Freedom Trail Pro Tips: WHERE ARE THE BATHROOMS?

People have got to go! There is no more pressing issue on Boston's historic Freedom Trail than the need to pee. I'm here to help. Below is every bathroom stop I know of. I'll make sure to clarify what is a public bathroom and what is a "private bathroom" that you can use.

Visitor Information Center on Boston Common

Boston Common (public bathrooms): The obvious bathroom stop is the Visitor Information Center on Boston Common, though truth be told, they have very small bathrooms that are often overrun by school groups, the homeless, and other visitors. The pros go to the Frog Pond bathrooms. They are also small, but less known, so they are also usually less gross and less full.

Boston Athenaeum (private bathrooms): This is located at 10 1/2 Beacon St., just around the corner from the Boston Common, and also close to the side entrance of the Granary Burying Ground. The first floor of the Athenaeum is open to the public, though you do have to sign in. There is a bathroom on the first floor. You see where I'm going with this?

Omni Parker House Hotel (private bathrooms): As a general rule, hotels are good for a bathroom break. The Parker House is tops, though. They have two bars and a restaurant on the first floor, and are the oldest hotel in America, so they are more accommodating than most to walk-ins. Their bathrooms are on the "mezzanine level," which is essentially the second floor. When you get to the top of the stairs, boys go right, girls go left. This hotel is located at the corner of Tremont and School, near the Granary Burying Ground and across from King's Chapel.

"What's that big clock tower in Boston?"

There are some questions visitors always ask. "Where is the closest bathroom" usually tops the list, and "is that Ben Franklin" when they see the "Franklin" monument in the Granary Burying Ground is also popular. Another top-tier inquiry is "what's that big clock tower?"

The big clock tower in question is the the old custom house. Not actually our oldest custom house ever, its domed base was built in 1847 to replace an older building which was itself a replacement to our original. The tower completed in 1915, making it the tallest building in Boston until 1964. Just off State Street in McKinley Square, the custom house was built just steps away from Long Wharf, where much of Boston's shipping arrived in the 19th century.

While this particular building has no exciting history of note (though it did play a prominent role in Boston scribe Dennis Lehane's novel Prayers for Rain), it is iconic in Boston's waterfront skyline. Currently under the management of Marriott, it serves as a luxury hotel. What many people who see it don't know though is that the base of the building is still very much open to the public. Go inside and get literature free of charge from the front desk, and then you can take a tour through the antebellum structure's breathtaking Greek revival interior, including the original dome, which resides underneath the tower today. Hanging from the ceiling around the dome, you will find very strange flags, representing prominent merchant houses of the custom house's hayday: J.H. Shattuck & Co., Z. Azarian & Co., John Mayo & Co., Gilden & Williams, H. Oxnard, and Brocker & Stugis (see photos below).

John W. McCormack speaks to Boston about the war effort

In commemoration of the 70th anniversary of D-Day -- when Allied forces stormed the beaches of France and began their bloody eleven month march toward Nazi Germany -- I thought it might be interesting to reflect on the city of Boston during the war.

McCormack in the 1960s

One of my favorite moment's in Boston's WWII history is US Congressman John W. McCormack's Fourth of July oration. Speaking to a packed crowd in Faneuil Hall's second floor, known for two centuries as "Great Hall" and for slightly less as "the Cradle of Liberty," McCormack explained to Bostonians why they had to put in long hours at the Navy Yard or the factory, why they had to put every extra cent into war bonds, and why they had to send their sons and husbands to war:

"In this war more than any other," he said, "we are fighting powerful enemies who are imbued with the monstrous doctrine of hatred -- anti-religious hatred, economic hatred, and racial hatred -- determined to enslave the world." He ridiculed the Axis powers, criticizing their disdain for "the rule of majority, because their power lies in their own success in pillaging and destroying -- in the burning of books and the persecution of minorities, in the destruction of the dignity and personality of the individual."

Faneuil Hall

This speech, with was answered with thunderous applause and not a few war bond purchases, is an example of a countless number of local efforts to clearly and honestly explain the necessity of "the good war" to the American people on a local level. In reflecting on its origins -- coming from an America with a segregated army and from a home front torn asunder that same year (1943) with race riots, it is easy to dismiss speeches like McCormack's as propaganda. It is harder, but no less honest, to see it for what it was: a call to the people of Boston, and the United States, to strive toward a society free of these tyrannies. It could not have been lost on a politician regularly facing legislation and letters on both sides of the race issue that he was describing an America that was fantastical at the time, but looking back, it is equally difficult for us to recognize that we still have a long way to go, and that men like McCormack and his contemporaries put us on a path for a better tomorrow many yesterdays ago.

Congratulations to my American Culture in World War II Class!

Today marked the end of my first class - a five week course at UMass-Boston's OLLI program on American Culture on the Home Front. I want to commend all of my 70+ students for their outstanding work and thank them all for providing me the opportunity to explore history with them!

Check out the first session of the class here!