Eden on the Charles : : The Making of Boston / / Michael Rawson.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Harvard University Press eBook Package Backlist 2000-2013
• VerfasserIn: Rawson, Michael,
• Place / Publishing House: Cambridge, MA : : Harvard University Press, , [2021]; ©2010
• Year of Publication: 2021
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (384 p.)

In Eden on the Charles: The Making of Boston, Michael Rawson examines how the city's relationship with its natural surroundings informed its early growth and development. His compelling, well-researched narrative touches on several milestones on Boston's road to modernity, including the Common's conversion from a place of labor to a place of leisure, the emergence of pastoral suburbs as a respite from an increasingly urbanized landscape, and the long fight over a proposed municipal water system to bring fresh water to those who needed it most.Perhaps the book's most important lesson comes from a frustrated mariner who, upset over the maltreatment of the harbor, laments that "the past seems to be forgotten, the present only is regarded as of importance, and a veil is drawn over the future." Eden on the Charles is a valiant effort to combat such shortsightedness, reminding us that the key to building a successful community lies in respecting the natural resources that provide for it and in understanding our responsibility to our fellow citizens.