June 18–22, 2003, will be a beautiful time to visit Boston, often called the “capitol of New England.” Average high temperatures at this time of year are 76° F.; lows, 59°. The hotel for the Annual Meeting, the Boston Park Plaza, is located at 64 Arlington Street within a few blocks of the Boston Commons, the public gardens, the theater district, the Newbury Street shops, and easy access to the rest of Boston. A guide to Boston sights and restaurants, compiled by our Boston Local Arrangements Committee, will be in your registration package.
Boston's history embodies the beginning of America as an independent nation. Boston was founded by the Puritans in 1630 as an autonomous chartered colony of the Massachusetts Bay Company. It came under royal authority only when its charter was nullified, at which time the unrest that was to erupt into the American Revolution began to build.
The city has maintained its colonial heritage, and there is much history to be seen while walking around the streets. There is, for example, a famous walk called the “Freedom Trail” (thefree-domtrail.org). When you've grown tired of long hours of sitting, spend two or three hours following the red brick trail, which visits sixteen sites covering 250 years of significant history. You can also walk the “Black Heritage Trail” (nps.gov) in the heart of the Beacon Hill neighborhood. This 1.6–mile walk includes fifteen pre-Civil War structures relating to the history of Boston's African-American community, including the African Meeting House, the oldest standing African-American church in the United States; and Augustus Saint-Gaudens' memorial to the Massachusetts 54th Regiment, a Union Army regiment of free African-Americans, and their leader, Col. Robert Gould Shaw.
Boston is a city of culture, art, and science. Its museums include the Museum of Fine Arts, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the New Museum at the John F. Kennedy Library, the Children's Museum, and the MIT Museum (which houses the world's largest collection of holographic art). Faneuil Hall/Quincy Market is a square of four buildings that house a great sampling of dining, shops, craft peddlers, jugglers, and musicians.
Boston offers far too many sights of interest to list here. Rather than list my own perhaps eccentric choices, I refer you to the plethora of attractions available on the Web. A few sites that I found particularly helpful to the potential Boston explorer: (my favorite); ; and . At the latter, you can type in dates and get a list of events going on in Boston and some surrounding cities.
Speaking of surrounding cities, one of my eccentric
Randi Finger, Ph.D., is a child/adolescent and adult psychoanalyst in private practice in Washington, D.C., and an instructor for the Washington Psychoanalytic Institute. She co-chairs the APsaA's Committee on Outreach for Scientific and Educational Programs.
choices (sorry, I couldn't resist) is in Lowell, Mass.: the New England Quilt Museum, with a permanent collection of historic quilts and temporary shows of contemporary fabric art. It's about a forty-minute drive from downtown, or you can take the train at Boston's North Station to Lowell's Gallagher Terminal, from which shuttles go to downtown Lowell every thirty minutes. Consider visiting Concord and Lexington, where “the shot heard 'round the world” was fired.
Boston, like many large cities with an extensive theater life, offers tickets at discount prices. “BosTix” in Faneuil Hall (open Tuesday through Saturday from 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. and Sunday from 11:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.) sells half-price tickets for that day's shows.
Sightseers can save 50 percent on many attractions and avoid lines by getting a CityPass (). It is good for nine days and gets you into six museums: Museum of Science, New England Aquarium, Skywalk Observatory, Museum of Fine Arts, Harvard Museum of Natural History, and the JFK Library and Museum.
The Boston Local Arrangements Committee is co-chaired by Stephanie Smith of the Boston Psychoanalytic Society and Institute (617-731-6614) and Maida Greenberg of the Psychoanalytic Institute of New England (617-244-2813). Societies that would like to arrange a lunch or dinner for their members while in Boston should contact either co-chair to discuss details. If you are new to the meetings and would like some help with registration, program planning, or meeting people, contact Joan Lynch (847-864-3738).