Beneath the Streets of Boston: Building America's First Subway - Hardcover

McKendry, Joe

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1567922848 ISBN 13: 9781567922844

Publisher: David R. Godine, Publisher, 2004

Synopsis

Beckoning readers to explore the territory beneath Boston’s streets, Joe McKendry explores a century-old world when Beantown designed and created the country’s first subway. In stunning artwork and through a fascinating narrative, you will enter the subterranean realm of workers who dug miles of tunnels by hand. Using pick and shovels to create new routes, you’ll discover how these workers burrowed deep below Boston Harbor, under Beacon Hill and the Old State House, and built the Longfellow Bridge to carry the trains over the Charles River to the center of Cambridge. You’ll read lively first-hand accounts of the turn-of-the-century public’s perception of the underground public transportation, including their fears (expressed fantastically through the gruesome image of a fanged and tentacled “subway microbe”), and learn how the system served as a model for the rest of the country in its ability to relieve traffic, mitigate congestion (which was even more severe a hundred years ago than today) and get people anywhere they wanted to go for only a nickel.

About this title

About the Author

Joe McKendry is a painter and illustrator whose work has appeared in over 100 publications worldwide, including the New York Times, the London Times, and Vanity Fair, as well as two books, Beneath the Streets of Boston: Building America’s First Subway (2005) and One Times Square: A Century of Change at the Crossroads of the World (2012). A native of Maynard, Massachusetts, Mr. McKendry teaches painting and illustration at the Rhode Island School of Design.

From the Back Cover

Joe McKendry's Beneath the Streets of Boston offers a concise yet detailed history of this country's oldest underground system. Building his magnificent watercolor illustrations from a combination of old photographs, architectural drawings, and even newspaper clippings, he has created a coherent and convincing picture of 23 years of construction that significantly improved life above ground for the residents of one of America's most beautiful cities. -- David Macaulay

From the Inside Flap

Beckoning readers to examine the territory beneath Boston's streets, Joe McKendry explores a century-old world when the city took the initiative to design and create the country's first subway. In stunning artwork and through a fascinating (and historically accurate) narrative of Beantown's first "Big Dig," you will enter the subterranean real of workers who dug miles of tunnels by hand. Using picks and shovels to create new routes, you'll discover how these workers burrowed deep below Boston Harbor, under Beacon Hill and the Old State House, and built the Charlestown Bridge to carry trains over the Charles River to the center of Charlestown. You'll read lively first-hand press accounts of the turn-of-the-century ideas about underground public transportation, including both the hopes and fears (expressed graphically through a gruesome image of a fanged and tentacled "subway microbe') of an engaged citizenry. You'll see how the system served as a model for the rest of the country, a prototype urban transportation system that actually relieved traffic, mitigated congestion (which was even more severe a hundred years ago than today) and got people where they wanted to go for only a nickel.

Reviews

Grade 4-7–New England history buffs and those interested in the origins of mass transport will welcome this look at the beginnings of America's first subway. Recounting the problems of Boston's traffic congestion (wrought by the city's burgeoning population in the late 1800s), McKendry tells the story of how, in 1894, the Boston Transit Commission won its hard-fought battle to begin construction on the four-pronged public transportation system known today as the T. The text is clear and well written, and is supplemented by copies of relevant newspaper articles about the triumphs and tribulations that the project faced, as well as by several boxed inserts that describe the more personal aspects of the project, e.g., the discovery and relocation of 900 dead bodies. Sepia tones in the realistic watercolor illustrations, as well as in the maps and precise technical drawings, help to maintain a serious tone. The paintings convey the sense of story, while the drawings provide specific details. Both are equally well executed and contribute to the overall understanding of the text. The endpapers, which feature copies of actual subway signs, give another view of history. This title should be a welcome addition to New England libraries as well as to those collections that frequently circulate titles such as David Macaulay's Underground (1976) and Building Big (2000, both Houghton).–Nancy Menaldi-Scanlan, LaSalle Academy, Providence, RI
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Gr. 3-5. New York's subway has been featured in several children's books honoring the system's 2004 centennial. Here readers will discover that Boston's subway preceded New York's by seven years. In a narrative as densely wallpapered with visuals as a Victorian-era parlor, McKendry provides insights into the worsening congestion in 1890s Boston, and highlights residents' resistance to the proposal: "I expect to be a long time underground when I am dead, but while I live I want to travel on earth, not under it." A half-subterrenean, half-elevated plan was eventually carried out, documented here in sepia-toned watercolors (many modeled on archival photographs), reprints of newspaper articles, diagrams, and discussions of the methods used by subway-building "sandhogs." Source notes and captions would have been useful, and McKendry's explanations are not as clear as those in David Macaulay's Underground (1983). Still, this will draw a large and fascinated regional audience, and the book's themes of urban development and transportation history can easily be more broadly applied. Jennifer Mattson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: David R. Godine, Publisher
• Publication date: 2004
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1567922848
• ISBN 13: 9781567922844
• Binding: Hardcover
• Illustrator: McKendry Joe
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 48