As someone who hated high school history class, I’m amazed at how much I enjoy visiting places from those dreaded books and lectures. At first it was Jim who was encouraging the stops, but now we both agree that, although some places may not be politically correct in this day and age, it’s our history. How can we measure how far we’ve come without knowing where we’ve been.

Click on the first photo in each group and scroll to see the square photos at full size.
To start at the beginning of this series, visit Fall for New England 2021.

Make the Most of the Miles

As much as we loved New Hampshire, it’s time to move our home base from Bartlett to Boston. We were able to visit Lexington and Concord by adding just ten minutes to our route. This stop fit in nicely as a prelude to the history we have in store for us in Boston.

Had we done more research beforehand, we would have realized the good stuff that’s available in this area. We really should have scheduled an overnight in Lexington to get the most out of both cities, but instead we just hit the highlights.

We started at Minute Man National Historical Park (in Concord) which included some wonderful displays about the events leading up to the Revolutionary War.

A Glimpse of the Battle Road Trail

Just up the road is the North Bridge Visitor Center which is located in a brick mansion built in 1911 by descendants of Major John Buttrick – the officer who first ordered his militia to fire upon British soldiers. There we watched a short video and perused some great exhibits.

Keep in mind the gentleman riding the horse in the last photo (Dr. Samuel Prescott), because we’ll actually see him tomorrow on our “Walk Into History Tour” in Boston. He’ll set a few things straight that the retelling of history may have gotten wrong.

The Old North Bridge

From the Visitor Center we walked out about a third mile to the Old North Bridge – a replica of the original bridge which spans the Concord River. After our time in the Visitor Center, my history lessons (from a long time ago) all started to come back.

We were reminded of the bridge’s historical significance with the phrase “The shot heard ’round the world” – fired from this very spot. Of course the phrase refers to the opening shot of the battles of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775 which started the American Revolutionary War – which eventually led to the creation of the United States of America.

Amid a lot of “confusion and contradiction”, no single shot can be cited as the first shot of the war. Shots were fired earlier that day at Lexington, but Concord’s North Bridge “skirmish” saw the “first shots by Americans acting under orders, the first organized volley by Americans, the first British fatalities, and the first British retreat.”

It seems Lexington and Concord have long debated the point of origin for the Revolutionary War since Lexington was described as the “birthplace of American liberty”, but the “first forcible resistance” occurred in Concord.

A Much-too-quick stop in Lexington

Unfortunately we had very little time in Lexington, long enough for a quick stop at the Visitor Center and to check out Battle Green, which was a lovely park with lots of history. Check out the link to see all this town has to offer. I think an overnight here would have given us more time to explore both Lexington and Concord, but instead we’re hoping to get to our hotel before traffic gets too thick in Boston. Oops, too late!

Boston, Here we Come!

Next up: City on a Hill

Happy trails,
Barb