HIST/ ENVS 1515 The Just City: Race, Class, and Communities/Nature, Environment, and Infrastructure

Something like a mini-DPLA for Massachusetts, this site draws together records from archives and historical societies all over Massachusetts. Searchable by place name, subject, title, or creator.

Aggregates digital collections from around the U.S. and offers excellent tools to discover and explore them. Focuses on 17th to 21st centuries.

Interface in English. Content in English or other languages.
Digitized collections from the Library of Congress, includes manuscripts, books, photos, maps, audio recordings, and more. Strongest between the 17th and 21st centuries. Content dating back to B.C.E.
Open Access.

Information on ordering building plans through the Boston City Archives. The City Archives holds blueprints, architectural drawings, and building inspector's reports from 1879 to 1969.

The nearly 2,000 black & white photographs, shot by Nishan Bichajian, assistant to Professor Kepes, document the Boston urban environment during the mid-1950s prior to urban renewal.

Collects materials related to the university's history, as well as materials that reflect the university's urban mission and strong support of community service, notably in collections of records related to urban planning, social welfare, social action, alternative movements, community organizations and local history related to neighboring communities.

Interface and content in English.
The Assessing Online application brings direct access for taxpayers, homeowners, real estate and legal professionals as well as business owners to property parcel data including assessed value, location, ownership and tax information for each piece of property in the city.
Open Access.

The BPDA GIS Department has made many changes to make it easier for neighbors and makers of all kinds to collaborate on the improvement, extension and applications of the city's representation of itself.
Open Access.

The City of Boston Archives preserves and provides access to Boston’s municipal archival records. Much diverse historical material.

Interface and content in English.
Building permits contain valuable information about a building from the day it was built to the present, such as original owner, architect, builder, and subsequent residents.
Open Access

Interface and material predominately in English.
Provides a searchable database of the fire insurance maps published by the Sanborn Map Company housed in the collections of the Geography and Map Division. The Sanborn maps are arranged by state, then city and release data. Currently there are over 25,000 sheets from over 3000 city sets online. Bulk of the content comes from the 1880s to the 1950s.
Open Access.

Home of the Boston Public Library map collection. Their holdings, some digitized, extend from the 15th century–present. The bulk of their digital copies are available through the Digital Commonwealth (under Broad Digital Collections).

Interface and content in English.
This guide exists to gather together resources to help in the study of the former towns that make up Boston. Material on the neighborhoods as they exist today is also presented.
Open Access.

Interface and content in English.
Get to know Boston's unique neighborhoods through overviews, development projects, planning initiatives, events, research, news, and more.
Open Access

Global Boston is a digital project chronicling the history of immigration to greater Boston since the early nineteenth century. Examining different time periods and ethnic groups, the site features capsule histories, photographs, maps, documents, and oral histories documenting the history of a city where immigrants have long been a vital force in shaping economic, social and political life. To get started, try clicking on the Eras of Migration box below to explore different time periods in the region’s history.

This page lists Massachusetts current and historical newspapers, news publications, news websites, and local interest magazines and indexes thereto that are freely available online. The focus is more on historical newspapers, but includes some that are current. If you are looking for a current newspaper that does not appear here, do an internet search under the name of the newspaper or the town name and word newspaper to find it, or visit the "Multi-Town Links" in the Massachusetts City & Town Newspapers section below. Many of these digitization projects are still in process so dates may be different than posted.
Open Access

Catalog of news content from WHDH, Cambridge Community Television, WCVB, and WGBH from the 1960s–1990s. Some is available streaming.

Digitized versions of video, audio, and searchable transcripts of the WGBH media library and archives.

Interface and content in English.
Collections related to housing, community development, and land use and planning activism in Boston
Open Access

Interface and content in English.
Over 4,000 archival resources from Boston-area archives that narrate the long history of school desegregation in Boston.
Open Access.

Interface and content in English.
40+ audio and video interviews of current and former residents of Lower Roxbury.
Open Access.

Interface and content primarily in English and Chinese.
Over 7,000 records from the Chinese Progressive Association that document Asian American activism and community in Boston.
Open Access.