachusetts, the victims of the Boston Massacre, 'Mother' Goose, Benjamin Franklin's parents and Paul Revere all are buried here.

On we walked to the King's Chapel - a symbol of what Puritans fled. After more than a half century of the Puritans exercising their religious freedom, King James II order the establishment of an Anglican parish in Boston. When no Puritan would sell the Anglicans land, the Governor seized a corner of the burying ground - assuming that the dead could not complain! In Britain at that time, church and nobility were enmeshed in corrupt politics and Bostonians wanted no part of that. When the American Revolution caused the British Army to evacuate Boston, many of the church attendees left with them. Eventually, the church became the first Unitarian church and continues today.

At the site of the first public school, Boston Latin School, this statue of Benjamin Franklin stands. Although he actually dropped out of the school, Bostonians are still proud of his attendance, along with other scholars such as, John Hancock and Samuel Adams.

In the early 1800's, this building functioned as the home of the nation's leading book publisher. Known now as the Old Corner Book Store, several now famous authors gathered here including Longfellow, Hawthorne, Emerson and Harriet Beecher Stowe. Charles Dickens also visited here.

This is the famous South Meeting House where the original Tea Party members masqueraded as Mohawk Indians before boarding British ships to dump the tea in the harbor.

And just down the block, the Old State House - the seat of government during British Rule.

Cory recognized the symbols of the lion and the unicorn at the top of the building as being identical to the banners and shields displayed at the Governor's Palace in Williamsburg.

After all the Tea Party and more than half of the Freedom Trail, we were ready for lunch and found delicious clam chowder at this restaurant on the harbor. All around us, business folks were ordering huge lobsters, but we were quite happy with the New England style chowder and fresh rolls. Our feet were also happy to get some rest!

Refreshed, we strolled out the pier to see if we could spy the location of the ship emptied of its tea. The exhibit was closed during our visit to Boston and it could not be made out from here. We enjoyed the beautiful spring day on the harbor anyway!

On we went and found Paul Revere's House...

And this tribute to his famous ride to warn the colonists of the British approach...

And here's the North Church with the tower housing the location of the warning lamps 'One if by sea, two if by land'.

We deviated from the full tour due to our tired feet and legs from standing at the Tea Party for 3-4 hours before beginning the trail. We would definitely continued on across to see the USS Constitution and Bunker Hill, but were just too tired to make it on this day. We looped back through the downtown area and enjoyed a close look at many of the taverns.

Several markets are centered around Faneuil Hall. Restaurants, shops and modern chain stores are all mixed in four large buildings.

And amongst the several offerings, we were pleased to see 'Cheers' - a copy cat of the famous bar in the TV series by the same name. The boys didn't have a clue!

Our walk back toward the train station took us back by the Old State House.

Next to the traffic signal on the right is a circle of pavers that marks the spot where the colonists fell during the Boston Massacre. They were shot at very close range from that balcony visible ont he second floor.

Successfully making our way back to the train station, we got the boys to pose for one more photo!

Well, two...they're just so handsome! We made it back in plenty of time for the commuter train we wanted back to our spot at the RV park.

Boston Tea Party - 2010

We left the RV Park at Lancaster, PA and pulled a long trek (for us!) to an RV Park near Boston, MA. The timing of this journey was to line up with the "Tea Party Express" who had an event planned for Boston on April 15 with Sarah Palin as the featured speaker. Our family attended a "Tea Party Express" rally in Amarillo last year and we support this effort to change the direction of the country. It seems such a great opportunity to attend this event and at the same time explore the city where a tax protest lead to the war for our Independence and the founding of our country.





If it seems like we left out a couple of places in our itinerary (like New York City and Philadelphia), that would be true. We will backtrack a little later in the spring as the parks we want to use are not open or do not have options we want (like day tours from the campground) until May 10th or so.





This itinerary will be a little challenging with heading north and looking for open campgrounds in New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine. We have already had to alter our length of stay near Boston due to projected snow, and are glad we did. We've enjoyed snow....several times...this year. We've frankly had enough of it with our current accommodations!





We allowed ourselves a day to recover from the long drive over and to determine how to best get into the city for the Tea Party, held on the 14th. Having a positive experience with the Metro commuter system in DC, we found a similar offering and the RV park staff cheerfully directed us to the nearest station and even troubled herself to print out the inbound and outbound schedules from her computer. Contrary to the reputation for rudeness, we found most Boston folk to be very upbeat and helpful. We did find a few that were not cheerful or polite, but we feel that those are in the minority of the population. I suppose everyone has stronger remembrances of nasty encounters, so there lies the root of the reputation of the 'rude' Bostonian!





On the day of the scheduled Tea Party, we rose bright and early and arrived at the train station around 6:30 am. We normally are up early, but we are NOT normally out in public at that hour! The kids were pleased to see a new kind of train - a double decker! We climbed aboard and took our seats on the second level and had a great view of the countryside on our way in to town.





We lacked an easy map to follow from Union station to Boston Common, but we made do with a trolley system map and the help from some fellow Tea Partiers we found along the way at Starbucks. Ann, a Bostonian that had taken the day off to attend, and her parents from Maine guided us along and chatted with us for the few blocks through the chilly streets to the park.





The Tea Party Express is a group that had made their 3rd cross country journey to this point. This trip started for them in Searchlight, NV - hometown of Harry Reid, with an emphasis on their 3rd trip slogan "Just Vote Them Out". This trip was born out of a feeling that congressmen and senators in Washington are not heeding the voices of their constituents that want the excessive spending to stop and to put the brakes on government intervention (bail-outs, auto maker and student loan take-overs, etc.) We were pleased to attend their rally for the 2nd time along our own journeys and were particularly pleased to meet up with them at the location of the very first Tea Party so many years ago.





We found a pretty good-sized crowd upon our arrival (about an hour before the scheduled speakers) and a whole bevy of media vans with their high flying satellite antennae and huge strings of power cords stretched along the ground. Several media members interviewed us. We think partly because we were on the outskirts of the developing crowd, partly because we had kids with us and partly very curious upon hearing we were from so far out of town. Even Will was interviewed, but he didn't have much to say. He was not accustomed to anyone sticking a microphone in his face and was caught off-guard by their questions. Cory, on the other hand, was not intimidated at all by a microphone or the opportunity to voice his opinion. Craig, from whom Cory must derive his comfort level with audiences in general, was equally comfortable and familiar with media attention from his career. Linda was not nearly as intimidated as Will, but also was not nearly as comfortable with the mike! Here we are posed to stand as background for the local Fox affiliates interview with another bystander. As the reporter was waiting her cue, however, she found out our Texas roots and family travels and promptly interviewed us all without warning after asking the original participant a couple of questions.





Later, her crew sought Cory out after hearing his statement to a Boston Globe reporter. After making his statement, the reporter offered on air "Very well spoken. Perhaps we have a future presidential candidate in our midst!" We were so proud! A couple of other kids were interviewed in the same segment and one of them overcame his speech dyslexia moment to be able to say 'deficit' correctly. Nerves just overcome your normal ability to articulate at times, don't they? The other one was not very well prepared for an impromptu interview. We were so affirmed in our parental philosophy that we must prepare our kids to be able to speak articulately of issues that are important to them. Thank you to Mrs. Hallock and Mrs. Seaman of the homeschool drama productions and to Communicators for Christ, a group organized to teach children to be effective communicators.

The crowd continued to grow. We saw media reports that varied between an estimate of 5,000 to as many as 13,000 rally attendees. We have no good feel for the number, but were pleased to see the large group. We also were pleased that reports of nasty counter-protesters were not noticeable to us. Counter protesters are great, of course, as they certainly have the right to free speech. Also, you never know when you might be able to persuade someone to consider your perspective and how do you accomplish that if those that differ with you never show up? Nasty folks that have a single purpose of damaging the reputation of those gathered for a common, positive purpose, however, are not welcome to do so in any setting! We later heard of a couple of incidents, but again witnessed absolutely none. We did find some dissenting views and odd folks, but nothing too distasteful or inappropriate for our kids.

Here's a few photos of the crowd around us:

Craig brought Sarah Palin's book, "Going Rogue" with him instead of a sign and we found matching tee shirts with our flag. We were glad that we could express ourselves with positive aspects of our country and our freedom.

It was easy to relate to most of the people in the crowd.

What we saw was people a lot like us who are worries about the direction our country is headed.

We talked to several that, like us, were very worried about their children and grandchildren.

Mostly we saw a lot of flags and some very funny signs, pins and stickers.

Here's a shot of the crowd's reaction when the featured speaker, Sarah Palin, was introduced and arrived onstage. Lots of enthusiasm!

We zoomed in a bit here...notice the sign that says 'We can see NOVEMBER from our house'.

While so many were excited to see and hear Sarah Palin, the view for Will was pretty much a sampling of a bunch of peoples back pockets.

Craig hoisted Will up on his shoulder at one point during Sarah Palin speech. He peered over the heads of the people in the crowd and exclaimed, "Hey Dad, the lady looks just like the picture on the book!".

The crowd thinned quickly after Ms. Palin's speech. We like her and feel that many others do for similar reasons. She's very professional, sharp in wit and has a common sense approach to solving problems that is very refreshing. We were very pleased with the time and effort spent to attend this event as a family and we were ready to spend what remains of our day experiencing Boston.