Passenger rail service along the Fitchburg and Lowell lines had been declining for some time, and stations such as Gilman Square were removed as early as the late s.
Highway projects were advanced in the wake of the Federal Highway Aid Actin some instances displacing entire neighborhoods. Almost thirty years after passenger rail service to Somerville was halted, the Red Line Northwest Extension reached Davis Square in Thousands of militiamen began streaming toward Boston and Cambridgeand mob action forced Loyalists and some government officials to flee to the protection of the British Army.
The city and community used the creation of the new station as a catalyst for revitalizing the faded square, promoting new commercial development and sponsoring other physical and infrastructural improvements. Each successive owner of Ten Hills Farm would depend upon slavery's profits until the s, when Massachusetts abolished the practice.
Passenger rail service stopped altogether by However many non-retail uses, such as beauty salons and real estate offices, had already begun to fill the empty retail spaces.
Therefore, the rural part of Charlestown found herself contributing to the paving of the streets, the maintenance of a night watch, to the building of engine houses, and various other improvements from which they derived little benefit. Graves was attracted to the narrow Mishawum Peninsula between the Charles River and the Mystic Riverlinked to the mainland at the present-day Sullivan Square.
The number of retail stores in the area declined from 68 in to 56 in The original choice for the city's new name, after breaking away from Charlestown, was Walford, after the first settler of Charlestown, Thomas Walford.
During this time of industrial prosperity, continuing through World War II, the city of Somerville reached its population apex atresidents in By the late s, Somerville was losing population, revenue and jobs. Other Somerville factories came to produce steam engines, boilers, household appliances, glass, and iron. Between and population growth slowed slightly as Somerville's industries consolidated rather than expanded, and the period's most important enterprises were meat packing, dairy processing, ice and food distribution.
Ball SquareMagoun Square and Teele Square were developed with one- or two-story masonry commercial buildings. While brickmaking had taken a hold in the area after the railroads first arrived in the s, Somerville's brickyards boomed through From there they marched about a mile to the Speed dating somerville ma House, and after sunrise removed all of the gunpowder.
The number of cars on Somerville's streets continued to rise, and road construction projects proliferated.
With the Boston area's emergence from its long recession, the area truly began to revive. He was shot thirteen times after famously telling a retreating colleague, "I am too old to run.
The population continued to slowly increase, and by there were about inhabitants scattered across the area. Early settlement[ edit ] The territory now comprising the city of Somerville was first settled in as part of Charlestown.
In Paul Revere 's own written account of his ride, Revere mentions a specific location in Somerville then part of Charlestown. During the s and early s, Washington Street, together with Somerville Avenue, comprised "Milk Row," a route favored by Middlesex County dairy farmers as the best way to get to the markets of Charlestown and Boston.
Its height and commanding view of Boston and the harbor had tremendous strategic value and the fortress became known as the "Citadel". Contemporary revitalization[ edit ] In the last years of the 20th century, the situation in Somerville stabilized and growth returned—first to West Somerville, and then the rest of the city.
As it was nearly high tide, East Cambridge was an island and the troops, skirting the marshes, were obliged to wade "thigh deep" to reach Somerville.
These improvements included the opening of the Middlesex Canal through Somerville in various turnpikes such as Medford and Beacon streets, built during the s and s, and especially the introduction of rail lines. The city also had a very high car theft rate, once being the car theft capital of the country, and its Assembly Square area was especially infamous for this.