Cambridge ( ) is a city in
Middlesex County, Massachusetts
Middlesex County is located in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, in the United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 1,632,002, making it the most populous county in both Massachusetts and New England and the 22nd most populous cou ...
, United States. As part of the
Boston metropolitan area
Greater Boston is the metropolitan region of New England encompassing the municipality of Boston (the capital of the U.S. state of Massachusetts and the most populous city in New England) and its surrounding areas. The region forms the northern ar ...
, the cities population of the
2020 U.S. census
The United States census of 2020 was the twenty-fourth decennial United States census. Census Day, the reference day used for the census, was April 1, 2020. Other than a pilot study during the 2000 census, this was the first U.S. census to of ...
was 118,403, making it the fourth most populous city in the state, behind
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
,
Worcester
Worcester may refer to:
Places United Kingdom
* Worcester, England, a city and the county town of Worcestershire in England
** Worcester (UK Parliament constituency), an area represented by a Member of Parliament
* Worcester Park, London, Engla ...
, and
Springfield. It is one of two
de jure
In law and government, ''de jure'' ( ; , "by law") describes practices that are legally recognized, regardless of whether the practice exists in reality. In contrast, ("in fact") describes situations that exist in reality, even if not legally ...
county seat
A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or civil parish. The term is in use in Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, Taiwan, and the United States. The equivalent term shire town is used in the US st ...
s of Middlesex County, although the county's executive government was abolished in 1997. Situated directly north of
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
, across the
Charles River
The Charles River ( Massachusett: ''Quinobequin)'' (sometimes called the River Charles or simply the Charles) is an river in eastern Massachusetts. It flows northeast from Hopkinton to Boston along a highly meandering route, that doubles b ...
, it was named in honor of the
University of Cambridge
The University of Cambridge is a public collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world's third oldest surviving university and one of its most pr ...
in England, once also an important center of the
Puritan
The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to purify the Church of England of Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should become more Protestant. ...
theology embraced by the town's founders.
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...
, the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...
(MIT),
Lesley University
Lesley University is a private university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is accredited by the New England Commission of Higher Education. As of 2018-19 Lesley University enrolled 6,593 students (2,707 undergraduate and 3,886 graduate).
History ...
, and
Hult International Business School
Hult International Business School (also known as Hult Business School or Hult) is a private business school with campuses in Cambridge, London, San Francisco, Dubai, New York City, and Shanghai. Hult is named for the school's benefactor Bertil ...
are in Cambridge,
as was
Radcliffe College before it merged with Harvard.
Kendall Square
Kendall Square is a neighborhood in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The square itself at the intersection of Main Street and Broadway. It also refers to the broad business district east of Portland Street, northwest of the Charles River, north of MIT ...
in Cambridge has been called "the most innovative square mile on the planet" owing to the high concentration of successful
startups
A startup or start-up is a company or project undertaken by an entrepreneur to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model. While entrepreneurship refers to all new businesses, including self-employment and businesses that never intend t ...
that have emerged in the vicinity of the square since 2010.
History
Native Americans inhabited the area that would become Cambridge for thousands of years prior to
European colonization of the Americas
During the Age of Discovery, a large scale European colonization of the Americas took place between about 1492 and 1800. Although the Norse had explored and colonized areas of the North Atlantic, colonizing Greenland and creating a short t ...
. At the time of European contact and exploration, the area was inhabited by
Naumkeag
Naumkeag is the former country estate of noted New York City lawyer Joseph Hodges Choate and Caroline Dutcher Sterling Choate, located at 5 Prospect Hill Road, Stockbridge, Massachusetts. The estate's centerpiece is a 44-room, Shingle Style ...
or
Pawtucket to the north and
Massachusett
The Massachusett were a Native American tribe from the region in and around present-day Greater Boston in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The name comes from the Massachusett language term for "At the Great Hill," referring to the Blue Hills ...
to the south, and may have been inhabited by other groups such as the Totant not well described in later European narratives. The contact period introduced a number of European infectious diseases which would decimate native populations in
virgin soil epidemic
Virgin soil epidemic is a term coined by Alfred Crosby, who defined it as epidemics "in which the populations at risk have had no previous contact with the diseases that strike them and are therefore immunologically almost defenseless." His c ...
s, leaving the area uncontested upon the arrival of large groups of English settlers in 1630. In 1639, the
Massachusetts General Court
The Massachusetts General Court (formally styled the General Court of Massachusetts) is the State legislature (United States), state legislature of the Massachusetts, Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The name "General Court" is a hold-over from th ...
would purchase the land that would become present day Cambridge from the Naumkeag
Squaw Sachem of Mistick.
In December 1630, the site of what would become Cambridge was chosen because it was safely upriver from
Boston Harbor
Boston Harbor is a natural harbor and estuary of Massachusetts Bay, and is located adjacent to the city of Boston, Massachusetts. It is home to the Port of Boston, a major shipping facility in the northeastern United States.
History
...
, making it easily defensible from attacks by enemy ships.
Thomas Dudley
Thomas Dudley (12 October 157631 July 1653) was a New England colonial magistrate who served several terms as governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Dudley was the chief founder of Newtowne, later Cambridge, Massachusetts, and built the tow ...
, his daughter
Anne Bradstreet
Anne Bradstreet ( née Dudley; March 8, 1612 – September 16, 1672) was the most prominent of early English poets of North America and first writer in England's North American colonies to be published. She is the first Puritan figure in ...
, and her husband,
Simon Bradstreet
Simon Bradstreet (baptized March 18, 1603/4In the Julian calendar, then in use in England, the year began on March 25. To avoid confusion with dates in the Gregorian calendar, then in use in other parts of Europe, dates between January and Ma ...
, were the town's founders. The first houses were built in the spring of 1631. The settlement was initially referred to as "the newe towne".
Official Massachusetts records show the name rendered as Newe Towne by 1632, and as Newtowne by 1638.
Located at the first convenient Charles River crossing west of Boston, Newtowne was one of several towns (including Boston,
Dorchester,
Watertown Watertown may refer to:
Places in China
In China, a water town is a type of ancient scenic town known for its waterways.
Places in the United States
*Watertown, Connecticut, a New England town
**Watertown (CDP), Connecticut, the central village ...
, and
Weymouth) founded by the 700 original Puritan colonists of the
Massachusetts Bay Colony under Governor
John Winthrop
John Winthrop (January 12, 1587/88 – March 26, 1649) was an English Puritan lawyer and one of the leading figures in founding the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the second major settlement in New England following Plymouth Colony. Winthrop led t ...
. Its first preacher was
Thomas Hooker
Thomas Hooker (July 5, 1586 – July 7, 1647) was a prominent English colonial leader and Congregational minister, who founded the Connecticut Colony after dissenting with Puritan leaders in Massachusetts. He was known as an outstanding spea ...
, who led many of its original inhabitants west in 1636 to found
Hartford
Hartford is the capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It was the seat of Hartford County until Connecticut disbanded county government in 1960. It is the core city in the Greater Hartford metropolitan area. Census estimates since t ...
and the
Connecticut Colony; before leaving, they sold their plots to more recent immigrants from England. The original village site is now within
Harvard Square. The
marketplace
A marketplace or market place is a location where people regularly gather for the purchase and sale of provisions, livestock, and other goods. In different parts of the world, a marketplace may be described as a '' souk'' (from the Arabic), ' ...
where farmers sold crops from surrounding towns at the edge of a salt marsh (since filled) remains within a small park at the corner of John F. Kennedy and Winthrop Streets.
In 1636, the Newe College (later renamed
Harvard College
Harvard College is the undergraduate college of Harvard University, an Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636, Harvard College is the original school of Harvard University, the oldest institution of higher lea ...
after benefactor
John Harvard) was founded by the Massachusetts Bay Colony to train
ministers
Minister may refer to:
* Minister (Christianity), a Christian cleric
** Minister (Catholic Church)
* Minister (government), a member of government who heads a ministry (government department)
** Minister without portfolio, a member of governme ...
. According to
Cotton Mather, Newtowne was chosen for the site of the college by the
Great and General Court
The Massachusetts General Court (formally styled the General Court of Massachusetts) is the state legislature of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The name "General Court" is a hold-over from the earliest days of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, w ...
(the Massachusetts legislature) primarily for its proximity to the popular and highly respected Puritan preacher
Thomas Shepard. In May 1638, the settlement's name was changed to Cambridge in honor of the university in
Cambridge
Cambridge ( ) is a College town, university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cam ...
, England.
The town comprised a much larger area than the present city, with various outlying parts becoming independent towns over the years: Cambridge Village (later Newtown and now
Newton) in 1688, Cambridge Farms (now
Lexington) in 1712 or 1713, and Little or South Cambridge (now
Brighton) and Menotomy or West Cambridge (now
Arlington) in 1807. In the late 19th century, various schemes for annexing Cambridge to Boston were pursued and rejected.
Newtowne's ministers, Hooker and Shepard, the college's
first president, the college's major benefactor, and the first schoolmaster
Nathaniel Eaton
Nathaniel Eaton (17 September 1609 − 11 May 1674) was the first Headmaster of Harvard, President designate, and builder of Harvard's first College, Yard, and Library, in 1636.
Nathaniel was also the uncle of Samuel Eaton (one of the seven foun ...
were all Cambridge alumni, as was the colony's governor John Winthrop. In 1629, Winthrop had led the signing of the founding document of the city of Boston, which was known as the
, after the university. In 1650, Governor Thomas Dudley signed the charter creating the corporation that still governs Harvard College.
Cambridge grew slowly as an agricultural village by road from Boston, the colony's capital. By the
American Revolution
The American Revolution was an ideological and political revolution that occurred in British America between 1765 and 1791. The Americans in the Thirteen Colonies formed independent states that defeated the British in the American Revoluti ...
, most residents lived near the
Common and Harvard College, with most of the town comprising farms and estates. Most inhabitants were descendants of the original Puritan colonists, but there was also a small elite of
Anglican "worthies" who were not involved in village life, made their livings from estates, investments, and trade, and lived in mansions along "the Road to Watertown" (today's
Brattle Street, still known as
Tory Row).
Coming north from
Virginia
Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...
, George Washington took command of the volunteer American soldiers camped on Cambridge Common on July 3, 1775, now reckoned the birthplace of the
U.S. Army
The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cl ...
. Most of the
Tory
A Tory () is a person who holds a political philosophy known as Toryism, based on a British version of traditionalism and conservatism, which upholds the supremacy of social order as it has evolved in the English culture throughout history. The ...
estates were confiscated after the Revolution. On January 24, 1776,
Henry Knox
Henry Knox (July 25, 1750 – October 25, 1806), a Founding Father of the United States, was a senior general of the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War, serving as chief of artillery in most of Washington's campaigns. Following the ...
arrived with artillery captured from
Fort Ticonderoga
Fort Ticonderoga (), formerly Fort Carillon, is a large 18th-century star fort built by the French at a narrows near the south end of Lake Champlain, in northern New York, in the United States. It was constructed by Canadian-born French milit ...
, which enabled Washington to drive the British army out of Boston.
Between 1790 and 1840, Cambridge grew rapidly, with the construction of the
West Boston Bridge
The Longfellow Bridge is a steel rib arch bridge spanning the Charles River to connect Boston's Beacon Hill neighborhood with the Kendall Square area of Cambridge, Massachusetts. The bridge carries Massachusetts Route 3, US Route 3, the MBTA Red ...
in 1792 connecting Cambridge directly to Boston, so that it was no longer necessary to travel through the
Boston Neck
The Boston Neck or Roxbury Neck was an isthmus, a narrow strip of land connecting the then-peninsular city of Boston to the mainland city of Roxbury (now a neighborhood of Boston). The surrounding area was gradually filled in as the city of Bos ...
,
Roxbury, and
Brookline to cross the Charles River. A second bridge, the Canal Bridge, opened in 1809 alongside the new
Middlesex Canal
The Middlesex Canal was a 27-mile (44-kilometer) barge canal connecting the Merrimack River with the port of Boston. When operational it was 30 feet (9.1 m) wide, and 3 feet (0.9 m) deep, with 20 locks, each 80 feet (24 m) long and between 10 and ...
. The new bridges and roads made what were formerly estates and
marsh
A marsh is a wetland that is dominated by herbaceous rather than woody plant species.Keddy, P.A. 2010. Wetland Ecology: Principles and Conservation (2nd edition). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. 497 p Marshes can often be found a ...
land into prime industrial and residential districts.
In the mid-19th century, Cambridge was the center of a literary revolution. It was home to some of the famous Fireside Poets—so called because their poems would often be read aloud by families in front of their evening fires. The
Fireside Poets
The fireside poets – also known as the schoolroom or household poets – were a group of 19th-century American poets associated with New England. These poets were very popular among readers and critics both in the United States and overseas. Th ...
—
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (February 27, 1807 – March 24, 1882) was an American poet and educator. His original works include " Paul Revere's Ride", '' The Song of Hiawatha'', and ''Evangeline''. He was the first American to completely tran ...
,
James Russell Lowell
James Russell Lowell (; February 22, 1819 – August 12, 1891) was an American Romantic poet, critic, editor, and diplomat. He is associated with the fireside poets, a group of New England writers who were among the first American poets that ...
, and
Oliver Wendell Holmes—were highly popular and influential in their day.
Soon after,
turnpikes were built: the
Cambridge and Concord Turnpike
The Cambridge and Concord Turnpike was an early turnpike between Cambridge and Concord, Massachusetts. Portions have been incorporated into today's Massachusetts Route 2; the remainder forms other major local roads.
Route description
The turnp ...
(today's Broadway and Concord Ave.), the
Middlesex Turnpike (Hampshire St. and
Massachusetts Ave. northwest of
Porter Square
Porter Square is a neighborhood in Cambridge and Somerville, Massachusetts, located around the intersection of Massachusetts Avenue and Somerville Avenue, between Harvard and Davis Squares. The Porter Square station serves both the MBTA Red Li ...
), and what are today's Cambridge, Main, and Harvard Streets connected various areas of Cambridge to the bridges. In addition, the town was connected to the
Boston & Maine Railroad
The Boston and Maine Railroad was a U.S. Class I railroad in northern New England. Originally chartered in 1835, it became part of what was the Pan Am Railways network in 1983 (most of which was purchased by CSX in 2022).
At the end of 1970 ...
, leading to the development of Porter Square as well as the creation of neighboring
Somerville from the formerly rural parts of
Charlestown.
![1852 Middlesex Canal (Massachusetts) map](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/17/1852_Middlesex_Canal_%28Massachusetts%29_map.jpg)
Cambridge was incorporated as a city in 1846. The city's commercial center began to shift from Harvard Square to Central Square, which became the city's downtown around that time.
Between 1850 and 1900, Cambridge took on much of its present character—
streetcar suburban development along the turnpikes, with working-class and industrial neighborhoods focused on East Cambridge, comfortable middle-class housing on the old Cambridgeport and Mid-Cambridge estates, and upper-class enclaves near Harvard University and on the minor hills. The coming of the railroad to North Cambridge and Northwest Cambridge led to three major changes: the development of massive brickyards and brickworks between Massachusetts Ave., Concord Ave. and
Alewife Brook
Alewife Brook Reservation is a Massachusetts state park and urban wild located in Cambridge, Arlington, and Somerville. The park is managed by the state Department of Conservation and Recreation and was established in 1900. It is named for Ale ...
; the ice-cutting industry launched by
Frederic Tudor
Frederic Tudor (September 4, 1783 – February 6, 1864) was an American businessman and merchant. Known as Boston's "Ice King", he was the founder of the Tudor Ice Company and a pioneer of the international ice trade in the early 19th century. H ...
on
Fresh Pond; and the carving up of the last estates into residential subdivisions to house the thousands of immigrants who arrived to work in the new industries.
For many decades, the city's largest employer was the
New England Glass Company
Libbey, Inc., (formerly Libbey Glass Company and New England Glass Company) is a glass production company headquartered in Toledo, Ohio. It was originally founded in Cambridge, Massachusetts as the ''New England Glass Company'' in 1818'','' before ...
, founded in 1818. By the middle of the 19th century, it was the world's largest and most modern glassworks. In 1888,
Edward Drummond Libbey
Edward Drummond Libbey (April 17, 1854 – November 13, 1925) is regarded as the father of the glass industry in Toledo, Ohio, where he opened the Libbey Glass Company (later Libbey, Inc.) in 1888.
Biography
Libbey was born April 17, 1854, in C ...
moved all production to
Toledo, Ohio
Toledo ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Lucas County, Ohio, United States. A major Midwestern United States port city, Toledo is the fourth-most populous city in the state of Ohio, after Columbus, Cleveland, and Cincinnati, and according ...
, where it continues today under the name
Owens-Illinois. The company's flint glassware with heavy lead content is prized by antique glass collectors. There is none on public display in Cambridge, but the
Toledo Museum of Art
The Toledo Museum of Art is an internationally known art museum located in the Old West End neighborhood of Toledo, Ohio. It houses a collection of more than 30,000 objects. With 45 galleries, it covers 280,000 square feet and is currently in th ...
has a large collection. The
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Sandwich Glass Museum on
Cape Cod
Cape Cod is a peninsula extending into the Atlantic Ocean from the southeastern corner of mainland Massachusetts, in the northeastern United States. Its historic, maritime character and ample beaches attract heavy tourism during the summer mont ...
also have a few pieces.
In 1895,
Edwin Ginn
Edwin Ginn (February 14, 1838 – January 21, 1914) was an American publisher, peace advocate and philanthropist.
Biography
Ginn was born in Orland, Maine, on February 14, 1838, into a Universalist farming family who were descendants of early ...
, founder of
Ginn and Company
Pearson Education is a British-owned education publishing and assessment service to schools and corporations, as well for students directly. Pearson owns educational media brands including Addison–Wesley, Peachpit, Prentice Hall, eCollege, ...
built the
Athenaeum Press
Athenæum Press is an historic building located at 215 First Street in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The structure occupies the entire block between First Street, Second Street, Athenæum Street, and Linskey Way, which was formerly known as Munroe Str ...
Building for his publishing textbook empire.
By 1920, Cambridge was one of
New England
New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York (state), New York to the west and by the Can ...
's main industrial cities, with nearly 120,000 residents. Among the largest businesses in Cambridge during the period of industrialization was
Carter's Ink Company
Carter's Ink Company was an American manufacturer of ink and related products, based first in Boston and later in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was once the largest ink manufacturer in the world.[Nabisco
Nabisco (, abbreviated from the earlier name National Biscuit Company) is an American manufacturer of cookies and snacks headquartered in East Hanover, New Jersey. The company is a subsidiary of Illinois-based Mondelēz International.
Nabisco's ...]
and originator of the
Fig Newton
Newtons are a Nabisco-trademarked version of a pastry filled with sweet fruit paste. "Fig Newtons" are the most popular variety ( fig rolls filled with fig paste). They are produced by an extrusion process. Their distinctive shape is a character ...
),
Necco
Necco (or NECCO ) was an American manufacturer of candy created in 1901 as the New England Confectionery Company through the merger of several small confectionery companies located in the Greater Boston area, with ancestral companies dating b ...
,
Squirrel Brands, George Close Company (1861–1930s),
Page & Shaw, Daggett Chocolate (1892–1960s, recipes bought by Necco), Fox Cross Company (1920–1980, originator of the
Charleston Chew, and now part of
Tootsie Roll Industries
Tootsie Roll Industries is an American manufacturer of confectionery based in Chicago, Illinois. Its best-known products include the namesake Tootsie Rolls and Tootsie Pops. Tootsie Roll Industries currently markets its brands internationally in ...
), Kendall Confectionery Company, and James O. Welch (1927–1963, originator of
Junior Mints
Junior or Juniors may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Music
* ''Junior'' (Junior Mance album), 1959
* ''Junior'' (Röyksopp album), 2009
* ''Junior'' (Kaki King album), 2010
* ''Junior'' (LaFontaines album), 2019
Films
* ''Junior'' (1994 ...
,
Sugar Daddies
''Sugar Daddies'' is a silent comedy short film starring Jimmy Finlayson, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy prior to their official billing as the duo Laurel and Hardy
Laurel and Hardy were a British-American comedy duo act during the early Cl ...
,
Sugar Mamas
Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or double s ...
, and
Sugar Babies, now part of Tootsie Roll Industries).
Main Street was nicknamed "Confectioner's Row".
Only the
Cambridge Brands subsidiary of Tootsie Roll Industries remains in town, still manufacturing Junior Mints in the old Welch factory on Main Street.
The
Blake and Knowles Steam Pump Company (1886), the
Kendall Boiler and Tank Company
Kendall Boiler and Tank Company Building is a one-story commercial edifice located on 275 Third Street in Kendall Square, Cambridge, Massachusetts. The brick building was formerly owned by the Kendall Boiler and Tank Company and is part of the Blak ...
(1880, now in
Chelmsford, Massachusetts
Chelmsford () is a town in Massachusetts that was established in 1655. It is located northwest of Boston. The Chelmsford militia played a role in the American Revolution at the Battle of Lexington and Concord and the Battle of Bunker Hill. ...
), and the New England Glass Company (1818–1878) were among the industrial manufacturers in what are now Kendall Square and East Cambridge.
In 1935, the Cambridge Housing Authority and the
Public Works Administration demolished an
integrated low-income
tenement
A tenement is a type of building shared by multiple dwellings, typically with flats or apartments on each floor and with shared entrance stairway access. They are common on the British Isles, particularly in Scotland. In the medieval Old Town, i ...
neighborhood with African Americans and European immigrants. In its place, it built the whites-only "Newtowne Court"
public housing development and the adjoining, blacks-only "Washington Elms" project in 1940; the city required segregation in its other public housing projects as well.
As industry in New England began to decline during the
Great Depression and after World War II, Cambridge lost much of its industrial base. It also began to become an intellectual, rather than an industrial, center. Harvard University had always been important as both a landowner and an institution, but it began to play a more dominant role in the city's life and culture. When Radcliffe College was established in 1879 the town became a mecca for some of the nation's most academically talented female students. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology's move from Boston in 1916 reinforced Cambridge's status as an intellectual center of the United States.
After the 1950s, the city's population began to decline slowly as families tended to be replaced by single people and young couples. In Cambridge Highlands, the technology company
Bolt, Beranek, & Newman produced
the first network router in 1969 and hosted the invention of computer-to-computer email in 1971. The 1980s brought a wave of high-technology startups. Those selling advanced
minicomputers were overtaken by the
microcomputer. Cambridge-based
VisiCorp
VisiCorp was an early personal computer software publisher. Its most famous products were Microchess, Visi On and VisiCalc.
It was founded in 1976 by Dan Fylstra and Peter R. Jennings as Personal Software, and first published Jennings' Microc ...
made the first
spreadsheet
A spreadsheet is a computer application for computation, organization, analysis and storage of data in tabular form. Spreadsheets were developed as computerized analogs of paper accounting worksheets. The program operates on data entered in c ...
software for personal computers,
Visicalc
VisiCalc (for "visible calculator") is the first spreadsheet computer program for personal computers, originally released for Apple II by VisiCorp on 17 October 1979. It is often considered the application that turned the microcomputer from a hob ...
, and helped propel the
Apple II to major consumer success. It was overtaken and purchased by Cambridge-based
Lotus Development
Lotus Software (called Lotus Development Corporation before its acquisition by IBM) was an American software company based in Massachusetts; it was "offloaded" to India's HCL Technologies in 2018.
Lotus is most commonly known for the Lotus 1- ...
, maker of
Lotus 1-2-3
Lotus 1-2-3 is a discontinued spreadsheet program from Lotus Software (later part of IBM). It was the first killer application of the IBM PC, was hugely popular in the 1980s, and significantly contributed to the success of IBM PC-compatibles i ...
. (This was in turn replaced in the market by
Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Excel is a spreadsheet developed by Microsoft for Windows, macOS, Android and iOS. It features calculation or computation capabilities, graphing tools, pivot tables, and a macro programming language called Visual Basic for App ...
).
The city continues to be home to many startups. Kendall Square was a major software hub through the
dot-com boom
The dot-com bubble (dot-com boom, tech bubble, or the Internet bubble) was a stock market bubble in the late 1990s, a period of massive growth in the use and adoption of the Internet.
Between 1995 and its peak in March 2000, the Nasdaq Compos ...
and today hosts offices of such technology companies as Google,
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washin ...
, and
Amazon
Amazon most often refers to:
* Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology
* Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin
* Amazon River, in South America
* Amazon (company), an American multinational technolog ...
. The Square also now houses the headquarters of
Akamai.
In 1976, Harvard's plans to start experiments with recombinant DNA led to a three-month moratorium and a citizen review panel. In the end, Cambridge decided to allow such experiments but passed safety regulations in 1977. This led to regulatory certainty and acceptance when
Biogen
Biogen Inc. is an American multinational biotechnology company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, specializing in the discovery, development, and delivery of therapies for the treatment of neurological diseases to patients worldwide.
History
...
opened a lab in 1982, in contrast to the hostility that caused the Genetic Institute (a Harvard spinoff) to abandon Somerville and Boston for Cambridge. The biotech and pharmaceutical industries have since thrived in Cambridge, which now includes headquarters for Biogen and
Genzyme
Genzyme was an American biotechnology company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Since its acquisition in 2011, Genzyme (also known as Genzyme Transgenics Corp or GTC Biotherapeutics) has been a fully owned subsidiary of Sanofi. In 2010, Genzyme ...
; laboratories for
Novartis
Novartis AG is a Swiss-American multinational pharmaceutical corporation based in Basel, Switzerland and
Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States (global research).name="novartis.com">https://www.novartis.com/research-development/research-loc ...
,
Teva,
,
Alnylam,
Ironwood
Ironwood is a common name for many woods or plants that have a reputation for hardness, or specifically a wood density that is heavier than water (approximately 1000 kg/m3, or 62 pounds per cubic foot), although usage of the name ironwood in E ...
,
Catabasis
A katabasis or catabasis ( grc, κατάβασις, from "down" and "go") is a journey to the underworld. Its original sense is usually associated with Greek mythology and Classical mythology more broadly, where the protagonist visits the Gree ...
,
Moderna Therapeutics,
Editas Medicine; support companies such as
Cytel
Cytel is a multinational statistical software developer and contract research organization, headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. Cytel provides clinical trial design, implementation services, and statistical products primarily for the ...
; and many smaller companies.
By the end of the 20th century, Cambridge had one of the most costly housing markets in the Northeastern United States. While considerable class, race, and age diversity persisted, it became harder for those who grew up in the city to afford to stay. The end of
rent control
Rent regulation is a system of laws, administered by a court or a public authority, which aims to ensure the affordability of housing and tenancies on the rental market for dwellings. Generally, a system of rent regulation involves:
* Price con ...
in 1994 prompted many Cambridge renters to move to more affordable housing in Somerville and other cities or towns.
Until recently, Cambridge's mix of amenities and proximity to Boston kept housing prices relatively stable despite the bursting of the
United States housing bubble
The 2000s United States housing bubble was a real-estate bubble affecting over half of the U.S. states. It was the impetus for the subprime mortgage crisis. Housing prices peaked in early 2006, started to decline in 2006 and 2007, and reac ...
. Cambridge has been a
sanctuary city since 1985 and reaffirmed its status as such in 2006.
Geography
![Charles River Cambridge USA](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ea/Charles_River_Cambridge_USA.jpg)
According to the
United States Census Bureau
The United States Census Bureau (USCB), officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the U.S. Federal Statistical System, responsible for producing data about the American people and economy. The Census Bureau is part of t ...
, Cambridge has a total area of , of which is land and (9.82%) is water.
Adjacent municipalities
Cambridge is located in eastern Massachusetts, bordered by:
* the city of Boston to the south (across the Charles River) and east
* the city of Somerville to the north
* the town of Arlington to the northwest
* the town of
Belmont and
* the city of
Watertown Watertown may refer to:
Places in China
In China, a water town is a type of ancient scenic town known for its waterways.
Places in the United States
*Watertown, Connecticut, a New England town
**Watertown (CDP), Connecticut, the central village ...
to the west
The border between Cambridge and the neighboring city of Somerville passes through densely populated neighborhoods which are connected by the
MBTA Red Line
The Red Line is a rapid transit line operated by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) as part of the MBTA subway system. The line runs south and east underground from Alewife station in North Cambridge through Somerville and Ca ...
. Some of the main squares,
Inman, Porter, and to a lesser extent, Harvard and
Lechmere
Lechmere ( "leech-meer") was a Massachusetts-based chain of retail stores that closed in 1997. At the time of its closing, it had 27 stores, including 20 in New England. The chain offered electronics, appliances, and various household goods. It a ...
, are very close to the city line, as are Somerville's
Union
Union commonly refers to:
* Trade union, an organization of workers
* Union (set theory), in mathematics, a fundamental operation on sets
Union may also refer to:
Arts and entertainment
Music
* Union (band), an American rock group
** ''Un ...
and
Davis Square
Davis Square is a major intersection in the northwestern section of Somerville, Massachusetts where several streets meet: Holland Street, Dover Street, Day Street, Elm Street, Highland Avenue, and College Avenue. The name is often used to refer ...
s.
Through the City of Cambridge's exclusive municipal water system, the city further controls two
exclave areas, one being Payson Park Reservoir and Gatehouse, a
2009 listed American Water Landmark located roughly one mile west of Fresh Pond and surrounded by the town of Belmont. The second area is the larger Hobbs Brook and
Stony Brook watersheds, which share borders with neighboring towns and cities including Lexington,
Lincoln
Lincoln most commonly refers to:
* Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865), the sixteenth president of the United States
* Lincoln, England, cathedral city and county town of Lincolnshire, England
* Lincoln, Nebraska, the capital of Nebraska, U.S.
* Lincol ...
,
Waltham and
Weston
Weston may refer to:
Places Australia
* Weston, Australian Capital Territory, a suburb of Canberra
* Weston, New South Wales
* Weston Creek, a residential district of Canberra
* Weston Park, Canberra, a park
Canada
* Weston, Nova Scotia
* ...
.
Neighborhoods
Squares
Cambridge has been called the "City of Squares", as most of its commercial districts are major street intersections known as
squares
In Euclidean geometry, a square is a regular quadrilateral, which means that it has four equal sides and four equal angles (90- degree angles, π/2 radian angles, or right angles). It can also be defined as a rectangle with two equal-length a ...
. Each square acts as a neighborhood center. These include:
*
Kendall Square
Kendall Square is a neighborhood in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The square itself at the intersection of Main Street and Broadway. It also refers to the broad business district east of Portland Street, northwest of the Charles River, north of MIT ...
, formed by the junction of Broadway, Main Street, and Third Street, has been called "the most innovative square mile on the planet", owing to its high concentration of
entrepreneurial
Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value. With this definition, entrepreneurship is viewed as change, generally entailing risk beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business, which may include other values th ...
start-ups and quality of innovation which have emerged in the vicinity of the square since 2010.
[ Technology Square is an office and laboratory building cluster in this neighborhood. Just over the ]Longfellow Bridge
The Longfellow Bridge is a steel rib arch bridge spanning the Charles River to connect Boston's Beacon Hill neighborhood with the Kendall Square area of Cambridge, Massachusetts. The bridge carries Massachusetts Route 3, US Route 3, the MBTA Re ...
from Boston, at the eastern end of the MIT campus, it is served by the Kendall/MIT station on the MBTA Red Line subway. Most of Cambridge's large office towers are located in the Square. A biotech
Biotechnology is the integration of natural sciences and engineering sciences in order to achieve the application of organisms, cells, parts thereof and molecular analogues for products and services. The term ''biotechnology'' was first used b ...
industry has developed in this area. The Cambridge Innovation Center
Cambridge Innovation Center (CIC) is an American real estate services company which bills itself as a "community of entrepreneurs". The company was founded in 1999 by Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) graduates Timothy Rowe and Andrew ...
, a large co-working space, is in Kendall Square at 1 Broadway. The Cambridge Center office complex is in Kendall Square, and not at the actual center of Cambridge. The "One Kendall Square" complex is nearby, but not actually in Kendall Square.
* Central Square, formed by the junction of Massachusetts Avenue, Prospect Street, and Western Avenue. Containing a variety of ethnic restaurants, it was economically depressed as recently as the late 1990s; it underwent gentrification
Gentrification is the process of changing the character of a neighborhood through the influx of more affluent residents and businesses. It is a common and controversial topic in urban politics and planning. Gentrification often increases the ec ...
in recent years (in conjunction with the development of the nearby University Park at MIT
University Park at MIT is a mixed-use urban renewal project in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, occupying land near Central Square between the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) campus and the primarily residential neighborhood o ...
), and continues to grow more costly. It is served by the Central Station
Central stations or central railway stations emerged in the second half of the nineteenth century as railway stations that had initially been built on the edge of city centres were enveloped by urban expansion and became an integral part of the ...
stop on the MBTA Red Line subway. Lafayette Square, formed by the junction of Massachusetts Avenue, Columbia Street, Sidney Street, and Main Street, is considered part of the Central Square area. Cambridgeport
Cambridgeport is one of the neighborhoods of Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is bounded by Massachusetts Avenue, the Charles River, the Grand Junction Railroad, and River Street. The neighborhood contains predominantly residential homes, many of the ...
is south of Central Square along Magazine Street and Brookline Street.
* Harvard Square, formed by the junction of Massachusetts Avenue, Brattle Street, and JFK Street. This is the primary site of Harvard University and a major Cambridge shopping area. It is served by a Red Line station. Harvard Square was originally the Red Line's northwestern terminus and a major transfer point to streetcars that also operated in a short tunnel
A tunnel is an underground passageway, dug through surrounding soil, earth or rock, and enclosed except for the entrance and exit, commonly at each end. A pipeline is not a tunnel, though some recent tunnels have used immersed tube cons ...
—which is still a major bus terminal, although the area under the Square was reconfigured dramatically in the 1980s when the Red Line was extended. The Harvard Square area includes Brattle Square and Eliot Square. A short distance away from the square lies the Cambridge Common, while the neighborhood north of Harvard and east of Massachusetts Avenue is known as Agassiz, after the famed scientist Louis Agassiz.
* Porter Square, about a mile north on Massachusetts Avenue from Harvard Square, at the junction of Massachusetts and Somerville Avenues. It includes part of the city of Somerville and is served by the Porter Square Station
Porter is a Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) transit station in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It serves the Red Line rapid transit line, the MBTA Commuter Rail Fitchburg Line, and several MBTA bus lines. Located at Porter Squar ...
, a complex housing a Red Line stop and a Fitchburg Line commuter rail
Commuter rail, or suburban rail, is a passenger rail transport service that primarily operates within a metropolitan area, connecting Commuting, commuters to a Downtown, central city from adjacent suburbs or commuter towns. Generally commuter r ...
stop. Lesley University's University Hall and Porter campus are in Porter Square.
* Inman Square, at the junction of Cambridge and Hampshire streets in mid-Cambridge. It is home to restaurants, bars, music venues, and boutiques. Victorian streetlights, benches, and bus stops were added to the streets in the 2000s, and a new city park was installed.
* Lechmere Square, at the junction of Cambridge and First streets, adjacent to the CambridgeSide Galleria shopping mall. It is served by Lechmere station
Lechmere station is a Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) Green Line light rail station in Lechmere Square in East Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is located on the east side of Monsignor O'Brien Highway near First Street, adjacen ...
on the MBTA Green Line.
= Gallery
=
File:Centralsquarecambridgemass.jpg, Central Square
File:Harvard square 2009j.JPG, Harvard Square
File:Cambridge MA Inman Square.jpg, Inman Square
Other neighborhoods
Cambridge's residential neighborhoods border but are not defined by the squares.
* East Cambridge
East Cambridge is a neighborhood of Cambridge, Massachusetts. Referred to in modern times as Area 1, East Cambridge is bounded by the Charles River and the Charlestown neighborhood of Boston on the east, the Somerville border on the north, Bro ...
(Area 1) is bordered on the north by Somerville, on the east by the Charles River, on the south by Broadway and Main Street, and on the west by the Grand Junction Railroad
Grand may refer to:
People with the name
* Grand (surname)
* Grand L. Bush (born 1955), American actor
* Grand Mixer DXT, American turntablist
* Grand Puba (born 1966), American rapper
Places
* Grand, Oklahoma
* Grand, Vosges, village and c ...
tracks. It includes the NorthPoint development.
* MIT Campus
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology occupies a tract in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. The campus spans approximately one mile (1.6 km) of the north side of the Charles River basin directly opposite the Back Bay neigh ...
( Area 2) is bordered on the north by Broadway, on the south and east by the Charles River, and on the west by the Grand Junction Railroad tracks.
* Wellington-Harrington
Wellington-Harrington, also known as Area 3, is a neighborhood in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Overlapping with Inman Square and Kendall Square, it is bounded by Hampshire Street and Broadway on the southwest, the Grand Junction railroad tracks on t ...
(Area 3) is bordered on the north by Somerville, on the south and west by Hampshire Street, and on the east by the Grand Junction Railroad tracks. Referred to as "Mid-Block".
* The Port, formerly known as Area 4, is bordered on the north by Hampshire Street, on the south by Massachusetts Avenue, on the west by Prospect Street, and on the east by the Grand Junction Railroad tracks. Residents of Area 4 often simply call their neighborhood "The Port" and the area of Cambridgeport and Riverside "The Coast". In October 2015, the Cambridge City Council officially renamed Area 4 "The Port", formalizing the longtime nickname, largely on the initiative of neighborhood native and then-Vice Mayor Dennis Benzan. The port is usually the busier part of the city.
* Cambridgeport
Cambridgeport is one of the neighborhoods of Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is bounded by Massachusetts Avenue, the Charles River, the Grand Junction Railroad, and River Street. The neighborhood contains predominantly residential homes, many of the ...
(Area 5) is bordered on the north by Massachusetts Avenue, on the south by the Charles River, on the west by River Street, and on the east by the Grand Junction Railroad tracks.
* Mid-Cambridge
Mid-Cambridge, also known as "Area 6", is a neighborhood of Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 U.S. c ...
(Area 6) is bordered on the north by Kirkland and Hampshire Streets and Somerville, on the south by Massachusetts Avenue, on the west by Peabody Street, and on the east by Prospect Street.
* Riverside
Riverside may refer to:
Places Australia
* Riverside, Tasmania, a suburb of Launceston, Tasmania
Canada
* Riverside (electoral district), in the Yukon
* Riverside, Calgary, a neighbourhood in Alberta
* Riverside, Manitoba, a former rural m ...
(Area 7), an area sometimes called "The Coast", is bordered on the north by Massachusetts Avenue, on the south by the Charles River, on the west by JFK Street, and on the east by River Street.
* Baldwin (Area 8) is bordered on the north by Somerville, on the south and east by Kirkland Street, and on the west by Massachusetts Avenue.
* Neighborhood Nine or Radcliffe (formerly called Peabody, until the recent relocation of a neighborhood school by that name) is bordered on the north by railroad tracks, on the south by Concord Avenue, on the west by railroad tracks, and on the east by Massachusetts Avenue.
::The Avon Hill sub-neighborhood consists of the higher elevations within the area bounded by Upland Road, Raymond Street, Linnaean Street and Massachusetts Avenue.
* Brattle area/West Cambridge
West Cambridge is a university site to the west of Cambridge city centre in England. As part of the ''West Cambridge Master Plan'', several of the University of Cambridge's departments have relocated to the West Cambridge site from the centre ...
(Area 10) is bordered on the north by Concord Avenue and Garden Street, on the south by the Charles River and Watertown, on the west by Fresh Pond and the Collins Branch Library, and on the east by JFK Street. It includes the sub-neighborhoods of Brattle Street (formerly known as Tory Row) and Huron Village.
* North Cambridge
North Cambridge, also known as "Area 11", is a neighborhood of Cambridge, Massachusetts bounded by Porter Square and the Fitchburg Line railroad tracks on the south, the city of Somerville, Massachusetts, Somerville on the northeast, Alewife Brook ...
(Area 11) is bordered on the north by Arlington and Somerville, on the south by railroad tracks, on the west by Belmont, and on the east by Somerville.
* Cambridge Highlands (Area 12) is bordered on the north and east by railroad tracks, on the south by Fresh Pond, and on the west by Belmont.
* Strawberry Hill (Area 13) is bordered on the north by Fresh Pond, on the south by Watertown, on the west by Belmont, and on the east by railroad tracks.
Climate
In the Köppen-Geiger classification, Cambridge has a hot-summer humid continental climate
A humid continental climate is a climatic region defined by Russo-German climatologist Wladimir Köppen in 1900, typified by four distinct seasons and large seasonal temperature differences, with warm to hot (and often humid) summers and freez ...
(Dfa) with hot summers and cold winters, that can appear in the southern end of New England's interior. Abundant rain falls on the city (and in the winter often as snow); it has no dry season. The average January temperature is 26.6 °F (–3 °C), making Cambridge part of Group D, independent of the isotherm. There are four well-defined seasons.
Demographics
As of the census of 2010, there were 105,162 people, 44,032 households, and 17,420 families residing in the city. The population density was . There were 47,291 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the city was 66.60% White
White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no hue). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully reflect and scatter all the visible wavelengths of light. White o ...
, 11.70% Black
Black is a color which results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without hue, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white ...
or African American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...
, 0.20% Native American, 15.10% Asian
Asian may refer to:
* Items from or related to the continent of Asia:
** Asian people, people in or descending from Asia
** Asian culture, the culture of the people from Asia
** Asian cuisine, food based on the style of food of the people from Asi ...
(3.7% Chinese
Chinese can refer to:
* Something related to China
* Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity
**''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation
** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...
, 1.4% Asian Indian
Indian Americans or Indo-Americans are citizens of the United States with ancestry from India. The United States Census Bureau uses the term Asian Indian to avoid confusion with Native Americans, who have also historically been referred t ...
, 1.2% Korean
Korean may refer to:
People and culture
* Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula
* Korean cuisine
* Korean culture
* Korean language
**Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl
**Korean dialects and the Jeju language
** ...
, 1.0% Japanese
Japanese may refer to:
* Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia
* Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan
* Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture
** Japanese diaspor ...
), 0.01% Pacific Islander
Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the Pacific Islands. As an ethnic/racial term, it is used to describe the original peoples—inhabitants and diasporas—of any of the three major subregions of O ...
, 2.10% from other races, and 4.30% from two or more races. 7.60% of the population were Hispanic
The term ''Hispanic'' ( es, hispano) refers to people, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or Hispanidad.
The term commonly applies to countries with a cultural and historical link to Spain and to viceroyalties forme ...
or Latino
Latino or Latinos most often refers to:
* Latino (demonym), a term used in the United States for people with cultural ties to Latin America
* Hispanic and Latino Americans in the United States
* The people or cultures of Latin America;
** Latin A ...
of any race (1.6% Puerto Rican, 1.4% Mexican, 0.6% Dominican, 0.5% Colombian & Salvadoran
Salvadorans (Spanish: ''Salvadoreños''), also known as Salvadorians (alternate spelling: Salvadoreans), are citizens of El Salvador, a country in Central America. Most Salvadorans live in El Salvador, although there is also a significant Salvad ...
, 0.4% Spaniard
Spaniards, or Spanish people, are a Romance ethnic group native to Spain. Within Spain, there are a number of national and regional ethnic identities that reflect the country's complex history, including a number of different languages, both i ...
). Non-Hispanic Whites
Non-Hispanic whites or Non-Latino whites are Americans who are classified as "white", and are not of Hispanic (also known as "Latino") heritage. The United States Census Bureau defines ''white'' to include European Americans, Middle Eastern Ame ...
were 62.1% of the population in 2010, down from 89.7% in 1970. An individual resident of Cambridge is known as a Cantabrigian
__NOTOC__
''Cantabrigian'' (often shortened to ''Cantab'') is an adjective that is used in two meanings: 1) to refer to what is of or pertaining to Cambridge University, located in Cambridge, United Kingdom;http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictiona ...
.
In 2010, there were 44,032 households, out of which 16.9% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 28.9% were married couples living together, 8.4% had a female householder with no husband present, and 60.4% were non-families. 40.7% of all households were made up of individuals, and 9.6% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.00 and the average family size was 2.76.
In the city, the population was spread out, with 13.3% of the population under the age of 18, 21.2% from 18 to 24, 38.6% from 25 to 44, 17.8% from 45 to 64, and 9.2% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 30.5 years. For every 100 females, there were 96.1 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 94.7 males.
The median income for a household in the city was $47,979, and the median income for a family was $59,423 (these figures had risen to $58,457 and $79,533 respectively ). Males had a median income of $43,825 versus $38,489 for females. The per capita income for the city was $31,156. About 8.7% of families and 12.9% of the population were below the poverty line, including 15.1% of those under age 18 and 12.9% of those age 65 or over.
Cambridge has been ranked as one of the most liberal cities in America. Locals living in and near the city jokingly refer to it as "The People's Republic of Cambridge." For 2016, the residential property tax rate in Cambridge was $6.99 per $1,000. Cambridge enjoys the highest possible bond credit rating
In investment, the bond credit rating represents the credit worthiness of corporate or government bonds. It is not the same as an individual's credit score. The ratings are published by credit rating agencies and used by investment professiona ...
, AAA, with all three Wall Street rating agencies.
In 2000, 11.0% of city residents were of Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
ancestry; 7.2% were of English
English usually refers to:
* English language
* English people
English may also refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England
** English national ide ...
, 6.9% Italian
Italian(s) may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries
** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom
** Italian language, a Romance language
*** Regional Ita ...
, 5.5% West Indian
A West Indian is a native or inhabitant of the West Indies (the Antilles and the Lucayan Archipelago). For more than 100 years the words ''West Indian'' specifically described natives of the West Indies, but by 1661 Europeans had begun to use it ...
and 5.3% German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
** Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ge ...
ancestry. 69.4% spoke only English at home, while 6.9% spoke Spanish, 3.2% Chinese
Chinese can refer to:
* Something related to China
* Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity
**''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation
** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...
or Mandarin, 3.0% Portuguese
Portuguese may refer to:
* anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Portugal
** Portuguese cuisine, traditional foods
** Portuguese language, a Romance language
*** Portuguese dialects, variants of the Portuguese language
** Portu ...
, 2.9% French Creole, 2.3% French, 1.5% Korean
Korean may refer to:
People and culture
* Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula
* Korean cuisine
* Korean culture
* Korean language
**Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl
**Korean dialects and the Jeju language
** ...
, and 1.0% Italian.
Income
Data is from the 2009–2013 American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates.
Economy
Manufacturing was an important part of Cambridge's economy in the late 19th and early 20th century, but educational institutions are its biggest employers today. Harvard and MIT together employ about 20,000. As a cradle of technological innovation, Cambridge was home to technology firms Analog Devices, Akamai, Bolt, Beranek, and Newman (BBN Technologies) (now part of Raytheon), General Radio
General Radio Company (later, GenRad) was a broad-line manufacturer of electronic test equipment in Massachusetts, U.S. from 1915 to 2001.
History
On June 14, 1915, Melville Eastham and a small group of investors started General Radio Company ...
(later GenRad), Lotus Development Corporation (now part of IBM), Polaroid
Polaroid may refer to:
* Polaroid Corporation, an American company known for its instant film and cameras
* Polaroid camera, a brand of instant camera formerly produced by Polaroid Corporation
* Polaroid film, instant film, and photographs
* Polar ...
, Symbolics, and Thinking Machines
Thinking Machines Corporation was a supercomputer manufacturer and artificial intelligence (AI) company, founded in Waltham, Massachusetts, in 1983 by Sheryl Handler and W. Daniel "Danny" Hillis to turn Hillis's doctoral work at the Massachuse ...
.
In 1996, Polaroid, Arthur D. Little
Arthur D. Little is an international management consulting firm originally headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, founded in 1886 and formally incorporated in 1909 by Arthur Dehon Little, an MIT chemist who had discovered acetate. ...
, and Lotus were Cambridge's top employers, with over 1,000 employees, but they faded out a few years later. Health care and biotechnology firms such as Genzyme
Genzyme was an American biotechnology company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Since its acquisition in 2011, Genzyme (also known as Genzyme Transgenics Corp or GTC Biotherapeutics) has been a fully owned subsidiary of Sanofi. In 2010, Genzyme ...
, Biogen Idec
Biogen Inc. is an American multinational biotechnology company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, specializing in the discovery, development, and delivery of therapies for the treatment of neurological diseases to patients worldwide.
History
...
, bluebird bio
bluebird bio, Inc., based in Somerville, Massachusetts, is a biotechnology company that develops gene therapies for severe genetic disorders.
The company's only - in the European Union (EU) - approved drug is betibeglogene autotemcel (Zyntegl ...
, Millennium Pharmaceuticals
Takeda Oncology (originally Millennium Pharmaceuticals) is a biopharmaceutical company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is a fully owned subsidiary of Takeda Pharmaceutical.
Takeda Oncology's research, development and commercialization act ...
, Sanofi
Sanofi S.A. is a French multinational pharmaceutical and healthcare company headquartered in Paris, France. Originally, the corporation was established in 1973 and merged with Synthélabo in 1999 to form Sanofi-Synthélabo. In 2004, Sanofi-Syn ...
, Pfizer
Pfizer Inc. ( ) is an American multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology corporation headquartered on 42nd Street in Manhattan, New York City. The company was established in 1849 in New York by two German entrepreneurs, Charles Pfizer ...
and Novartis have significant presences in the city. Though headquartered in Switzerland, Novartis continues to expand its operations in Cambridge.
Other major biotech and pharmaceutical firms expanding their presence in Cambridge include GlaxoSmithKline, AstraZeneca
AstraZeneca plc () is a British-Swedish multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology company with its headquarters at the Cambridge Biomedical Campus in Cambridge, England. It has a portfolio of products for major diseases in areas includi ...
, Shire, and Pfizer. Most of Cambridge's biotech firms are in Kendall Square and East Cambridge, which decades ago were the city's center of manufacturing. Some others are in University Park at MIT, a new development in another former manufacturing area.
None of the high-technology firms that once dominated the economy was among the 25 largest employers in 2005, but by 2008 Akamai and ITA Software
ITA Software is a travel industry software division of Google, formerly an independent company, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The company was founded by Jeremy Wertheimer, a computer scientist from the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and Co ...
were. Google, IBM Research
IBM Research is the research and development division for IBM, an American multinational information technology company headquartered in Armonk, New York, with operations in over 170 countries. IBM Research is the largest industrial research or ...
, Microsoft Research, and Philips Research
The Philips Natuurkundig Laboratorium (English translation: ''Philips Physics Laboratory'') or NatLab was the Dutch section of the Philips research department, which did research for the product divisions of that company. Originally located in the ...
maintain offices in Cambridge. In late January 2012—less than a year after acquiring Billerica
Billerica (, ) is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 42,119 according to the 2020 census. It takes its name from the town of Billericay in Essex, England.
History
In the early 1630s, a Praying India ...
-based analytic database management company, Vertica
Vertica Systems is an analytic database management software company. Vertica was founded in 2005 by the database researcher Michael Stonebraker, with Andrew Palmer as the founding CEO. Ralph Breslauer and Christopher P. Lynch served as later ...
— Hewlett-Packard announced it would also be opening its first offices in Cambridge. Also around that time, e-commerce giants Staples and Amazon.com said they would be opening research and innovation centers in Kendall Square. And LabCentral provides a shared laboratory facility for approximately 25 emerging biotech companies.
The proximity of Cambridge's universities has also made the city a center for nonprofit groups and think tanks, including the National Bureau of Economic Research
The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) is an American private nonprofit research organization "committed to undertaking and disseminating unbiased economic research among public policymakers, business professionals, and the academic c ...
, the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy
The Lincoln Institute of Land Policy is a think tank based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The Lincoln Institute of Land Policy seeks to "improve quality of life through the effective use, taxation, and stewardship of land". A nonprofit private opera ...
, Cultural Survival
Cultural Survival (founded 1972) is a nonprofit group based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, which is dedicated to defending the human rights of indigenous peoples.
History
Cultural Survival was founded by anthropologist David Maybur ...
, and One Laptop per Child.
In September 2011, the City of Cambridge launched the "Entrepreneur Walk of Fame
The Entrepreneur Walk of Fame was established to recognize the positive impact of entrepreneurs on job creation and technological progress.
Seven honorees were unveiled in the inaugural year. These were Bill Gates, Bill Hewlett, Bob Swanson, ...
" initiative. The Walk recognizes people who have made contributions to innovation in global business.
In 2021, Cambridge was one of approximately 27 US cities to receive a AAA rating from each of the three major credit rating agencies in the nation, Moody's Investors Service
Moody's Investors Service, often referred to as Moody's, is the bond credit rating business of Moody's Corporation, representing the company's traditional line of business and its historical name. Moody's Investors Service provides internationa ...
, Standard & Poor's and Fitch Ratings
Fitch Ratings Inc. is an American credit rating agency and is one of the " Big Three credit rating agencies", the other two being Moody's and Standard & Poor's. It is one of the three nationally recognized statistical rating organizations ( NRSRO ...
. 2021 marked the 22nd consecutive year that Cambridge had retained this distinction.
Top employers
, the city's ten largest employers are:[(1) ]
Arts and culture
Museums
* Harvard Art Museum
The Harvard Art Museums are part of Harvard University and comprise three museums: the Fogg Museum (established in 1895), the Busch-Reisinger Museum (established in 1903), and the Arthur M. Sackler Museum (established in 1985), and four research ...
, including the Busch-Reisinger Museum
The Harvard Art Museums are part of Harvard University and comprise three museums: the Fogg Museum (established in 1895), the Busch-Reisinger Museum (established in 1903), and the Arthur M. Sackler Museum (established in 1985), and four research ...
, a collection of Germanic art, the Fogg Art Museum
The Harvard Art Museums are part of Harvard University and comprise three museums: the Fogg Museum (established in 1895), the Busch-Reisinger Museum (established in 1903), and the Arthur M. Sackler Museum (established in 1985), and four research ...
, a comprehensive collection of Western art, and the Arthur M. Sackler Museum
The Harvard Art Museums are part of Harvard University and comprise three museums: the Fogg Museum (established in 1895), the Busch-Reisinger Museum (established in 1903), and the Arthur M. Sackler Museum (established in 1985), and four research ...
, a collection of Middle East and Asian art
* Harvard Museum of Natural History
The Harvard Museum of Natural History is a natural history museum housed in the University Museum Building, located on the campus of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It features 16 galleries with 12,000 speciments drawn from the col ...
, including the Glass Flowers
The Ware Collection of Blaschka Glass Models of Plants (or simply the ''Glass Flowers'') is a collection of highly realistic glass botanical models at the Harvard Museum of Natural History in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Created by Leopold and Rudo ...
collection
* Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology
The Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology is a museum affiliated with Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1866, the Peabody Museum is one of the oldest and largest museums focusing on anthropological material, with ...
, Harvard
* MIT Museum
The MIT Museum, founded in 1971, is located at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It hosts collections of holography, technology-related artworks, artificial intelligence, architecture, robotics, maritime histor ...
* List Visual Arts Center
Established in 1950, the List Visual Arts Center (LVAC) is the contemporary art museum of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. It is known for temporary exhibitions in its galleries located in the MIT Media Lab building, as well as its admini ...
, MIT
* Semitic Museum
The Harvard Museum of the Ancient Near East (HMANE, previously the Harvard Semitic Museum) is a museum founded in 1889. It moved into its present location at 6 Divinity Avenue in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1903.
Description
From the beginning, ...
, Harvard
Public art
Cambridge has a large and varied collection of permanent public art, on both city property (managed by the Cambridge Arts Council) and the Harvard and MIT campuses. Temporary public artworks are displayed as part of the annual Cambridge River Festival on the banks of the Charles River, during winter celebrations in Harvard and Central Squares, and at university campus sites. Experimental forms of public artistic and cultural expression include the Central Square World's Fair, the annual Somerville-based Honk! Festival, and If This House Could Talk, a neighborhood art and history event.
Street musicians and other performers entertain tourists and locals in Harvard Square during the warmer months. The performances are coordinated through a public process that has been developed collaboratively by the performers, city administrators, private organizations and business groups. The Cambridge public library contains four Works Progress Administration
The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, i ...
murals completed in 1935 by Elizabeth Tracy Montminy: ''Religion'', ''Fine Arts'', ''History of Books and Paper'', and ''The Development of the Printing Press''.
Architecture
Despite intensive urbanization during the late 19th century and the 20th century, Cambridge has several historic buildings, including some from the 17th century. The city also has abundant contemporary architecture, largely built by Harvard and MIT.
Notable historic buildings in the city include:
* The Asa Gray House (1810)
* Austin Hall, Harvard University (1882–1884)
* Cambridge City Hall (1888–1889)
* Cambridge Public Library
The Cambridge Public Library in Cambridge, Massachusetts is part of the Minuteman Library Network. It consists of a main library and six branches, located throughout the city. Having developed from the Cambridge Athenaeum, the main library buildin ...
(1888)
* Christ Church, Cambridge (1761)
* Cooper-Frost-Austin House (1689–1817)
* Elmwood House (1767), residence of the president of Harvard University
* First Church of Christ, Scientist
The First Church of Christ, Scientist is the administrative headquarters and mother church of the Church of Christ, Scientist, also known as the Christian Science church. Christian Science was founded in the 19th century in Lynn, Massachusetts ...
(1924–1930)
* The First Parish in Cambridge
First Parish in Cambridge is a Unitarian Universalist church, located in Harvard Square in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is a Welcoming Congregation and a member of the Unitarian Universalist Association. The church is notable for its almost 40 ...
(1833)
* Harvard-Epworth United Methodist Church
The Harvard-Epworth United Methodist Church is a church located beside Harvard Law School near the Cambridge, Massachusetts common. Its congregation was organized in March 1941 by the merger of Harvard Street Methodist Church and Epworth Methodis ...
(1891–1893)
* Harvard Lampoon Building
The Harvard Lampoon Building (sometimes referred to as the Lampoon Castle) is a historic building in Cambridge, Massachusetts, which is best known as the home of ''The Harvard Lampoon'', and for its unusual design.
Architecture and design
The b ...
(1909)
* The Hooper-Lee-Nichols House (1685–1850)
* Longfellow House–Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site (1759), former home of poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and headquarters of George Washington
* The Memorial Church of Harvard University
The Memorial Church of Harvard University is a building on the campus of Harvard University. It is an inter-denominational Protestant church.
History Predecessors
The first distinct building for worship at Harvard University was Holden Chapel, b ...
(1932)
* Memorial Hall, Harvard University (1870–1877)
* Middlesex County Courthouse (1814–1848)
* Urban Rowhouse (1875)
* O'Reilly Spite House (1908), built to spite a neighbor who would not sell his adjacent land
Contemporary architecture:
* Baker House dormitory, MIT, by Finnish architect Alvar Aalto, one of only two Aalto buildings in the US
* Harvard Graduate Center/Harkness Commons, by The Architects Collaborative
The Architects Collaborative (TAC) was an American architectural firm formed by eight architects that operated between 1945 to 1995 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The founding members were Norman C. Fletcher (1917-2007), Jean B. Fletcher (1915-19 ...
(TAC, with Walter Gropius
Walter Adolph Georg Gropius (18 May 1883 – 5 July 1969) was a German-American architect and founder of the Bauhaus School, who, along with Alvar Aalto, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Le Corbusier and Frank Lloyd Wright, is widely regarded as one ...
)
* Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts
The Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts at Harvard University, in Cambridge, Massachusetts is the only building designed primarily by Le Corbusier in the United States—he contributed to the design of the United Nations Secretariat Building—a ...
, Harvard, the only Le Corbusier building in North America
* Harvard's Science Center, Holyoke Center
Harvard University's Smith Campus Center (formerly Holyoke Center) is a Brutalist administrative and service building occupying the block bounded by Massachusetts Avenue, Dunster Street, Holyoke Street, and Mount Auburn Street in Cambridge, Mass ...
and Peabody Terrace
Peabody Terrace, on the north bank of the Charles River in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is a Harvard University housing complex primarily serving graduate students, particularly married students and their families.
Designed in the Brutalist archit ...
, by Catalan
Catalan may refer to:
Catalonia
From, or related to Catalonia:
* Catalan language, a Romance language
* Catalans, an ethnic group formed by the people from, or with origins in, Northern or southern Catalonia
Places
* 13178 Catalan, asteroid #1 ...
architect and Harvard Graduate School of Design Dean Josep Lluís Sert
Josep Lluís Sert i López (; 1 July 190215 March 1983) was a Spanish architect and city planner.
Biography
Born in Barcelona, Catalonia, Sert showed keen interest in the works of his uncle, the painter Josep Maria Sert, and of Gaudí. He s ...
* Kresge Auditorium
Kresge Auditorium (MIT Building W16) is an auditorium structure at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, located at 48 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was designed by the Finnish-American architect Eero Saarinen, with g ...
, MIT
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...
, by Eero Saarinen
Eero Saarinen (, ; August 20, 1910 – September 1, 1961) was a Finnish-American architect and industrial designer noted for his wide-ranging array of designs for buildings and monuments. Saarinen is best known for designing the General Motors ...
* MIT Chapel
The MIT Chapel (dedicated 1955, completed in 1956) is a non-denominational chapel designed by noted architect Eero Saarinen. It is located on the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, next to Kresge Aud ...
, by Eero Saarinen
* Design Research Building, by Benjamin Thompson and Associates
Benjamin C. Thompson (July 3, 1918 – August 17, 2002) was an American architect. He was one of eight architects who founded The Architects' Collaborative (TAC) in 1945 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, one of the most notable firms in post-w ...
* American Academy of Arts and Sciences
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, a ...
, by Kallmann McKinnell and Wood Kallmann McKinnell & Wood is an architectural design firm based in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1962 as Kallmann McKinnell & Knowles by Gerhard Kallmann (1915-2012), Michael McKinnell (1935–2020), and Edward Knowles.
Histo ...
, also architects of Boston City Hall
Boston City Hall is the seat of city government of Boston, Massachusetts. It includes the offices of the mayor of Boston and the Boston City Council. The current hall was built in 1968 to assume the functions of the Old City Hall.
It is a con ...
* Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Harvard, one of the few buildings in the US by Pritzker Prize winner James Stirling
* Harvard Art Museums
The Harvard Art Museums are part of Harvard University and comprise three museums: the Fogg Museum (established in 1895), the Busch-Reisinger Museum (established in 1903), and the Arthur M. Sackler Museum (established in 1985), and four research ...
, renovation and major expansion of Fogg Museum building, completed in 2014 by Renzo Piano
Renzo Piano (; born 14 September 1937) is an Italian architect. His notable buildings include the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris (with Richard Rogers, 1977), The Shard in London (2012), the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City ( ...
* Stata Center, home to the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory
Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) is a research institute at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) formed by the 2003 merger of the Laboratory for Computer Science (LCS) and the Artificial Intelligence Lab ...
, the Department of Linguistics, and the Department of Philosophy, by Frank Gehry
* The two MIT Media Lab
The MIT Media Lab is a research laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, growing out of MIT's Architecture Machine Group in the School of Architecture. Its research does not restrict to fixed academic disciplines, but draws from ...
buildings by I. M. Pei
Ieoh Ming Pei
– website of Pei Cobb Freed & Partners ( ; ; April 26, 1917 – May 16, 2019) was ...
and Fumihiko Maki
is a Japanese architect who teaches at Keio University SFC. In 1993, he received the Pritzker Prize for his work, which often explores pioneering uses of new materials and fuses the cultures of east and west.
Early life
Maki was born in Tokyo. ...
* Simmons Hall, MIT, by Steven Holl
Music
The city has an active music scene, from classical performances to the latest popular bands. Beyond its colleges and universities, Cambridge has many music venues, including The Middle East
The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Province), East Thrace (Europea ...
, Club Passim
Club Passim is an American folk music club in the Harvard Square area of Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was opened by Joyce Kalina (now Chopra) and Paula Kelley in 1958, when it was known as Club 47 (based on its then address, 47 Mount Auburn Str ...
, The Plough and Stars
The Plough and Stars is a bar and music venue in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1969 by brothers Peter and Padraig O'Malley, named after the play by Seán O'Casey. The ''Boston Globe'' and ''Boston Phoenix'' have noted its disproport ...
, The Lizard Lounge and the Nameless Coffeehouse
The Nameless Coffeehouse, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, opened in 1967 and is now New England's oldest all-volunteer coffeehouse. Located in the First Parish Unitarian Universalist Church in Harvard Square, the Nameless currently presents a six-con ...
.
Parks and recreation
Consisting largely of densely built residential space, Cambridge lacks significant tracts of public parkland. Easily accessible open space on the university campuses, including Harvard Yard
Harvard Yard, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is the oldest part of the Harvard University campus, its historic center and modern crossroads. It contains most of the freshman dormitories, Harvard's most important libraries, Memorial Church, sever ...
, the Radcliffe Yard
Radcliffe or Radcliff may refer to:
Places
* Radcliffe Line, a border between India and Pakistan
United Kingdom
* Radcliffe, Greater Manchester
** Radcliffe Tower, the remains of a medieval manor house in the town
** Radcliffe tram stop
* ...
, and MIT's Great Lawn, as well as the considerable open space of Mount Auburn Cemetery and Fresh Pond Reservation, partly compensates for this. At Cambridge's western edge, the cemetery is known as a garden cemetery because of its landscaping (the oldest planned landscape in the country) and arboretum. Although known as a Cambridge landmark, much of the cemetery lies within Watertown. It is also an Important Bird Area (IBA) in the Greater Boston area. Fresh Pond Reservation is the largest open green space in Cambridge with 162 acres (656,000 m2) of land around a 155-acre (627,000 m2) kettle hole
A kettle (also known as a kettle lake, kettle hole, or pothole) is a depression/hole in an outwash plain formed by retreating glaciers or draining floodwaters. The kettles are formed as a result of blocks of dead ice left behind by retreating gla ...
lake. This land includes a 2.25-mile walking trail around the reservoir and a public 9-hole golf course.
Public parkland includes the esplanade along the Charles River, which mirrors its Boston counterpart; Cambridge Common
Cambridge Common is a public park and National Historic Landmark in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. It is located near Harvard Square and borders on several parts of Harvard University. The north end of the park has a large playground. T ...
, a busy and historic public park adjacent to Harvard's campus; Danehy Park
Thomas W. Danehy Park is a park in North Cambridge, North Cambridge, Massachusetts. Its eastern entrance is at 99 Sherman Street. It is bounded on the north by the Fitchburg Line, MBTA Fitchburg Line and to the west by Fresh Pond Mall.
The lands ...
, formerly a landfill; and the Alewife Brook Reservation
Alewife Brook Reservation is a Massachusetts state park and urban wild located in Cambridge, Arlington, and Somerville. The park is managed by the state Department of Conservation and Recreation and was established in 1900. It is named for Al ...
.
Government
Federal and state representation
Cambridge is split between Massachusetts's 5th
Fifth is the ordinal form of the number five.
Fifth or The Fifth may refer to:
* Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, as in the expression "pleading the Fifth"
* Fifth column, a political term
* Fifth disease, a contagious rash tha ...
and 7th
7 (seven) is the natural number following 6 and preceding 8. It is the only prime number preceding a cube (algebra), cube.
As an early prime number in the series of positive integers, the number seven has greatly symbolic associations in religion ...
U.S. congressional districts. The 5th district seat is held by Democrat Katherine Clark
Katherine Marlea Clark (born July 17, 1963) is an American politician who has served as the U.S. Representative for Massachusetts's 5th congressional district since 2013. She has been Assistant House Democratic Leader (officially Assistant Spea ...
, who replaced now-Senator Ed Markey
Edward John Markey (born July 11, 1946) is an American lawyer, politician, and former Army reservist who has served as the junior United States senator from Massachusetts since 2013. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the U.S. representa ...
in a 2013 special election; the 7th is represented by Democrat Ayanna Pressley
Ayanna Soyini Pressley (born February 3, 1974) is an American politician who has served as the U.S. representative for Massachusetts's 7th congressional district since 2019. This district includes the northern three quarters of Boston, most of C ...
, elected in 2018. The state's senior United States senator
The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States.
The composition and powe ...
is Democrat Elizabeth Warren
Elizabeth Ann Warren ( née Herring; born June 22, 1949) is an American politician and former law professor who is the senior United States senator from Massachusetts, serving since 2013. A member of the Democratic Party and regarded as a ...
, elected in 2012, who lives in Cambridge. The governor of Massachusetts is Republican Charlie Baker
Charles Duane Baker Jr. (born November 13, 1956) is an American politician and businessman serving as the 72nd governor of Massachusetts since 2015. A member of the Republican Party, Baker was a cabinet official under two governors of Massach ...
, elected in 2014.
Cambridge is represented in six districts in the Massachusetts House of Representatives
The Massachusetts House of Representatives is the lower house of the Massachusetts General Court, the state legislature of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. It is composed of 160 members elected from 14 counties each divided into single-member ...
: the 24th Middlesex (which includes parts of Belmont and Arlington), the 25th and 26th Middlesex (the latter of which includes a portion of Somerville), the 29th Middlesex (which includes a small part of Watertown), and the Eighth and Ninth Suffolk (both including parts of the City of Boston). The city is represented in the Massachusetts Senate
The Massachusetts Senate is the upper house of the Massachusetts General Court, the bicameral state legislature of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The Senate comprises 40 elected members from 40 single-member senatorial districts in the st ...
as a part of the 2nd Middlesex, Middlesex and Suffolk, and 1st Suffolk and Middlesex districts.
Politics
From 1860 to 1880, Republicans Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln ( ; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation thro ...
, Ulysses S. Grant
Ulysses S. Grant (born Hiram Ulysses Grant ; April 27, 1822July 23, 1885) was an American military officer and politician who served as the 18th president of the United States from 1869 to 1877. As Commanding General, he led the Union Ar ...
, Rutherford B. Hayes
Rutherford Birchard Hayes (; October 4, 1822 – January 17, 1893) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 19th president of the United States from 1877 to 1881, after serving in the U.S. House of Representatives and as governo ...
, and James Garfield each won Cambridge, Grant doing so by margins of over 20 points in both of his campaigns. Following that, from 1884–1892, Grover Cleveland
Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837June 24, 1908) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 22nd and 24th president of the United States from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. Cleveland is the only president in American ...
won Cambridge in all three of his presidential campaigns, by less than ten points each time.
Then from 1896 to 1924, Cambridge became something of a "swing" city with a slight Republican lean. GOP nominees carried the city in five of the eight presidential elections during that time frame, with five of the elections resulting in either a plurality or a margin of victory of fewer than ten points.
The city of Cambridge is extremely Democratic in modern times, however. In the last 23 presidential elections dating back to the nomination of Al Smith in 1928, the Democratic nominee has carried Cambridge in every election. Every Democratic nominee since Massachusetts native John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination ...
in 1960 has received at least 70% of the vote, except for Jimmy Carter
James Earl Carter Jr. (born October 1, 1924) is an American politician who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party, he previously served as the 76th governor of Georgia from 1 ...
in 1976 and 1980. Since 1928, the only Republican nominee to come within ten points of carrying Cambridge is Dwight Eisenhower in his 1956 re-election bid.
City government
Cambridge has a city government led by a mayor
In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilities of a mayor as well ...
and a nine-member city council. There is also a six-member school committee that functions alongside the superintendent of public schools. The councilors and school committee members are elected every two years using proportional representation
Proportional representation (PR) refers to a type of electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to geographical (e.g. states, regions) and political divis ...
.
The mayor is elected by the city councilors from among themselves and serves as the chair of city council meetings. The mayor also sits on the school committee. The mayor is not the city's chief executive. Rather, the city manager, who is appointed by the city council, serves in that capacity.
Under the city's Plan E form of government, the city council does not have the power to appoint or remove city officials who are under the direction of the city manager. The city council and its members are also forbidden from giving orders to any subordinate of the city manager.
Owen O'Riordan is the Acting City Manager, succeeding Louis DePasquale, who resigned on July 5, 2022, after six years in office. Yi-An Huang will take over as City Manager on September 6, 2022.
''* = current mayor''
''** = former mayor''
On March 8, 2021, Cambridge City Council voted to recognize polyamorous domestic partnerships, becoming the second city in the United States following neighboring Somerville, which had done so in 2020.
County government
Cambridge was a county seat
A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or civil parish. The term is in use in Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, Taiwan, and the United States. The equivalent term shire town is used in the US st ...
of Middlesex County, along with Lowell, until the abolition of county government. Though the county government was abolished in 1997, the county still exists as a geographical and political region. The employees of Middlesex County courts, jails, registries, and other county agencies now work directly for the state. The county's registrars of Deeds and Probate remain in Cambridge, but the Superior Court and District Attorney have had their operations transferred to Woburn. Third District Court has shifted operations to Medford, and the county Sheriff's office awaits near-term relocation.
Education
Higher education
Cambridge is perhaps best known as an academic and intellectual center. Its colleges and universities include:
* Cambridge School of Culinary Arts
Cambridge School of Culinary Arts (CSCA) is a professional school located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It offers several certificate and professional programs, including a culinary studies and pastry specialization. It also offers a variet ...
* Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...
* Hult International Business School
Hult International Business School (also known as Hult Business School or Hult) is a private business school with campuses in Cambridge, London, San Francisco, Dubai, New York City, and Shanghai. Hult is named for the school's benefactor Bertil ...
* Lesley University
Lesley University is a private university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is accredited by the New England Commission of Higher Education. As of 2018-19 Lesley University enrolled 6,593 students (2,707 undergraduate and 3,886 graduate).
History ...
* Longy School of Music of Bard College
Longy School of Music of Bard College is a private music school in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1915 as the Longy School of Music, it was one of the four independent degree-granting music schools in the Boston region along with the New En ...
* Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...
* Radcliffe College (now merged with Harvard College)
At least 258 of the world's total 962 Nobel Prize winners have at some point in their careers been affiliated with universities in Cambridge.
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences is also based in Cambridge.
Primary and secondary public education
The city's schools constitute the Cambridge Public School District. Schools include:
* Amigos School
* Baldwin School (formerly the Agassiz School)
* Cambridgeport School
* Fletcher-Maynard Academy
* Graham and Parks Alternative School
* Haggerty School
* Kennedy-Longfellow School
* King Open School
* Martin Luther King, Jr. School
* Morse School (a Core Knowledge
Core Knowledge (CK) refers to a current textbook series originally written by a collective of former top Year 12 South Australian students of the same name (2003–2008) for South Australian Certificate of Education (SACE) students. The Core Kno ...
school)
* Peabody School
* Tobin School (a Montessori school
The Montessori method of education involves children's natural interests and activities rather than formal teaching methods. A Montessori classroom places an emphasis on hands-on learning and developing real-world skills. It emphasizes indepen ...
)
Five upper schools offer grades 6–8 in some of the same buildings as the elementary schools:
* Amigos School
* Cambridge Street Upper School
* Putnam Avenue Upper School
* Rindge Avenue Upper School
* Vassal Lane Upper School
Cambridge has three district public high school programs, the principal one being Cambridge Rindge and Latin School
The Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, also known as CRLS or "Rindge," is a public high school in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. It is a part of the Cambridge Public School District. In 1977, two separate schools, the Rindge Technical ...
(CRLS).
Other public charter schools include Benjamin Banneker Charter School
Benjamin ( he, ''Bīnyāmīn''; "Son of (the) right")blue letter bible: https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/h3225/kjv/wlc/0-1/ H3225 - yāmîn - Strong's Hebrew Lexicon (kjv) was the last of the two sons of Jacob and Rachel (Jacob's thirt ...
, which serves grades K–6; Community Charter School of Cambridge
Community Charter School of Cambridge is a charter school located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Located in the Kendall Square area near MIT, the school serves 360 students in grades 6-12. CCSC opened in September 2005. Since 2009, w ...
in Kendall Square, which serves grades 7–12; and Prospect Hill Academy, a charter school
A charter school is a school that receives government funding but operates independently of the established state school system in which it is located. It is independent in the sense that it operates according to the basic principle of autono ...
whose upper school is in Central Square though it is not a part of the Cambridge Public School District.
Primary and secondary private education
Cambridge also has several private schools, including:
* Boston Archdiocesan Choir School
St. Paul's Choir School is a Catholic choir school located at St. Paul’s Church, Harvard Square in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1963, by Theodore Marier, the middle school for boys in third through eighth grades is the only boys' choi ...
* Buckingham Browne & Nichols School
Buckingham Browne & Nichols School, often referred to as BB&N, is an independent co-educational day school in Cambridge, Massachusetts, educating students from pre-kindergarten (called Beginners) through twelfth grade. BB&N is regularly ranked am ...
* Cambridge Montessori school
* Cambridge Friends School
* Fayerweather Street School
* International School of Boston (formerly École Bilingue)
* Matignon High School
* Shady Hill School
* St. Peter School
Media
Newspapers
Cambridge is served by the '' Cambridge Chronicle'', the oldest surviving weekly paper in the United States. It was founded in May 1846. Another popular online newspaper is Cambridge Day.
Radio
Cambridge is home to the following commercially licensed and student-run radio stations:
Television and broadband
Cambridge Community Television (CCTV) has served the city since its inception in 1988. CCTV operates Cambridge's public access television facility and three television channels, 8, 9, and 96, on the Cambridge cable system (Comcast). The city has invited tenders from other cable providers, but Comcast remains its only fixed television and broadband utility, though services from American satellite TV providers are available. In October 2014, Cambridge City Manager Richard Rossi appointed a citizen Broadband Task Force to "examine options to increase competition, reduce pricing, and improve speed, reliability and customer service for both residents and businesses."
Infrastructure
Utilities
*Cable television service is provided by XFINITY (Comcast Communications).
*Parts of Cambridge are served by a district heating
District heating (also known as heat networks or teleheating) is a system for distributing heat generated in a centralized location through a system of insulated pipes for residential and commercial heating requirements such as space heating a ...
systems loop for industrial organizations that also cover Boston.
*Electric service and natural gas are both provided by Eversource Energy
Eversource Energy is a publicly traded, Fortune 500 energy company headquartered in Hartford, Connecticut, and Boston, Massachusetts, with several regulated subsidiaries offering retail electricity, natural gas service and water service to ap ...
.
*Landline telecommunications service are provided by Harvard University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and Verizon Communications. All phones in Cambridge are inter-connected to central office locations in the metropolitan area.
*The city maintains its own Public, educational, and government access
Public-access television is traditionally a form of non-commercial mass media where the general public can create content television programming which is narrowcast through cable television specialty channels. Public-access television was creat ...
(PEG) known as Cambridge Community Television (CCTV).
Water department
Cambridge obtains water from Hobbs Brook (in Lincoln and Waltham) and Stony Brook (Waltham and Weston), as well as an emergency connection to the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority
The Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA) is a public authority in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts that provides wholesale drinking water and sewage services to certain municipalities and industrial users in the state, primarily in th ...
. The city owns over of land in other towns that includes these reservoirs and portions of their watershed. Water from these reservoirs flows by gravity through an aqueduct to Fresh Pond in Cambridge. It is then treated in an adjacent plant and pumped uphill to an elevation of above sea level at the Payson Park Reservoir (Belmont). The water is then redistributed downhill via gravity to individual users in the city. A new water treatment plant opened in 2001.
In October 2016, the City of Cambridge announced that, owing to drought conditions, they would begin buying water from the MWRA. On January 3, 2017, Cambridge announced that "As a result of continued rainfall each month since October 2016, we have been able to significantly reduce the need to use MWRA water. We have not purchased any MWRA water since December 12, 2016 and if 'average' rainfall continues this could continue for several months."
*Sewer service is available in Cambridge. The city is inter-connected with the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority
The Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA) is a public authority in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts that provides wholesale drinking water and sewage services to certain municipalities and industrial users in the state, primarily in th ...
(MWRA)'s sewage network with sewage treatment plant
Sewage treatment (or domestic wastewater treatment, municipal wastewater treatment) is a type of wastewater treatment which aims to remove contaminants from sewage to produce an effluent that is suitable for discharge to the surrounding en ...
in the Boston Harbor.
Transportation
Road
Several major roads lead to Cambridge, including Route 2, Route 16, and the McGrath Highway (Route 28). The Massachusetts Turnpike
The Massachusetts Turnpike (colloquially "Mass Pike" or "the Pike") is a toll highway in the US state of Massachusetts that is maintained by the Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT). The turnpike begins at the New York state li ...
does not pass through Cambridge but provides access by an exit in nearby Allston
Allston is an officially recognized neighborhood within the City of Boston, Massachusetts, United States. It was named after the American painter and poet Washington Allston. It comprises the land covered by the zip code 02134. For the most pa ...
. Both U.S. Route 1
U.S. Route 1 or U.S. Highway 1 (US 1) is a major north–south United States Numbered Highway that serves the East Coast of the United States. It runs from Key West, Florida, north to Fort Kent, Maine, at the Canadian border, making ...
and Interstate 93 also provide additional access on the eastern end of Cambridge at Leverett Circle in Boston. Route 2A runs the length of the city, chiefly along Massachusetts Avenue. The Charles River forms the southern border of Cambridge and is crossed by 11 bridges connecting Cambridge to Boston, including the Longfellow Bridge and the Harvard Bridge
The Harvard Bridge (also known locally as the MIT Bridge, the Massachusetts Avenue Bridge, and the "Mass. Ave." Bridge) is a steel haunched girder bridge carrying Massachusetts Avenue ( Route 2A) over the Charles River and connecting Back Bay, ...
, eight of which are open to motorized road traffic.
Cambridge has an irregular street network because many of the roads date from the colonial era. Contrary to popular belief, the road system did not evolve from longstanding cow-paths. Roads connected various village settlements with each other and nearby towns and were shaped by geographic features, most notably streams, hills, and swampy areas. Today, the major "squares" are typically connected by long, mostly straight roads, such as Massachusetts Avenue between Harvard Square and Central Square, or Hampshire Street between Kendall Square and Inman Square.
Mass transit
Cambridge is served by the MBTA, including the Porter Square Station on the regional Commuter Rail
Commuter rail, or suburban rail, is a passenger rail transport service that primarily operates within a metropolitan area, connecting Commuting, commuters to a Downtown, central city from adjacent suburbs or commuter towns. Generally commuter r ...
; the Lechmere Station on the Green Line; and the Red Line at Alewife, Porter Square
Porter Square is a neighborhood in Cambridge and Somerville, Massachusetts, located around the intersection of Massachusetts Avenue and Somerville Avenue, between Harvard and Davis Squares. The Porter Square station serves both the MBTA Red Li ...
, Harvard Square, Central Square, and Kendall Square/MIT Stations. Alewife Station, the terminus of the Red Line, has a large multi-story parking garage (at a rate of $7 per day ).
The Harvard bus tunnel, under Harvard Square, connects to the Red Line underground. This tunnel was originally opened for streetcars in 1912 and served trackless trolleys (trolleybus
A trolleybus (also known as trolley bus, trolley coach, trackless trolley, trackless tramin the 1910s and 1920sJoyce, J.; King, J. S.; and Newman, A. G. (1986). ''British Trolleybus Systems'', pp. 9, 12. London: Ian Allan Publishing. .or trol ...
es) and buses as the routes were converted; four lines of the MBTA trolleybus system continued to use it until their conversion to diesel in 2022. The tunnel was partially reconfigured when the Red Line was extended to Alewife in the early 1980s.
Besides the state-owned transit agency, the city is also served by the Charles River Transportation Management Agency (CRTMA) shuttles which are supported by some of the largest companies operating in the city, in addition to the municipal government itself.
Cycling
Cambridge has several bike path
A bike path is a bikeway separated from motorized traffic and dedicated to cycling or shared with pedestrians or other non-motorized users. In the US a bike path sometimes encompasses ''shared use paths'', "multi-use path", or "Class III bikewa ...
s, including one along the Charles River, and the Linear Park
A linear park is a type of park that is significantly longer than it is wide. These linear parks are strips of public land running along canals, rivers, streams, defensive walls, electrical lines, or highways and shorelines. Examples of linear p ...
connecting the Minuteman Bikeway
The Minuteman Bikeway is a 10-mile (16-kilometre) paved multi-use rail trail located in the Greater Boston area of Massachusetts. It runs from Bedford to Alewife station, at the northern end of the Red Line in Cambridge, passing through the tow ...
at Alewife with the Somerville Community Path
The Somerville Community Path is a paved rail trail in Somerville, Massachusetts, running from Massachusetts Avenue to Lowell Street via Davis Square. Opened in segments between 1985 and 2015, it follows part of the former Fitchburg Cutoff rail ...
. A connection to Watertown is under construction. Bike parking is common and there are bike lanes on many streets, although concerns have been expressed regarding the suitability of many of the lanes. On several central MIT streets, bike lanes transfer onto the sidewalk. Cambridge bans cycling on certain sections of sidewalk where pedestrian traffic is heavy.
While ''Bicycling Magazine
''Bicycling'' is a cycling magazine published by Hearst in Easton, Pennsylvania.
__TOC__
History
''Bicycling'' started in 1961 as ''Northern California Cycling Association Newsletter'', a four-page mimeographed newsletter (8 ½ x 14) started b ...
'' in 2006 rated Boston as one of the worst cities in the nation for bicycling, it has given Cambridge honorable mention as one of the best and was called by the magazine "Boston's Great Hope". Boston has since then followed the example of Cambridge and made considerable efforts to improve bicycling safety and convenience.
Cambridge has an official bicycle committee. The LivableStreets Alliance, headquartered in Cambridge, is an advocacy group for bicyclists, pedestrians, and walkable neighborhoods.
Walking
Walking is a popular activity in Cambridge. In 2000, among US cities with more than 100,000 residents, Cambridge had the highest percentage of commuters who walked to work. Cambridge's major historic squares have changed into modern walking neighborhoods, including traffic calming
Traffic calming uses physical design and other measures to improve safety for motorists, pedestrians and cyclists. It has become a tool to combat speeding and other unsafe behaviours of drivers in the neighbourhoods. It aims to encourage safe ...
features based on the needs of pedestrians rather than of motorists.
Intercity
The Boston intercity bus and train stations at South Station
South Station, officially The Governor Michael S. Dukakis Transportation Center at South Station, is the largest railroad station and intercity bus terminal in Greater Boston and New England's second-largest transportation center after Logan In ...
, Boston, and Logan International Airport
General Edward Lawrence Logan International Airport , also known as Boston Logan International Airport and commonly as Boston Logan, Logan Airport or simply Logan, is an international airport that is located mostly in East Boston and partial ...
in East Boston
East Boston, nicknamed Eastie, is a neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts annexed by the city of Boston in 1637. Neighboring communities include Winthrop, Revere, and Chelsea. It is separated from the Boston neighborhood of Charlestown and d ...
, are accessible by subway. The Fitchburg Line rail service from Porter Square connects to some western suburbs. Since October 2010, there has also been intercity bus service between Alewife Station
Alewife station is a Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) intermodal transit station in the North Cambridge neighborhood of Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is the northwest terminal of the rapid transit Red Line (part of the MBTA subw ...
(Cambridge) and New York City.
Police department
In addition to the Cambridge Police Department, the city is patrolled by the Fifth (Brighton) Barracks of Troop H of the Massachusetts State Police
The Massachusetts State Police (MSP) is an agency of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts' Executive Office of Public Safety and Security, responsible for criminal law enforcement and traffic vehicle regulation across the state. As of 10/4/2022, it ...
. Owing, however, to proximity, the city also practices functional cooperation with the Fourth (Boston) Barracks of Troop H, as well. The campuses of Harvard and MIT are patrolled by the Harvard University Police Department and MIT Police Department
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology Police Department (MIT Police, formerly MIT Campus Patrol) is the police agency charged with providing law enforcement to the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The 168-acre (68.0 ha) c ...
, respectively.
Fire department
The city of Cambridge is protected by the Cambridge Fire Department. Established in 1832, the CFD operates eight engine companies, four ladder companies, one rescue company, and two paramedic squad companies from eight fire stations located throughout the city. The Acting Chief is Gerard Mahoney.
Emergency medical services (EMS)
The city of Cambridge receives emergency medical services
Emergency medical services (EMS), also known as ambulance services or paramedic services, are emergency services that provide urgent pre-hospital treatment and stabilisation for serious illness and injuries and transport to definitive care. ...
from PRO EMS, a privately contracted ambulance service.
Public library services
Further educational services are provided at the Cambridge Public Library. The large modern main building was built in 2009, and connects to the restored 1888 Richardson Romanesque building. It was founded as the private Cambridge Athenaeum in 1849 and was acquired by the city in 1858, and became the Dana Library. The 1888 building was a donation of Frederick H. Rindge.
Sister cities and twin towns
Cambridge's sister cities
A sister city or a twin town relationship is a form of legal or social agreement between two geographically and politically distinct localities for the purpose of promoting cultural and commercial ties.
While there are early examples of inter ...
with active relationships are:
* Coimbra
Coimbra (, also , , or ) is a city and a municipality in Portugal. The population of the municipality at the 2011 census was 143,397, in an area of .
The fourth-largest urban area in Portugal after Lisbon, Porto, and Braga, it is the largest cit ...
, Portugal (1982)
* Gaeta, Italy (1982)
* Tsukuba
is a city located in Ibaraki Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 244,528 in 108,669 households and a population density of 862 persons per km². The percentage of the population aged over 65 was 20.3%. The total ar ...
, Japan (1983)
* San José Las Flores, Chalatenango, San José Las Flores, El Salvador (1987)
* Yerevan, Armenia (1987)
* Galway, Ireland (1997)
* Les Cayes, Haiti (2014)
Cambridge has ten additional inactive sister city relationships:
* Dublin, Ireland (1983)
* Ischia, Italy (1984)
* Catania, Italy (1987)
* Kraków, Poland (1989)
* Florence, Italy (1992)
* Santo Domingo Oeste, Dominican Republic (2003)
* London Borough of Southwark, Southwark, England (2004)
* Yuseong District, Yuseong (Daejeon), Korea (2005)
* Haidian District, Haidian (Beijing), China (2005)
* Cienfuegos, Cuba (2005)
Notes
References
Citations
Sources
*
*
*
*
Cambridge article
by Rev. Edward Abbott in Volume 1, pages 305–358.
* Eliot, Samuel Atkins. ''A History of Cambridge, Massachusetts: 1630–1913''. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Cambridge Tribune, 1913.
*
* Paige, Lucius. ''History of Cambridge, Massachusettse: 1630–1877''. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Riverside Press, 1877.
* ''Survey of Architectural History in Cambridge: Mid Cambridge''. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Cambridge Historical Commission, 1967. .
* ''Survey of Architectural History in Cambridge: Cambridgeport''. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Cambridge Historical Commission, 1971. .
* ''Survey of Architectural History in Cambridge: Old Cambridge''. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Cambridge Historical Commission, 1973. .
* ''Survey of Architectural History in Cambridge: Northwest Cambridge''. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Cambridge Historical Commission, 1977. .
* ''Survey of Architectural History in Cambridge: East Cambridge'' (revised edition). Cambridge, Massachusetts: Cambridge Historical Commission, 1988.
*
*
External links
*
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The Innovation Trail
- History of invention in Cambridge and Boston
{{Authority control
Cambridge, Massachusetts,
1630 establishments in Massachusetts
Charles River
Cities in Middlesex County, Massachusetts
County seats in Massachusetts
Populated places established in 1630
Cities in Massachusetts