The Norman B. Leventhal Walk to the Sea / Scollay Square & Government Center

The Norman B. Leventhal Walk to the Sea, also, Scollay Square and Government Center. . , The Norman B. Leventhal Walk to the Sea , The Walk to the Sea encompasses four centuries of Boston history. Beginning at the State House on Beacon Hill, overlooking Boston's ancient Common, the Walk passes among historic landmarks and skyscrapers. The Walk crosses ground that, centuries earlier, was not ground at all but an active harbor. Boston's history is tied to the sea, whose smells and sounds once pervaded the town. the Walk from summit to sea, spanning one mile and descending a hundred feet, brings that history to life., Mayor Thomas Menino dedicated the Norman B. Leventhal Walk to the Sea in 2008. For more information, explore The Norman B. Leventhal Map Center at the Boston Public Library (www.maps.bpl.org)., Scollay Square and Government Center , The Scollay Square neighborhood stood here until the 1960s. Its colorful, Victorian buildings, bearing large painted advertisements, originally teemed with shoppers and theatergoers., By the mid-20th century, however, this warren of 22 streets had become seedy. Scollay Square's theaters became burlesque houses surrounded by bars and tattoo parlors that attracted sailors on leave., Eventually, public opinion censured the lively squalor, and Scollay Square became a candidate for urban renewal., Its buildings were razed and replaced by the "superblocks" of Government Center, where by 1969, a monumental new City Hall anchored a vast 10-acre plaza. Bostonians still debate the consequences of urban renewal, but the bold rebuilding reversed the decline in Boston's fortune that occurred during the first half of the 20th century.