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A publication of neigborhoods.net

Other water resources

Ocean

Rivers

When a growing and thirsty Boston began sucking Jamaica Pond dry in the mid-1800s, it turned to Lake Cochituate to provide the city's water supplies. Even that wasn't enough, and greater Boston eventually flooded four towns in the western part of the state to create the Quabbin - the country's largest drinking-water reservoir. Today, Lake Cochituate and its surrounding parkland is sort of MetroWest's Central Park - a place of respite amidst the surburban sprawl. Indirectly, it still serves as a water supply: Natick gets much of its drinking water from wells near the lake.

• Cochituate State Park
• Moss Animals Invade Lake Cochituate - Attack of the microsopic sponge creatures.
• Attack of the Mutant Giant Madagascar Cockroaches - Released by an Army research lab on the shores of the lake. Is there a theme developing here?
• Lake Cochituate Watershed - Variety of links related to the health of the lake environment.
• Early Boston Water System - Includes a description of the lake's transformation into a reservoir.

Jamaica Pond was Boston's first reservoir - bringing water to downtown via a series of wooden pipes. When firemen needed water, they'd use a special tool to punch a hole in the pipe. When done, they'd put in what they called a "fireplug" to stop up the hole. (We don't know, but we suspect you'd get towed if you parked in front of a fireplug even then.)

Today, Jamaica Pond is a great place to go jogging, rent a boat (sail or row) or take in a weekend concert.

• Jamaica Plain parks and ponds

We're going to let you in on a little secret, if you promise not to tell anyone. Concord and Thoreau had a love-hate relationship. What Thoreau saw as a conscientous act of civil disobediance (getting himself thrown in jail for refusing to pay a poll tax in protest of the war with Mexico), other Concordians saw as attention-grabbing by a smart-ass. Perhaps that explains why Concord put its town dump right across the street from Thoreau's beloved Walden Pond - and right next to the trailer park that they let somebody build there, too.

Meanwhile, his supporters across the country fight a never-ending struggle to get the state to limit public access to Walden Pond - can't have the teeming masses despoiling the reverent quietude of the place (and never mind the commuter trains the rumble by every hour or so).

• Walden - Thoreau's masterpiece.
• Walden Pond photos
• Walden Pond State Reservation