WALK IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF WORCESTER'S REVOLUTIONARIES

From Worcester’s Meetinghouse, near the site of today’s City Hall to what we now know as Lincoln Square, Worcester patriots led Massachusetts and later the country toward Revolution. Auspiciously in September 1774, patriots from across the region assembled along Main Street to reject rule under Parliament’s Massachusetts Government Act, close the county courts, and shame their loyalist elite neighbors. Now you can join Worcester Historical Museum and walk in their footsteps, as they forced wellborn local defenders of royal government to walk a gauntlet of common men intent on defending their liberty or as they spread their revolutionary ideas between the town’s taverns and meetinghouse. Read more About Us

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Worcester’s Police Headquarters is located where Timothy Bigelow’s house and forge stood. In this house, on the banks of the Mill Brook that ran through the town, Bigelow not only lived but worked as a blacksmith. In 1767 he was awarded a license to…

In the 1770s Worcester had at least 10 taverns. Taverns provided food, drink, and lodging. They were also gathering places where men discussed farming, local business, and politics, and formed the hubs of political and social networks. Some were…

In 1755 the town of Worcester sent its minister, Thaddeus Maccarty, to Cambridge. His mission was to observe the new graduates of Harvard College and to offer to one of them the position of teacher. Maccarty, himself a Harvard alumnus, listened to a…

The Heywood Tavern, located at the site of the current deadhorse hill restaurant, was owned and operated by Daniel Heywood, whose family had operated the tavern since 1722. Its clientele was mostly Tory in outlook. It was one of the oldest taverns in…

Boston-born Thomas Hancock was one of the wealthiest merchants in Massachusetts. In 1744 he adopted his 8-year old nephew, John. Twenty years later, when Thomas died, young John inherited the estate which included Thomas’s property in Worcester. John…

Worcester’s Rural Cemetery, located on Grove Street, was not a burial ground during the Revolution but became the final resting place for many who either participated in or observed the events of 1774 and after. Much of the land had originally been…

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