Beachin' it up in Revere :))

       On the first week of programming, I had the pleasure of starting the summer off at Revere Beach. Revere beach is just outside of Boston, next to the twins of Winthrop and East Boston. This is a very big beach, but that also means there are more activities to do. Each day of our programming we did something different. As a group we did things like fish, try to catch crabs and some sightseeing. People respected the beach for the most part, taking their trash with them instead of leaving it on the beach or in the water. As a group, we had done the same thing. 

Drawing in the sand at Revere Beach

As some of you may know, the Boston Harbor used to be one of the dirtiest harbors in the country because we would just pump our dump into the water. Doing this for so many years led to trash piling up on Spectacle Island. This is where trash from many towns and neighboring towns of Boston would put their trash, however it soon became a health hazard. It was shut down in 1959, but the trash remained. People wanted to turn it into a park or just a place people could go and get amazing views. The trash pile up stopped and they made some changes to the dump of an island. After the people got the okay to do the island over they used dirt from the Big Dig to fill it up. Now when you go to Spectacle and walk along the dirt paths, thank the Big Dig. There is still some trash below all of the dirt but you can't see it. The island grew in size as well, becoming the tallest island in the Harbor. 

Patrice Haney working on Spectacle Island last year.

Cleaning up our Harbor is extremely important if we want to stay healthy and prevent what happened so many years ago. Deer Island now helps keep Boston waters clean, but without it we would be surrounded by hazardous waters. Everybody just needs to do their part in picking up trash on beaches and not throwing trash or waste in our harbor. Having clean waters allows people to swim, fish and go out on boats because it is safe. As David Coffin always said, "back in the day if you were to go into the Boston Harbor, you would need a tetanus shot."

The Boston Harbor