Massachusetts - Political   Capital Boston Largest City Boston Major Cities Worcester, Springfield, Lowell, Cambridge, Salem, Lawrence, Fall River, New Bedford Nicknames Bay State, Old Colony State Area 8,257 sq. miles Population 6,349,097

 

Massachusetts - Physical features   Physical Features Berkshire Hills, Massachusetts Bay, Cape Cod Bay, Buzzards Bay, Nantucket Sound, Connecticut River Valley, Cape Cod, Cape Ann Rivers Connecticut, Merrimack, Housatonic, Charles Highest Point Mt. Greylock Islands Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket Island, Elizabeth Islands Bordering States New Hampshire (north), Vermont (northwest), New York (west), Connecticut (southwest), Rhode Island (south) National Parks None Key Products Cranberries, Clams, Oysters, Lobsters Natural Resources Fish

 

Massachusetts - History   1620 Pilgrims establish colony at Plymouth 1636 Harvard University established as the first college in the nation 1773 Boston Tea Party- History was made when Bostanians boarded a British tea ship, and tossed the tea into Boston Harbor in protest of unfair taxation 1775 The first outbreak of the American Revolution occurs at Lexington and neighboring Concord 1788 Massachusetts becomes 6th state Present Day Cambridge is one of the country’s leading educational centers, with two of the its best colleges, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Harvard University

 

Massachusetts - Facts   The Pilgrims, a group of Puritan settlers aboard the ship Mayflower, made their first landfall at the settlement of Provincetown, before landing on the mainland at Plymouth Rock and finding the settlement of Plymouth on Cape Cod Bay south of Boston Massachusetts cranberry crop is the nation’s second largest after Wisconsin The Quabbin Reservoir, the largest body of water in Massachusetts, is located in the western part of the state, northeast of Springfield. Water from this reservoir is used by the city of Boston Boston is the largest city in New England, and also its cultural, financial and scientific center Massachusetts is one of few states that uses the term Commonwealth in its official name, the others being Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. The term simply means that the governments of these states are based on the common consent of the people Massachusetts is New England’s most populous state Tanglewood, near the Massachusetts-New York border, is a notable music resort, and hosts the annual Berkshire Festival The Cape Cod Canal links Buzzards Bay in the south to Cape Cod Bay in the north and provides a shorter route for ships and cargo headed up north to Boston Cape Cod is actually a peninsula, and many people mistake it to be a cape, as suggested by its name. The city of Provincetown is located at its northern tip, and the Cape Cod National Seashore occupies the peninsula’s Atlantic coastline Lowell was one of the United States’s first cloth-manufacturing areas, where textile mills used to spring up along the banks of the Merrimack River, which in turn was harnessed to produce electricity for the region The oldest US Navy ship, the USS Constitution, is docked permanently at Charlestown, a suburb across the Charles River from Boston