training field preservation
News
We’re happy to report that the Browne Fund of the City of Boston has awarded CPS a $50,000 grant for historic signage in the Charlestown Training Field. And we need your help.
We plan to hire a team -- including a professional historian and a landscape architect -- to research, write, design, fabricate and install four to five interpretive panels like the ones you see in Boston's historic burying grounds.
We're looking for stories, photos, maps and other information to give to the team to help them bring the Training Field to life, from its earliest days to the present. To contribute, you can:
- write CPS, Box 290201, Charlestown, MA 02129
- Call 617.241.7500 and leave a message on the answering machine
- Email info@charlestownpreservation.org
The panels will educate people about the Training Field's rich history as pastureland, militia training ground, schoolyard, site of political rallies and much-loved urban park. They’ll also cover the significance of its Civil War monument and the defeat of many threats to its existence.
We'll keep you informed about our progress over the winter as we publish a request for proposals, choose consultants and start the research, writing and design process. There’ll be a public meeting in the spring to update the entire Charlestown community on the project.
As always, thank you for your help and support of your preservation society!
The Soldiers and Sailors Monument 1872-73
Civil War Commemorative Statue
The Training Field is Charlestown’s beloved “outdoor room,” and the Soldiers and Sailors Monument is its centerpiece.
Today this massive granite statue is looking better than it has for years, thanks to a professional conservation effort sponsored by Charlestown Preservation Society and completed in August 2008.
Preservation came just in time: conservators discovered that the mortar holding the three main figures together had disintegrated, putting the whole statue in danger of collapse. Besides repointing with mortar to match the original, the conservators cleaned and repaired the granite following the Secretary of the Interior’s standards for preservation.
The statue was created by Victorian sculptor Martin Milmore (You’ll find his name on the book at the soldier’s feet). Milmore who was born in Ireland, educated at Boston Latin School and apprenticed in Charlestown, is also responsible for commemorative sculptures in the Boston Common and Forest Hills Cemetery.
When the scaffolding came down last month, the Training Field statue positively gleamed. The tree growing out of the top is gone, along with weeds, moss and algae. Original details are again visible: you can see the veins in the soldiers’ hands and the stars on Victory’s robes.
To make sure quality maintenance will continue, CPS has established an endowment for the statue through the City of Boston’s Adopt-a-Statue Fund.
Many thanks to those who helped fund the statue conservation, including the George B. Henderson Foundation, the Convention Center Authority Community Partnership Fund, the City of Boston Small Changes Program, and more than 70 generous Charlestown residents and businesses.
Ivan Myjer of Building and Monument Conservation was the project conservator, along with the Joseph Gnazzo Company, preservation masonry specialists, and Tree Specialists of Holliston, which trimmed nearby trees to increase sunlight and discourage plant growth.