Louisburg Square

Every city has areas which are despair of the modern-minded civic engineer. Boston is no exception, for Beacon Hill has long and stoutly resisted attempts to remodel it in the prevailing fashion. At the center of this placid conservatism lies Louisburg Square. A fences oblong of greenery flanked by two rows of red brick Bulfinch Houses, the square lies between Pinckney and Mount Vernon Streets on the river side of Beacon Hill.

Rounding the corner of Pinckney Street, one soon sees that any changes of the last century are little more than a veneer covering a Louisburg over a hundred years old. The gleaming brass nameplates of the houses might have been nailed on yesterday, but the houses themselves were all built before 1850. The street is paved--but the old cobblestones still show through a dip in the pavement at the west end. The lights which once burned whale oil now use electricity but the modern bulbs, without globes, are fixed into the old lamps. There are not many lights, and at night the center green becomes a mass of black surrounded by a glinting curlicue iron fence and the red brick sidewalk that is found throughout the Hill.

To guard the character of the Square, an Association of Louisburg Residents who own the Square has struggled with a slow infiltration of moderninity from the quicker-moving surrounding streets. The first house was built in the Square in 1834, and a scant ten years later, the Association held its first annual meeting to "enlarge and adorn the said Square for the material andvantage and enjoyment of said Parties." For that first meeting there were seven Proprietors, the number swelling since then to twenty-six.

Since that first meeting the Association has plodded on with its work in an obvious reluctance to rush through any progressive measure. In 1850, the Proprietors voted to embellish the center plot with a statue of Columbus to balance a gift of a smuggled Florentine statue of Aristides in the Just. A committee was charged to find, "with as little delay as possible," a suitable statue. A short two years later they reported success and now the statues stand guard at each end of the green. In past days, Italians from the North End would descend once a year upon the Square to crown Columbus with a wreath. Not to be out-done, the M.I.T. students, who had a club house at 6 Louisburg Square, trussed Aristides up in a cup and gown. The Association took a dim view of Aristides' garb. Now the green is fenced and only residents have keys to the gates.

When a small, villainous boy hopped the fence and made off with Columbus' forefinger which he later threw into the Charles, the Association solemnly passed a resolution against small boys. It began, "Resolved: that no boy or boys be allowed ..."

As Beacon Hill's population increased, Louisburg Square suffered a constant, if mild invasion of its private property. Contemptuous gas buggies parked in the space that was reserved for Louisburg residents. The residents were forced to recognize the new motor fad and resignedly hired a policeman to ticket illegal parkers. At times the trespassers have proved so numerous that the Proprietors have put up gates across each end of the Square to keep out inquisitive Boston.

Since the old days, the Square has slowly been dropping its guard against modern Boston. There are now may apartments on the North side filled with solid professional men and their families. But the past is sometimes still vividly near. The carollers still past on the Hill on Christmas Eve, and Louisburg residents still put candles out for them. But where it lives most vividly is in the minds he has asked about the Square, Proprietor said when he was asked about the Square, "I'd like to help you, but I don't really know anything about Louisburg Square--I only moved in ten years ago."