Celebrate New Year's Day on Prospect Hill

[ron_newman]

Every New Year's Day, the Somerville Historic Preservation Commission celebrates the January 1, 1776 raising of the First American Flag on Prospect Hill.

At 11:30 am, "George Washington" on horseback leads a short parade from the City Hall concourse to Prospect Hill Park. The main event starts at noon, featuring songs, readings, short speeches, military re-enactors (both Colonial and British), and refreshments (usually donuts, coffee, hot chocolate, and cider). I've enjoyed this event for many years and encourage all of you to attend it too.

In some years, the city has invited the public to climb the tower at the end of the ceremony. I don't know if it will be possible this year, since the tower has been undergoing some repairs.

To reach Prospect Hill from West Somerville, take the #87 bus to Union Square, then walk up Stone Avenue. Or take the #80 or #88 or #90 bus to McGrath Highway, and walk up Greenville Street or Prospect Hill Avenue to the park.

Here is the city's official press release about the event.

Comments

[pekmez.livejournal.com]

Not only was it not possible for the public to climb the tower, it wasn't possible for any flag-raisers to climb the tower (at least, not without breaking safety rules
the city wasn't going to break!) The flagpole has apparently been inacessible for some time (and the flag atop it has not been able to be raised or lowered).

The flag-raising ceremony today was amusingly anachronistic -- in the presence of the re-enactors, a giant Grand Union Flag was raised for the ceremony on the tippy top of the city's tallest ladder fire truck (according to a firefighter who was there, they were originally going to try to get to the actual flagpole using the ladder, but couldn't get the angle of the ladder right to do so while the truck remained in the street.)

[ron_newman]

This event was too long, given the weather -- sunny but very cold and windy. The city should consider shortening it next year.

The current flag has been atop the tower so long that the upper-left corner is no longer easily recognizable as a Union Jack. The blue has faded, leaving only the red and white.

[wintahill.livejournal.com]

If only the city would use the new CPA funds from the tax payers and the state to fix up this historic monument. Is that not a big part of what we were told the Community Preservation Act funds would be used for?

[vonelftinhaus.livejournal.com]

Were any part if not all of the Community Preservation Act funds used for this project or were funds pulled from another source for this? I am just curious because 1) you would want to start/finish this type of work once you knew you had all the funding and 2) complete said project before the harsh weather approaches.

[ron_newman]

The first round of CPA funds have not yet been disbursed, but the mayor made it pretty clear that this monument would be a priority. I sure hope so. It's the main reason I voted for the CPA.

re: CPA funding

[pekmez.livejournal.com]

I believe that CPA funding for Somerville is just becoming available now for the first time. I haven't followed super closely, but my recollection is that first we voted to pass the CPA (was that in Nov 2013?), and then (last spring, maybe?) they had a process to select the CPA committee members who would get to allocate the CPA money, and this fall the CPA committee took proposals to distribute the first batch of funds to projects in the public space, historic preservation, etc categories who applied. They are holding hearings on all the proposals this month, and then the ones that actually get the funding will be notified and the funding will be available later in 2015.

The ceremony mentioned that they intend to use the CPA funding to complete major repairs and restoration on the tower this year, but I think that the list of CPA funded projects has not yet been officially finalized.