The Boston Freedom Trail

Boston is one of the few cities in the US that offer an ultimate historical experience. With its fascinating architecture and chic yet peaceful urban environment, this city of wonders will surely entice every discriminating tourist. “Founded in 1630, Boston is one of America’s oldest cities… and is the largest city in New England. [Boston] is often referred to as the “Cradle of Liberty” for its role in instigating the American Revolution in the late 18th century” (Bunker Hill College: 2011). “With more than 12 million annual visitors from across the country and around the globe, indeed it would be interesting to discover how Boston, a city of cultural history, persuades the diverse needs and expectations of today’s tourists (City of Boston: 2011). Currently, many of the younger generation prefer a more adventurous type of tourism as many of them find cultural history as unexciting and laid-back. As a result, many of the today’s cultural tourism sites have done some commodification, like making museums more interactive, to meet the younger market’s demands. Hence, this paper will explore how Boston’s historical freedom trail and its assets preserve and integrate Boston and America’s humble beginning, and how some of its assets lack thorough materials and commodification that are necessary to meet the demands of visitors who does not have knowledge about American history. On the positive side, several assets of the freedom trail incorporate modern commodification to bring back memories from the past in a very creative way that even foreign visitors and the younger generation will appreciate. This paper will also mention the other neighboring assets like Quincy market and Haymarket that somehow intensify the goal of the freedom trail, which is to promote and preserve Boston and New England’s cultural history.
Beginning the Trail For an international student who has a limited knowledge about the history of Boston, visiting the freedom

References: Bunker Hill Community College. About: Boston. Accessed: October 10, 2011 http://www.bhcc.mass.edu/inside/54 City of Boston. Visitors: Tourism in Boston. Accessed: October 10, 2011 http://www.cityofboston.gov/visitors/ Dunnahoo, Terry. 1994. Boston’s Freedom Trail. New York: Dillon Press. The Freedom Trail. About: The Freedom Trail. Accessed: October 10, 2011 http://www.thefreedomtrail.org/visitor/visitor.html