A few nice is real estate a good investment in 2015 images I found:
Jackson-Square – Jamaica Plain MA – Centre St Bridge c1960
Image by clamshack
From the Jamaica Plain Historical Society.
"Jackson Square – Origin of the Name"
By Richard Heath
STONY BROOK divided Roxbury into east and west for over 250 years. During that time the principle highway between the business and civic district of Dudley Square and the village center of Jamaica Plain was Centre Street. Since at least 1662 Centre St crossed Stony Brook over a wooden plank bridge near Heath Lane (a cart path to the Heath Farm; in 1825 it became Heath Street). That junction was called Central Bridge but most people until the turn of the 20th century called it Hog’s Bridge.[i]
That intersection is today known as Jackson Square, a familiar crossroads at Columbus Ave. and Centre Street, but no public record has been found to determine who the Square was named after. Hog’s Bridge was used up to end of the 19th century so it is a 20th century appellation.
It may be that the Square was named for General Henry Jackson, one of the three Revolutionary War military leaders from Boston[ii]. General William Heath defended Roxbury during the Siege of Boston and afterwards was ordered to the strategic Hudson River command after Benedict Arnold defected to guard that crucial waterway from 1777 to 1783. Heath Square at the nearby junction of Heath St and Parker Street is named after the general on land he once owned. General Joseph Warren was killed at the Battle of Bunker Hill. A statue of him stood at Warren and Regent Streets for 62 years[iii]. So it would seem appropriate that when Columbus Avenue was extended to Franklin Park in 1895 that the new crossroad would be named after General Henry Jackson.
II.
Henry Jackson. Courtesy of New England Historic Genealogical Society. Engraved from a pastel drawing done in 1777. Appeared in the April 1892 edition of New England Historical and Genealogical Register.
HENRY JACKSON was born a British subject and died an American citizen.[iv] His life was in two parts: soldier and civic leader who participated in the rebuilding of Boston after the war. Jackson was born on Oct 19. 1747. His father Joseph was a distiller and his home was more than likely on Essex Street. The center of the distillery business in 18th century Boston was at Essex and South Streets. In 1794 there were thirty distilleries on Essex and South Streets. Ships tied up at the South Street wharf to unload grain and barrels of West Indian molasses.[v] Henry Knox’s father William mastered one of those ships. Henry Knox was Jackson’s lifelong friend. Knox was born 1750; his house was on Sea Street (today Atlantic Avenue) at the foot of Essex directly overlooking the South Bay[vi].
Jackson’s father was a life- long military man. In 1738 Joseph joined the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company in which he served until the outbreak of the Revolutionary War. (He was on duty with William Heath of Roxbury who joined the Ancients at the age of 17 in 1754). Joseph died at the age of 84 in 1790. The Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company gave him a military funeral; he was buried at Kings Chapel burial ground.
Henry Jackson was an officer in the First Corp Cadets. The First Corps of Cadets was formed in 1741 as bodyguards for the Royal Governor (the first was Gov William Shirley). After the tumult and in the vacuum of the British evacuation, Jackson reorganized the remaining members and recruited other soldiers to form the 16th Massachusetts Regiment called the Boston Regiment in May of 1777. He was appointed colonel of the regiment and ordered by General Washington to join his army outside Philadelphia. The Boston Regiment fought in the battle of Monmouth (1778), Quaker Hill, RI (1778) and Springfield NJ in 1780. The Regiment was at Yorktown and then joined General Henry Knox in recovering New York City from British occupation after the Treaty of Paris in 1783. Jackson retired from active duty when the Continental Army was dissolved on June 29, 1784.
In June of 1783 at Newburgh New York he was among the group of army officers including Major General Heath to form the Massachusetts Society of the Cincinnati; he was treasurer of it until his death. Criticized by some in the young nation as a new aristocracy in America, the Society was largely fraternal and benevolent in helping veterans and their families.
In the summer of 1784 Jackson, a lifelong bachelor, returned to Boston to stay at Mrs. Hatch’s fashionable boarding house at Common (Tremont) and Winter Streets, then a fairly rural part of the city opposite the Boston Common. He was called back into active duty in 1786 to suppress Shays Rebellion, a revolt by farmers, mechanics and small landowners hard hit by post war financial difficulties who sought state assistance for their debts. Jackson found the task unpleasant, had difficulty raising troops but considered the rebellion a noisy mob. After the revolt was quelled, came home and hung up his uniform. Jackson seemed to have played no active or ceremonial role in the celebrations of George Washington’s triumphant Boston visit from October 24 through October 28, 1789.[vii] He and Generals Knox and Heath were certainly at the great banquet held at Faneuil Hall on the Washington’s last night in the city. Washington stayed at Mrs. Ingersol’s boarding house at Common and Court Street a few short blocks from Jackson’s rooms; it could very well have been that he and his friend Henry Knox paid a quiet visit with their former commanding officer.
After the war Jackson managed the business and financial affairs of his close friend Henry Knox[viii] whom President Washington appointed as the first Secretary of War in 1785. This included lumber and shipping businesses but mainly the construction of Montpelier Knox’s’ grand hilltop mansion at Thomaston, Maine. In 1794 Congress authorized construction of six new frigates and Secretary of War Knox directed that Henry Jackson be appointed the government’s agent for the construction of the Constitution at Hartt’s Shipyard in Charlestown. Working with Edmund Hartt Jackson approved and signed off on all payments that totaled 2,000. The oak for the famed iron side hull came from Georgia and the masts from Windsor, Maine just east of Augusta. The ship was launched on Oct 27, 1797.
III.
Henry Jackson’s closest personal and professional relationship after the war until the end of his life was with the fascinating family of James and Hepzibah Swan.[ix]
Born Hepzibah Clarke in 1757 her father was a prosperous merchant. In spring of 1776 during the siege of Boston when many families fled the city[x], Henry Jackson and Henry Knox lived at her home on Rawson’s Lane (Bromfield Street) before both went off to the front lines: Knox directed construction of battlements and breastworks at Roxbury defended by General Heath’s troops before going on to become artillery commander of the Continental Army. Jackson raised a regiment that he commanded for the duration of the war.
In 1775 Hepzibah Clarke married James Swan one of the most colorful rogues of wartime and postwar Boston. Swan was born in Scotland and arrived in Boston in 1765 at the age of 34 and became friends with Henry Knox. Active with the Sons of Liberty he participated in the Boson Tea Party and served in the artillery with Knox when the British were driven out of Boston. During the war he took over government positions vacated by the British; he was secretary of the board of war for Massachusetts, adjutant general and legislator. With his wife’s wealth he bought the confiscated house and grounds of Stephen Greenleaf the last Royal High Sheriff on Common Street between West and Winter Streets. (On April 30, 1779 The General court passed the Conspiracy and Confiscation Act in which all property of “certain notorious conspirators” was seized and sold to benefit the Commonwealth. The Act listed each one by name.) Three daughters were born to the Swans between 1777 and 1782 and in 1783 a son was born. Swan was allegedly a privateer during the war; ship owners and masters authorized by Congress to harass, seize and profit from the captured cargo of British supply ships on the high seas.
Swan squandered his wife’s wealth from gambling and poor land investments and in 1788 he went to France to rebuild his fortune. Hepzibah and James Swan were both pro French; Mrs. Swan in particular was a devout Francophile all her life. During the war and they entertained French naval officers stationed at Newport who brought their ships to Boston for repair, refitting and supplies. It was these French officers, often noblemen, whom James Swan asked for assistance and political access in Paris. A remarkable financier, he reorganized French debt after the collapse of the monarchy and set up a lucrative trading company to purchase food, munitions and merchandise in America. His trusted American agent in Boston was Henry Jackson. Swan made a huge fortune and returned triumphantly to America in 1795. He landed at Philadelphia and was joined by Hepzibah who arranged to have his portrait painted by her new protégé Gilbert Stuart.
On his return to Boston James Swan sought to impress the merchant oligarchy by building a grand countryseat on Dudley Street in Dorchester not far from Royal Governor Shirley’s mansion. Swan had purchased the land in 1781 when he was adjutant general of the Commonwealth. It was a 60-acre estate with a house near the road that the State of Massachusetts had confiscated from Loyalist Nathaniel Hatch. Hatch and 1000 other Tories had fled with the British army to Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1776. The house and land was confiscated under the enabling legislation of 1779 and Swan bought the property for 18,000 pounds. Planned in large part in the French style by Mrs. Swan, she consulted with another protégé the architect Charles Bullfinch who is given attribution for the design of the most remarkable house of its time in the region. The mansion was set on a high earth berm facing east across Dorchester Bay. Completed in 1796, its signature architectural feature was a two story circular drawing room 32 feet in circumference with a domed ceiling. The bow was pulled out from two traditional Federal style wings and surrounded by a colonnade. Everyone called it the Round House and Mrs. Swan filled it with French furnishings; much of it appropriated by the republican French government from royal palaces and sold to Swan’s import company.[xi]
James Swan didn’t live in his great house long. His marriage was deteriorating (even the cosmopolitan Hepzibah Swan was tired of his infidelities), his fortune reduced and his merchant company was in trouble; in he returned to France in 1798 to rebuild his company and restore his finances. He never returned. Arrested in 1808 for non-payment of debts to his principle investor, he spent the remainder of his life in a very comfortable Paris prison. Almost under house arrest, James Swan was in no hurry to return home to the aristocratic Hepzibah and prison kept him away from creditors. He lived well, ate well and entertained the ladies in style for the next 22 years. The Marquis de Lafayette, however, refused to visit him. One wonders about the conversation he had with Mrs. Swan when he called on her at Dorchester in 1825. James Swan was freed in 1830 after a change in government but he was disoriented and apparently unable to adjust. He died in a Paris street a year later.
Henry Jackson was Mrs. Swan’s closest friend and confidant after 1798. His boarding house was a block away from Mrs. Swan’s house but he was one of the family there and at the Dorchester mansion. After 1798 Mrs. Swan settled into a luxurious and cosmopolitan life of the Boston merchant and political elite in which she played a prominent role for the rest of her life; leaving her city address for her country home in Dorchester on May 1st. Even before James Swan returned to Paris, Jackson was handling her business and financial affairs, something she could not depend on her husband to do.
Acting on behalf of the Swan family, in 1795, Jackson bought the town granary at Park St and Common Street from the town of Boston for 66. Mrs. Swan deeded the land to her daughters who sold the corner lot to the Trustees of the Park St. Church in 1809.[xii]
Mrs. Swan bought out two of the original investors in the largest and most far reaching real estate venture in postwar Boston when she became the only female member of the four person Mt Vernon Proprietors that acquired the John Singleton Copley pasture in 1796. It was subdivided into townhouse lots that became very valuable when the State House opened in 1798. Mrs. Swan built three houses on the land for her daughters at 13, 15 + 17 Chestnut Street (built in 1805 and 1807) and her own townhouse at 16 Chestnut Street in 1817. Jackson assessed the property and handled all financial transactions on all four homes each designed by Charles Bullfinch, who seemed now to be among the members of her salon.
Jackson managed the household affairs as well. He was very close to the daughters. He organized and managed the marriage of oldest daughter Hepzibah to Dr. John Howard in 1800 and in 1802 the wedding of Sarah Swan to William Sullivan. Mrs. Swan disapproved of her middle daughters fiancé John Turner Sargent (of the Roxbury Sargents; Lucious Manlius Sargent was his brother). Yet despite that Christiana –obviously as strong willed as her mother- married him anyway in 1806 and Mrs. Swan built them a townhouse on Chestnut Street. (John and Christiana named their second son Henry Jackson Sargent,)
Her son James Keadie Swan married Caroline Knox, the daughter of Henry Knox, in 1808. At the time of the wedding Mrs. Swan commissioned Gilbert Stuart to paint a portrait of her son and also of herself. [xiii]
Henry Jackson was also involved in three major post war civic improvement projects. Jackson was one of six members of the West Boston Bridge Proprietors incorporated by Governor Hancock in 1792 and authorized to collect tolls for 40 years. It was completed in 1793 (replaced by the Longfellow Bridge).
In 1791 no doubt at the urging of Mrs. Swan, Jackson and others helped pass legislation which repealed the 1750 law against theater performances. Roxbury state senator William Heath was probably helpful. Jackson was trustee of the Boston Theatre – Boston’s first – designed by Charles Bullfinch at the corner Federal and Franklin Street that opened in 1793.
The third was the huge India Wharf project begun in 1803 Jackson. Henry Knox and other investors organized to replace the ramshackle jumble of wooden wharf buildings built on the old dock. Planned by the incorporators to make Boston a competitive international port, the long granite warehouse was designed by Charles Bullfinch with tall gable front entrance facing the city. The wharf was built in 1804 and the brick warehouse with 32 stores opened in 1808.[xiv]
Henry Knox traveled frequently to Boston with his wife Lucy and their daughter Caroline (Swan) Knox to visit Mrs., Swan. March 1805 marked the 30th anniversary of the British surrender of Boston made possible by the artillery brought down from Fort Ticonderoga by General Knox’s troops that he strategically placed on hilltops facing the city. There were certainly festivities and dinners at which Knox and his old friend Henry Jackson participated. In 1805, probably at this time, Mrs. Swan commissioned two portraits from Gilbert Stuart of Henry Knox and Henry Jackson. Two portraits could not be more different.[xv]Knox is in full uniform (which suggests he was at the Evacuation Day program) his right hand resting on the barrel of a canon with the smoke of battle behind him. He looks confident but not smug. Jackson is painted more intimately in business suit and ruffled collar. He is painted closer to the frame and his head is cocked back with a slight smile. It’s the face of a kind man.[xvi] Completed in 1806 they joined the earlier Stuart paintings of James and Hepzibah in her drawing room[xvii].
This was probably the last time the two old friends saw each other. Knox died the next year and Henry Jackson died suddenly on January 7, 1809. A notice went out that day from the Society of the Cincinnati which notified members of the death of their
“brother and friend”. Unlike his father, he was not given a military funeral[xviii]; a service was held at his boarding house. Mrs. Swan was in shock. He loyal friend was gone. The one who never fawned over her but treated her like anyone else. The imperious grande dame of wealth, fine tastes and love of French culture respected the old bachelor because he provided the stability and companionship that James Swan forfeited.
Hepzibah Swan had General Jackson interred in a tomb she built in her back garden. The tomb was raised on an earth berm surrounded by a hedge of lilacs and surmounted by an obelisk of blue marble probably quarried and made in Italy. On it was carved “Henry Jackson. Soldier, Patriot, Friend’. [xix] A lane of lilacs led from the house to the tomb that Mrs. Swan often visited and pointed out to guests. One of them was the Marquis de Lafayette in June of 1825 on his triumphal visit to Boston, for the 50th anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill. He visited Mrs. Swan on his way to Quincy to see John Adams. The Marquis and Mrs. Swan talked in French for over an hour and no doubt Mrs. Swan walked him out to look at the tomb of Revolutionary War General Henry Jackson.
Henry Jackson’s obelisk at the Swan lot Forest Hills Cemetery. Photo by Richard Heath
Hepzibah Swan died two months later probably of cholera on August 14, 1825. She was buried in General Jackson’s tomb. [xx] The house and grounds were left to Christiana Sargent who lived there until her death in 1867 at the age of 89.
The neighborhood then was changing. Howard Avenue was built through the property in 1869 and in 1872 the owners subdivided it again and Harlow Street was built through the garden. It was at that time that the Swan-Sargent family -probably John T. Sargent- had the grave removed to Forest Hills Cemetery. On Oct 21, 1872 the remains of General Henry Jackson, Hepzibah Swan, John T Sargent, Christiana Sargent and Mary Cochran were transferred to a lot on Lilac Path at Forest Hills Cemetery. In the center of the lot on the edge of the earth terrace was placed the blue marble obelisk dedicated to General Jackson.[xxi]
The great country house was torn down in 1891 and the two-acre site sat vacant for almost fifty years until the Boston Parks Dept built the Mary Hannon Playground on the land in 1945.
Hog’s Bridge in 1873. Atlas of the County of Suffolk Vol 2. G, M, Hopkins, Philadelphia 1873
At the time of General Jackson’s death, Hog’s Bridge was the site of Samuel Heath’s tannery established about 1760 adjacent o the farm of his bother William Heath. The Heath tannery was an extension of industry in the Stony brook Valley centered at Pierpont’s Village (Roxbury crossing). Heath’s Tannery was bought and expanded to become the Guild & White Tannery that opened in 1847. It specialized in calfskin gloves and tanned about 10,000 skins annually. Guild and White was located on the right of way of the Boston + Providence Railroad, a 40 mile passenger train route that opened on June 11, 1834 from Park Square through Pierpont’s Village and Hog’s Bridge to the seacoast city of Providence. Rhode Island. The railroad extended straight across the mudflats and marshes of the Back Bay on an earth and wood causeway; in 1850 a stop was added at Pierpont’s Village. The biggest change came in 1866 when freight service was added on additional track. Heath Street Station was added about this time. Also a second bridge was built to carry Centre Street over the railroad. An incline was graded and a wooden bridge carried wagons and carriages to and from Jamaica Plain.
In 1872 Hog’s Bridge was a busy crossroads in which was nestled a business district of wood frame and occasional brick buildings of shopkeepers, blacksmiths and mechanics servicing the tan yard, breweries and the railroad; meandering through was Stony Brook – by then contained in a stone channel- crossed by a wooden bridge at Centre and Heath Streets.
The New York New Haven and Hartford Railroad announced in 1893 its plan to eliminate the many unsafe grade crossings in the Stony Brook Valley. Beginning at Cumberland Street in the South End and extending four miles to Forest Hills a massive stone viaduct would carry passenger and freights trains over busy cross-town roads. Hundreds of wooden bridges over Stony Brook (many through factories) would be taken down and the entire length of Stony Brook placed in a brick culvert. The million project was the largest public works project ever seen in Roxbury; it coincided with the control of both Stony Brook and Muddy River in the just completed new park called the Back Bay Fens. The project included eight new bridges and the construction of new passenger stations designed by Samuel Shaw chief engineer of the Old Colony Railroad the owner of that portion of the NYNH &H[xxii].
Work began in May of 1895.[xxiii] A gravel berm was laid across the old right of way supported by granite walls twenty feet high built to create a multi track viaduct that rose gently at Cumberland Street adjacent to the baseball grounds (near present-day Carter Playground) to Forest Hills. Centre Street was widened to eighty feet and depressed nineteen feet in grade to run under an iron plate bridge about one hundred feet long including abutments. New electric car tracks were also built on a reconfigured Centre Street as it dropped down the Fort Hill slope. A fifty-foot iron plate bridge was over Heath Street that included in- bound and outbound passenger waiting rooms. By the end of 1897 a solid wall of masonry twenty feet high carrying passenger and freight trains extended across the Stony Brook Valley floor[xxiv].
Hog’s Bridge in 1890. Atlas of the City Of Boston Proper and Roxbury GW Bromley, Philadelphia 1890.
This was not the only change for Hog’s Bridge. In 1894 the State legislature established the Boston Board of Street Commissioners and also passed the Special Legislation Act for Great Avenues designed to extend roads out to the new districts of Boston. That bill authorized the extension of Columbus Avenue from Northampton Street to Franklin Park. Three hundred men were put to work to take down existing structures and build the Avenue that included electric streetcar tracks. Completed at the end of 1895, the new Columbus Avenue created a great X street pattern as old Centre Street crossed at an angle with the new boulevard. Columbus Avenue was built concurrently with the railroad viaduct. Centre Street was straightened and traffic went in a direct line to the underpass. It was now possible to drive – or take an electric car – from the old Park Square railroad station on a straight and smooth avenue to Egleston Square and Franklin Park.
Great improvements were also taking place at the other end of Columbus Avenue in the 1890’s. On October 19, 1891 Lt Col. Thomas Edmunds, commanding officer of the First Corps of Cadets laid the cornerstone for their great new armory at Columbus Ave. and Ferdinand St (later extended and named Arlington Street)[xxv]. It was the 150th anniversary of the fabled First Corp of Cadets that moved into its new armory in February and March 1897.
Josiah Quincy was mayor of the city, the third Josiah Quincy to hold that office in the 19th century. His grandfather had built Quincy Market in 1826 and his father opened the city to Cochituate water with a groundbreaking in 1846. He himself would cut the ribbon for the great South Station from which trains rolled over the Roxbury viaduct across Centre Street on its way to New York City.
It may have been that Lt Col Edmunds had a word with Mayor Quincy as the cadets hung up the pastel drawing of General Jackson done in 1777 in their new head house library. General Jackson was the man who reorganized the First Corp of Cadets in the turmoil of the British Evacuation and he commanded it as an effective fighting force for the duration of the conflict. Mayor Quincy would have been interested. His grandfather, the first Mayor Quincy (born in 1772), was an attorney and state legislator before becoming a Congressman in 1805, so he knew General Jackson.
Lt Col Edmunds may have gone on to note that 1897 was the 150th anniversary of the birth of General Jackson. The intersection created by the new Columbus Avenue might be named Jackson Square in his honor; after all the great investment it certainly deserved a better name than Hog’s Bridge. It was also near General Heath Square. Mayor Quincy may have agreed.
Richard Heath October 10, 2011
Jackson Square in 1978.
Jackson Square Centre St. bridge circa 1960. Courtesy of the Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Development Corporation
Notes:
[i] It got its name from an incident that occurred about 1750. A farm girl found her way blocked at the bridge by a drove of pigs. When the herdsman refused to let her pass, she picked up and tossed one of the pigs into Stony Brook and threatened to heave in another unless she was allowed to pass. Drake, Francis A. The Town of Roxbury. Page 386.
[ii] General Henry Knox was born in Boston, but he and his wife were far more invested in his huge land holdings and great mansion in Maine, which was part of Massachusetts until 1820
[iii] Paul Barrett sculptor. Dedicated June 17, 1904. Temporarily removed for street widening in 1966, it was taken by the Roxbury Latin School, of which Warren was an alumnus, in 1969.
[iv] For Jackson’s biography see.
1.“ The Swan Commissions” by Eleanor Pearson DeLorme, Winterthur Portfolio Vol 14, No 4, Winter 1979. Pg 389.
2. Drake, Francis A., Memorials of the Society of the Cincinnati of Massachusetts, Boston, 1873. page 360. (General William Heath biography page 329.)/
3. New England Historic and Genealogical Register, “Henry Jackson”. April 1892 page 111.
[v] Is it just a coincidence that Hogs Bridge was the center of the Boston brewery business?
[vi] Drake, Memorials of the Cincinnati, page 91.
[vii] Two sources consulted each with detailed descriptions of the four-day event make no reference to General Jackson or Major General Heath. Both veteran officers apparently passed on the honors to younger active duty officers: The Massachusetts Centinel. October 28, 1789. “Some recollections of George Washington’s Visit to Boston” by General William H. Sumner. New England Historic + Genealogical Register, April 1860.
[viii] Knox named his son born in 1780 Henry Jackson Knox and all his life Jackson was close to the boy.
[ix] “The Swan Commissions” By Eleanor Pearson DeLorme, Winterthur Portfolio, Vol 14, No 4. Winter 1979. The Downcast Dilettante blog. “Obelisks, Regrets, Debts, Swans, Bullfinch…” June 4, 2011.
[x] The father and mother in law of Henry Knox were among the Loyalists who took British ships to Halifax that month and then to England. Knox acquired for a nominal sum huge tracts of land owned by the Fluckers in coastal Maine that had been confiscated by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Not for nothing was the Revolutionary War called the first American Civil War. “The fact is that, as far as the Americans were in it, the war of the revolution was a civil war.” The Loyalists of Massachusetts, James H Stark, Boston, 1910. Pg 61. + Pg 403.
[xi] For details on the furnishings, many of which are in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, see de Lorme. Page 374. For the house, the definitive source is Kirker, Harold. The Architecture of Charles Bullfinch, Harvard University Press. 1969. Pages 128-131. Bullfinch had just completed plans for Montpelier the great house for Henry Knox at Thomaston, Maine
[xii] Lawrence, Robert M, Old Park Street and Its vicinity, HMCo, Boston, 1922. page 115.
[xiii] For Hepzibahs portrait with detailed commentary see de Lorme page 370. James Keadie’s portrait is on page 378. Both Hepzibah’s portrait and James Swan’s were given to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts by her great granddaughter in 1927. The Henry Knox House, Thomaston, Maine, owns James Keadie Swan’s portrait.
[xiv] Henry Knox did not live to see it completed. He died in 1806. Half of the wharf was destroyed for the widening of Atlantic Avenue in 1869 and the remainder was razed in 1962. The Aquarium was built on the 1804 wharf in 1969
[xv]The famous Henry Knox portrait is illustrated in deLorme page 38. It is at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. The Henry Jackson portrait is shown on page 388. It is privately owned.
[xvi] Writing in 1876 Francis S Drake described Jackson as “a large man full of wit and gallantry. a gentleman.”
[xvii] Did she hang them at her Chestnut Street home and then take them with her to Dorchester? More than likely. The Henry Knox painting was given to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts by the City of Boston in 1876.
[xviii] The answer might lie in the Stuart painting: Henry Jackson had hung up his uniform with the epaulets, gold braid and stripes over 20 earlier. He died as Mr. Jackson and as Mr. Jackson he was paid respects.
[xix] It may have looked somewhat like the John Codman tomb at the Dorchester Second Church Cemetery at Codman Square. It’s a brick vault crowned with earth from the excavation with a dressed stone front and an arch door to the interior crypt. This was built about 1847,
[xx] She joined her son in law John Turner Sargent. When he died in 1813, she had him buried in the Jackson tomb.
[xxi] Files of Forest Hills Cemetery. Thank you to Elise Ciregna for her help and the site visit. There are five graves on the lot today. The first one has General Jackson, Hepzibah Swan and Mary Cochran. Mary Cochran – who was perhaps a house servant to Mrs. Swan -died at the age of 91 in 1830. The engraved inscriptions on the obelisk are eroded away and difficult to read.
-Orcutt, Dana. Good Old Dorchester, Cambridge, 1894. Page 398, Also pg 397. For a photo of the house taken just before demolition see page 25.
-See also Find a Grave .Com; Forest Hills Cemetery: Henry Jackson. Created by Jen Smoots. The biography is by Bill McKern. Included is an engraving of the 1777 pastel drawing of Colonel Jackson when he commanded the Boston Regiment reproduced in the April 1892 NEHGR biography.
Also see de Lorme page 390 for the illustration of the original pastel drawing held at the first Corp Cadets Museum.
All three Boston Revolutionary War leaders were removed to Forest Hills Cemetery General Warren was removed from a crypt at St Paul’s Church to the family tomb in 1855. General Heath was taken from the family tomb at the Heath farm a placed beneath a splendid pink granite monument at Eliot Hill in 1860.
[xxii] A considerable amount of property was taken for this project including the Heath Street freight yard that was given up for the new Heath Street Station and bridge. To satisfy the brewers who had long received grain shipments there, a new one was regraded at Lamartine and Centre Street.
[xxiii] For stories on construction see:
Boston Globe July 7, 1893.
Boston Globe July 10, 1895.
Boston Herald, March 22, 1896.
The Herald noted that the work was done largely by Italian laborers but had to be replaced in the cold winter months by French Canadians.
[xxiv] Train service was never discontinued for the three years of construction. A two track right of way was laid parallel to the construction site for passenger service
[xxv] Boston Globe Oct 10, 1891. The Armory was designed by William G. Preston.
That Was the Year That Was – 2000
Image by brizzle born and bred
Billions of people around the world welcomed in the New Millennium with some of the most spectacular celebrations ever seen.
2000 – The Tate Modern opens in London. Concorde Air France Flight 4590 crashes just after takeoff from Paris killing all 109 aboard and 5 on the ground. The UK fuel protests take place, with refineries blockaded, and supply to the country’s network of petrol stations halted. The use of mobile phones continues to grow as mobile phones move from the percieved "Yuppie Device" to an essential consumer product. The UK is hit by one of the worst snow storms in the last 50 years bringing public transport to a halt. Mad Cow Disease causes alarm in Europe due to it’s growth.
The Summer Olympics are held in Sydney Australia. The Concerns over Y2K passes without the serious, widespread computer failures and malfunctions that had been predicted. Microsoft releases Windows 2000. AOL and Time Warner Merge. The popular show Big Brother is broadcast and captures worldwide media interest. The Latest Harry Potter Book Is Published "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire". 51 million viewers watch the first season finale of the reality show "Survivor". The last of the original Mini’s rolls off the production lines. Sony Playstation 2 is released.
Our vision of the future is always changing. In the year 1910, we imagined that the year 2000 would be filled with airships and multi-armed robotic helpers. In the 1960s, manned trips to Mars seemed in our grasp. Early ideas about the Internet were sharpened and refined, and we saw nuclear technology and plastics change our lives, but in different ways than we predicted.
How the UK coped with the millennium bug 15 years ago
In the final months of 1999 concern grew into panic that the millennium bug was going to cause computers to malfunction and potentially endanger everything from tills to power stations. It didn’t happen quite like that, but the public safety warnings from the time remain intriguing. The eight-page pullout that Action 2000 placed in British newspapers in 1999 is a snapshot of the technology in a home at the time. The government-backed advice booklet warns what to do about video recorders, answer phones and fax machines. The illustrations are of cathode ray tube computer monitors.
The bug had first been predicted years before. An article in Computer World magazine in 1993 was one of the first to attempt to bring it to a wider audience. "Have you ever been in a car crash?" the article asked. "Unfortunately, unlike the car crash, time will not slow down for us. If anything, we’re accelerating toward disaster."
The bug was about the limitations of the clocks inside computers. Since the 1960s computers denoted years such as 1998 as 98 to save memory. As a result, when the new millennium arrived, it was expected many computer clocks would see 00 and understand that to mean 1900. "All of a sudden your business logic wouldn’t work," says Ross Anderson, professor of security engineering at Cambridge University, of the threat. "The time of an invoice, delivery, transaction or any of the other 101 processes a business has is thrown completely off".
In 1993, a newsletter called "Tick, Tick, Tick" ran a "worst-case scenario contest" which sought "the most creative ideas of what could happen on 01/01/2000".
Many governments took precautions and in the UK and elsewhere they went further than just concentrating on business and key infrastructure – ordinary homeowners were drawn in too.
In the UK Action 2000 was set up to warn and to prepare. Electronic machines needed to be "year 2000 compliant". "Your business is in danger" a leaflet stated in large yellow letters. But the message was still restrained – "the very worst that can happen is that some (computers) may get confused over the date". Its millennium bug "home check" pullout sought to explain. "Check your PC with our simple 5-layer Bug Test," it said. But it was also an attempt to dispel myths. "Very few household appliances are affected," it explained. "Lawn mowers, hedge trimmers, rotovators, barbeques (and) swimming pool equipment" are confirmed as safe.
In the popular memory, the millennium bug was something that failed to come to pass. Most forget that there were consequences. In the UK, the bug was blamed for more than 150 pregnant women getting incorrect results for tests for Down’s Syndrome. And while the wilder predictions in the media did not come to pass, those who worked on informing the public feel they acted sensibly and proportionately at the time.
"We achieved our aim," says Gwynneth Flower, who was the managing director of Action 2000. "There were a few eccentrics. One woman virtually moved her whole family to a remote house in Scotland, with water only from a well at the bottom of the garden, because she thought it would be Armageddon." Traditional advertising was used, but also lectures in schools. We "explained it to them so they go and tell mummy and daddy, and ask what they were doing to prepare".
Take-up in some areas was slow. Even within the government. In 1999 a report from the National Audit Office warned that there was a "wide variation in progress" by local authorities. Some found the preparations excessive. "It was an astonishing incident," says Anthony Finkelstein, professor of software systems engineering at UCL.
But its implications were described by Tony Blair at the time as "one of the most serious problems facing not only British business but the global economy today".
Margaret Beckett, then the minister in charge of millennium preparations, said the bug had the capacity to "wreak havoc".
"I think there was a lot of hyperbole in the press. Part of our job was to keep on top of the hype" says Paddy Tipping, then minister for the millennium bug. "We had to downplay it and persuade people there was a strong government initiative working. Many people made their names saying it would be a catastrophe."
But Finkelstein says it was political. "The cost of political overreaction is smaller than underreaction. It was a confluence of politics, commercial money, journalists who had a story too good to check and local interest."
2000: Spring freeze brings chaos
Severe weather has forced the closure of one of Britain’s main airports, Luton, near London, as blizzards and flooding have caused widespread chaos. More than two weeks into British Summer Time, much of the country has been experiencing its coldest April day on record. Large swathes of countryside were blanketed in snow, bringing traffic to a standstill and paralysing transport systems. The blast of icy weather comes just a month after weather meteorologists pronounced this winter the sunniest this century, with a daily average in England and Wales of two-and-a-half hours of sunshine a day.
Concorde crash kills 113
Concorde crashed just minutes after take-off, killing all 109 people on board and four people on the ground. The Air France jet, bound for New York, crashed into a Relais Bleu hotel in the town of Gonesse, 10 miles north of Paris just before 1700 local time (1500 GMT). It is understood the aircraft, which had taken off from Roissy Charles de Gaulle airport just two minutes earlier, plummeted to the ground after one of the left-hand engines caught fire on take-off. There were 100 passengers on board, most were German tourists but also included two Danes, an Austrian and an American, all travelling to JFK airport in New York where they were due to join a cruise ship bound for Equador.
M25 killer
A man who carried out a "road rage" killing is beginning a life sentence after being convicted of murder at the Old Bailey in London. Kenneth Noye, 52, stabbed Stephen Cameron in the heart and liver as they fought on a slip road alongside the M25 motorway in 1996. Noye had been angered by the driving of Mr Cameron’s girlfriend, Danielle Cable, who had cut into the lane ahead of his Landrover. When the vehicles came to a halt he got out and confronted Mr Cameron who died at the scene in the arms of Ms Cable. After the killing Noye fled to the Costa del Sol in Spain where he was arrested in 1998 by British police.
Described by police as a "professional criminal", Noye had already been acquitted after a trial for stabbing an undercover policeman to death. However, he served a 14-year jail term for handling proceeds from the UK’s biggest robbery, the Brinks Mat bullion heist.
After Noye’s arrest Danielle Cable was given a new identity and 24-hour police guard and moved to another part of Britain. Police believed as the main prosecution witness and the person who identified Noye in Spain, she might be targeted by his underworld associates. Another eye-witness, Alan Decabral, testified against Noye in spite of threats on his life. Mr Decabral was shot dead in August 2000 – Noye was questioned in connection with the murder but no charges were brought against him.
In October 2001 Kenneth Noye’s appeal was rejected and in March 2004 failed in his High Court attempt to challenge his mandatory life sentence.
Sarah Payne’s body found
Police have confirmed the body they found in a West Sussex field yesterday is that of missing eight-year old Sarah Payne. A farm worker found the human remains less than 12 miles from where Sarah went missing near her grandparents’ home near Littlehampton on 1 July. The partly covered body was lying 10 yards away from the A29 between Pulborough and Billingshurst. Sarah’s parents, Sara and Michael, spent 20 minutes at the scene and laid flowers there. They looked at the tributes left by hundreds of well-wishers and police.
Two days later police found what they believed to be one of Sarah’s shoes in the village of Coolham, a few miles to the east of where the body was found. On 31 July, Roy Whiting – a known paedophile – was arrested then released on bail. He had already been questioned and released on 2 July. Whiting was arrested and charged with the murder on 6 February 2001. On 12 December 2001 he was found guilty of abducting and murdering Sarah Payne and given a life sentence. In 1995 Whiting had been given a four year sentence for attacking a nine-year-old girl.
The News of the World supported Sara and Michael Payne in their campaign for "Sarah’s Law" and public access to the sex offenders’ register. Pressure for a so-called Sarah’s Law has been maintained. But the government has resisted calls saying there would be a risk of the public taking the law into their own hands.
The Krays
Charlie Kray, one of the infamous Kray brothers, dies in hospital of the Isle of Wight after suffering a heart attack in Parkhurst Prison. He was 73 years old. 26 August – Gangster and murderer Reggie Kray, in the 32nd year of his life sentence at Broadmoor Hospital, is released from prison on compassionate grounds by Home Secretary Jack Straw due to bladder cancer from which he is expected to die within weeks. 1 October – Reggie Kray dies of cancer in a Norwich hotel at the age of 66.
Kray was jailed for life in 1969 alongisde his brother, Ronald ‘Ronnie’ Kray, for the murder of their friend Jack ‘the Hat’ McVitie at a flat in Stoke Newington. Ronnie Kray died in prison in 1995. He was serving a life sentence for the murder of George Cornell when he suffered a heart attack. In 2000, Reggie, whose real name was Reginald, was released from prison on compassionate grounds after being diagnosed with cancer. He took up a room in Beefeater Town House Hotel in Norwich after being discharged from the Norwich Hospital. On October 1, with his wife Roberta at his bedside, he died peacefully in his sleep. Considered the softer of the two twins, Reggie married twice in his life. His first wife, Frances Kray, died in 1967. While some claimed the young bride killed herself, others suggested Reggie’s twin, Ronnie, had a hand in her death.
Fuel protesters rally for tax cut
Convoys of lorries and tractors have converged on the capitals of England and Scotland to mark the 60-day deadline for government action to cut fuel tax. Both demonstrations passed off peacefully. The biggest was in London where protesters rallied in Hyde Park. About 350 vehicles were stopped by police from entering the centre of the city. Drivers parked their vehicles on the hard shoulder of the Westway on the outskirts of central London before making their way on foot to the demonstration. In Edinburgh, about 150 vehicles from as far away as John O’Groats converged on Princes Street in the city centre.
However, a spokesman for Prime Minister Tony Blair reiterated the government would not back down on fuel tax. He said: "We have acknowledged repeatedly that the price of petrol is high and this causes particular problems, for example, for people in rural communities. "We have done what we can, but to do more would be to start to jeopardise the extra investment the government is putting into public services." Fuel tax activists have warned they will take action again next year if the government does not meet their demands.
2000 Timeline
Japanese carmaker Nissan adds a third model to its factory near Sunderland; the new version of the Almera hatchback and slaoon, which goes on sale in March.
1 January – Millennium celebrations take place throughout the UK. The Millennium Dome is officially opened by the Queen.
3 January – Thames Valley Police speak of their belief that the Cézanne painting stolen from Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum on New Year’s Eve was taken by professional thieves.
4 January – Catherine Hartley and Fiona Thornewill become the first British women to reach the South Pole.
The flu outbreak in Britain puts pressure on NHS.
10 January – The Prime Minister’s wife, Cherie Blair, is fined for not having a valid train ticket with her during her journey from Blackfriars to Luton station. She claimed only to have Portuguese currency with her at the time and couldn’t find a machine where she could use her credit card.
11 January – A Scottish trawler, the Solway Harvester, sinks in the Irish Sea, killing seven sailors.
12 January – It is announced that former Chilean dictator, Augusto Pinochet, is to be sent home after the Home Secretary, Jack Straw, accepted "unequivocal and unanimous" medical evidence that Pinochet is unfit to stand trial in Spain on charges of torture.
22 January – The Rugby league 2000 World Club Challenge is won by Melbourne Storm who defeat St Helens 44 – 6 at the JJB Stadium.
31 January – Dr. Harold Shipman in sentenced to life imprisonment after being found guilty of murdering 15 patients in Greater Manchester between 1995 and 1998. He is also sentenced to four years in prison, to run concurrently, for forging the will of one of his victims.
Waterhouse report into the Wales child abuse scandal published.
11 February – The Royal Bank of Scotland succeeds in the hostile takeover battle for its larger English rival, NatWest Bank, successfully defeating a rival offer by the Bank of Scotland.
Northern Ireland Assembly is suspended.
28 February – The chief of British Nuclear Fuels resigns over a safety scandal at Sellafield.
2 March – The UK returns Augusto Pinochet to Chile to face trial.
14 March – All stores of furniture retailer World of Leather and its parent Uno plc close.
15 March – BMW announces plans to sell the Rover Group, with London-based Alchemy consortium emerging as favourites for a takeover.
25 March – David Trimble wins the leadership election of the Ulster Unionist Party.
31 March – Myra Hindley, who has spent 34 years in prison for her part in the Moors Murders, loses a third High Court appeal against a Home Office ruling that her life sentence should mean life.
April – The Ministry of Defence publishes a booklet Soldiering – The Military Covenant which introduces the term into public discourse referring to the mutual obligations between the nation and its armed forces.
1 April – An Enigma machine is stolen from Bletchley Park Museum.
Section 27 of the Access to Justice Act 1999 comes into force allowing recovery of fees from the losing party in civil actions, extending the availability of conditional fee arrangements.
3 April – The Immigration and Asylum Act means that all asylum seekers in England and Wales will now receive vouchers to cover the cost of food and clothes.
4 April – Charlie Kray, one of the infamous Kray brothers, dies in hospital of the Isle of Wight after suffering a heart attack in Parkhurst Prison. He was 73 years old.
12 April – The Royal Ulster Constabulary is presented with the George Cross by The Queen.
14 April – Kenneth Noye, the so-called "M25 killer", sentenced to life imprisonment.
19 April – Tony Martin is sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of a 16-year-old burglar he shot dead at his Norfolk farmhouse eight months ago. He is also convicted of the attempted murder of Brendon Fearon, the burglar who was wounded when Martin opened fire and killed Fred Barras.
29 April – At Murrayfield Stadium, the 2000 Challenge Cup rugby league tournament culminates in the Bradford Bulls’ 24 – 18 win in the final against the Leeds Rhinos.
1 May – May Day riot in central London by anti-capitalist protestors. The statue of Winston Churchill in Parliament Square, and the Cenotaph in Whitehall are daubed with graffiti.
3 May – The London Stock Exchange and Germany’s Deutsche Börse announce merger plans.
4 May – London mayoral election: Ken Livingstone elected Mayor of London defeating Steve Norris, the Conservative Party candidate in second place; and Frank Dobson, the Labour Party candidate in third place.
9 May – BMW sells the bulk of the Rover Group (the Rover and MG marques) to the Phoenix Consortium, while it retains the rights to the Mini marque, and sells Land Rover to Ford.
12 May – The Tate Modern art museum is opened.
Ford announces that production of cars at its Dagenham plant will discontinue when the Fiesta is replaced in 2002.
17 May – Royal Marines Alan Chambers and Charlie Paton become the first British people to reach the Geographic North Pole unaided.
20 May – Chelsea beat Aston Villa 1–0 to win the last FA Cup final at Wembley Stadium before the old stadium (which is due to close in October) is rebuilt.
24 May – National Botanic Garden of Wales opens to the public in Carmarthenshire.
25 May – National Waste Strategy first published.
June – Celtic Manor Wales Open European Tour golf tournament first played.
7 June – Tony Blair receives a hostile reception during a speech at the Women’s Institute, where he is heckled and slow hand-clapped by furious members.
10 June – The much-anticipated Millennium Bridge opens to the public, but has to close after it starts swaying.
12 June – The England national football team begins its participation in the European Championships, jointly hosted by the Netherlands and Belgium. They lose their opening group game 3–2 to Portugal despite taking an early 2–0 lead through Paul Scholes and Steve McManaman.
17 June – Alan Shearer, who is set to retire from international football after the European Championships, scores the only goal as England beat holders Germany 1–0 in the second group game.
18 June – Following a series of hooliganism incidents by England fans, UEFA threatens to expel England from Euro 2000 if there is any further trouble.
20 June – England’s hopes of winning Euro 2000 are ended when they lose 3–2 to Romania in the final group game, again after taking the lead earlier in the game.
21 June – Repeal in Scotland of controversial Section 28 of the Local Government Act 1988 which prevented local authorities from "promoting homosexuality". Section 28 is not repealed in the rest of the UK until 2003.
30 June – David Copeland is found guilty of causing the three nail bomb attacks in London last year. He is sentenced to life imprisonment and the trial judge recommends that he should serve at least 30 years before being considered for parole, meaning that he is likely to remain in prison until at least 2029 and the age of 54.
July – Vauxhall launches the all-new Agila city car.
5 July – Colin Fallows, driving the Vampire turbojet-propelled dragster, sets a British land speed record, a mean 300.3 mph (483.3 km/h), at Elvington, Yorkshire.
14 July – Reality television game show Big Brother first airs in Britain.
18 July – Alex Salmond resigns as the leader of the Scottish National Party.
20 July – Production of the Ford Escort, one of Britain’s most successful and iconic motoring nameplates, finishes after 32 years.
23 July – The News of the World starts a campaign for Sarah’s Law, in honour of murdered Surrey girl Sarah Payne, who was found dead in West Sussex on 17 July having gone missing 16 days earlier.
28 July – Last 80 prisoners leave the Maze Prison in Northern Ireland as part of the Northern Ireland peace process.
4 August – Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother celebrates her 100th birthday.
26 August – Gangster and murderer Reggie Kray, in the 32nd year of his life sentence at Broadmoor Hospital, is released from prison on compassionate grounds by Home Secretary Jack Straw due to bladder cancer from which he is expected to die within weeks.
September – Ford unveils its all-new second generation Mondeo large family car, which is due on sale towards the end of this year.
8 September – UK fuel protests: Protesters block the entrances to oil refineries in protest against high fuel prices. Panic buying by motorists leads to nationwide petrol shortages, with between 75–90% of all UK petrol stations closing due to low supplies in the following week.
14 September – After beginning the year 20 points behind the Labour government in the opinion polls, the Conservative opposition’s hopes of winning the next election (due to be held within 18 months) are boosted when they come two points ahead of Labour on 38% in a MORI opinion poll.
15 September – 1 October – Great Britain competes at the Olympics in Sydney and wins 11 gold, 10 silver and 7 bronze medals.
18 September – Survivors of the Southall and Ladbroke Grove rail disasters criticise Railtrack for putting costs ahead of safety and causing a series of blunders which led to the tragedies.
23 September – Earthquake in Warwickshire.
Rower Steve Redgrave wins his fifth consecutive gold medal at the Olympics.
October – Ford launches the all-new Mondeo with a range of saloons, hatchbacks and estates.
1 October – Reggie Kray dies of cancer in a Norwich hotel at the age of 66.
4 October – After 41 years, production of the Mini car ends at the Longbridge plant owned by MG Rover in Birmingham. The new model will go into production next spring at the Cowley plant in Oxford that is owned by BMW.
7 October – Wembley Stadium closes after 77 years. It is set to re-open in 2003 following a complete reconstruction that will see its capacity raised to 90,000 all-seated. In the final game at the old stadium, the England football team loses 1–0 to Germany in their opening qualifying game for the 2002 World Cup and manager Kevin Keegan resigns after 18 months in charge.
16 October – The BBC’s main evening news show moves to 10:00 pm; the following year ITV1 will move its news back to the same time slot and broadcasts in direct competition.
17 October – Hatfield rail crash: A Great North Eastern Railway InterCity 225 train derails south of Hatfield station, killing 4 people.
23 October – After the fuel protests were solved, Labour support has been restored, according to the latest MORI opinion poll which shows them 13 points ahead of the Conservatives with 45% of the vote.
26–27 October – Following the death of Donald Dewar, Henry McLeish is selected to be First Minister of Scotland by the Scottish Parliament, and is officially appointed by The Queen.
26 October – House of Lords delivers judgement in White v White, a landmark case in redistribution of finances and property on divorce.
30 October – Sven-Göran Eriksson, the 52-year-old Swedish coach of Italian side Lazio, accepts an offer from the Football Association to take charge of the England team for five years commencing next July. Eriksson will be the first foreign manager to take charge of the England team, but until his arrival the England team will be jointly managed by interim coaches Peter Taylor and Howard Wilkinson.
7 November – The theft of £350 million worth of diamonds from the Millennium Dome is foiled by police.
16 November – Actor Michael Caine receives a knighthood from the Queen.
18 November – Marriage of American actor Michael Douglas and Welsh actress Catherine Zeta-Jones.
20 November – Judith Keppel becomes the first person to win £1 million on the television programme Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?.
21 November – Dennis Canavan MSP resigns as MP for Falkirk West, triggering a by-election.
23 November – Double by-election held in Glasgow Anniesland to elect successors to Donald Dewar’s seats in both the UK Parliament and the Scottish Parliament.
Labour holds both seats with swings to the SNP of 6% and 7%.
26 November – Rio Ferdinand, the 22-year-old England national football team defender, becomes the nation’s most expensive player in an £18million transfer from West Ham United to Leeds United.
27 November – Damilola Taylor, a 10-year-old school boy originally from Nigeria, is stabbed to death on his way home from school in Peckham, London.
2 December – Two teenagers and a 39-year-old man are released on police bail after being arrested in connection with the Damilola Taylor killing.
3 December – The Church of England introduces the Common Worship series of service books.
8 December – The Equitable Life Assurance Society closes to new business.
21 December – Falkirk West by-election results in Eric Joyce retaining the seat for Labour, though with a majority reduced to just 705 votes in the face of a swing of 16.2% to the SNP.
22 December – American pop star Madonna, 42, marries 32-year-old British film producer Guy Ritchie at Skibo Castle in the Scottish Highlands.
29 December – Arctic weather conditions blight Britain, with heavy snow and temperatures as low as −13C plaguing the country and causing extensive gridlocking on the roads and railways.
31 December – The Millennium Dome closes as planned after one year.
2000 is the wettest year on record in the UK.
Sales of the DVD format, first launched in the UK in June 1998, pass the 1 million mark, although the VHS format remains by far the most popular format of home video.
Television
BBC One
1 January – Castaway 2000 (2000–2001)
23 January – Clocking Off (2000–2003)
4 February – My Hero (2000–2006)
27 February – Monarch of the Glen (2000–2005)
26 March – Doctors (2000–present)
2 October – BBC Breakfast (2000–present)
16 October – BBC News at Ten (2000–present)
BBC Two
12 May – Coupling (2000–2004)
14 August – The Weakest Link (2000–2012)
BBC News 24
Click Online (2000 – present)
ITV
20 January – At Home with the Braithwaites (2000–2003)
13 March – Savage Planet (2000–2000s)
15 August – The People Versus (2000–2002)
Channel 4
14 July – Big Brother (Channel 4 2000–2010, Channel 5 2011–present)
Channel 5
11 September – The Wright Stuff (2000–present)
12 September – Jailbreak (2000)
BBC Choice
30 May – Liquid News (2000–2004)
Sky
11 September – Time Gentlemen Please (2000–2002)
BRIT Awards
The 2000 BRIT Awards winners were:
Best selling live act: Steps
Best soundtrack: "Notting Hill"
British album: Travis – "The Man Who"
British breakthrough act: S Club 7
British dance act: The Chemical Brothers
British female solo artist: Beth Orton
British group: Travis
British male solo artist: Tom Jones
British single: Robbie Williams – "She’s the One"
British video: Robbie Williams – "She’s the One"
International breakthrough act: Macy Gray
International female: Macy Gray
International group: TLC
International male: Beck
Outstanding contribution: Spice Girls
Pop act: Five
Number-one singles
Westlife – "I Have a Dream"/"Seasons in the Sun"
Manic Street Preachers – "The Masses Against the Classes"
Britney Spears – "Born to Make You Happy"
Gabrielle – "Rise"
Oasis – "Go Let It Out"
All Saints – "Pure Shores"
Madonna – "American Pie"
Chicane with Bryan Adams – "Don’t Give Up"
Geri Halliwell – "Bag It Up"
Melanie C featuring Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes – "Never Be The Same Again"
Westlife – "Fool Again"
Craig David – "Fill Me In"
Fragma – "Toca’s Miracle"
Oxide & Neutrino – "Bound 4 Da Reload (Casualty)"
Britney Spears – "Oops!… I Did It Again"
Madison Avenue – "Don’t Call Me Baby"
Billie Piper – "Day & Night"
Sonique – "It Feels So Good"
Black Legend – "You See the Trouble with Me"
Kylie Minogue – "Spinning Around"
Eminem – "The Real Slim Shady"
The Corrs – "Breathless"
Ronan Keating – "Life Is a Rollercoaster"
Five + Queen – "We Will Rock You"
Craig David – "7 Days"
Robbie Williams – "Rock DJ"
Melanie C – "I Turn to You"
Spiller featuring Sophie Ellis-Bextor – "Groovejet (If This Ain’t Love)"
Madonna – "Music"
A1 – "Take On Me"
Modjo – "Lady (Hear Me Tonight)"
Mariah Carey featuring Westlife – "Against All Odds"
All Saints – "Black Coffee"
U2 – "Beautiful Day"
Steps – "Stomp"
Spice Girls – "Holler"/"Let Love Lead the Way"
Westlife – "My Love"
A1 – "Same Old Brand New You"
LeAnn Rimes – "Can’t Fight the Moonlight"
Destiny’s Child – "Independent Women Part I"
S Club 7 – "Never Had a Dream Come True"
Eminem featuring Dido – "Stan"
Bob the Builder – "Can We Fix It?"
Popular Films
How the Grinch Stole Christmas!
Cast Away
Mission: Impossible II
Gladiator
What Women Want
The Perfect Storm
Meet the Parents
X-Men
Scary Movie
What Lies Beneath
Gladiator
Erin Brockovich
Billy Elliot