Lexington is a suburban town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is 10 miles (16 km) from Downtown Boston. The population was 34,454 as of the 2020 census. The area was originally inhabited by Native Americans, and was first settled by Europeans in 1641 as a farming community. Lexington is well known as the site of the first shots of the American Revolutionary War, in the Battle of Lexington on April 19, 1775, where the "Shot heard 'round the world" took place. It is home to Minute Man National Historical Park.
The Bunker Hill Monument is a monument erected at the site of the Battle of Bunker Hill in Boston, Massachusetts, which was among the first major battles between the Red Coats and Patriots in the American Revolutionary War. The 221-foot granite obelisk was erected between 1825 and 1843 in Charlestown, Massachusetts, with granite from nearby Quincy conveyed to the site via the purpose-built Granite Railway, followed by a trip by barge. There are 294 steps to the top.
The Bedford Flag is the oldest known flag in the United States. It is associated with the Minutemen of Bedford, Massachusetts, and the Battles of Lexington and Concord of 1775.
John Parker was an American colonial farmer, smith, soldier, and colonial militia officer who commanded the Lexington, Patriot, colonial militia at the Battle of Lexington on April 19, 1775.
Minute Man National Historical Park commemorates the opening battle in the American Revolutionary War. It also includes the Wayside, home in turn to three noted American authors. The National Historical Park is under the jurisdiction of the National Park Service and protects 970 acres (392.5 ha) in and around the Massachusetts towns of Lexington, Lincoln, and Concord.
Munroe Tavern, located at 1332 Massachusetts Avenue, Lexington, Massachusetts, is an American Revolutionary War site that played a prominent role in the Battle of Lexington and Concord. It is now preserved and operated as a museum by the Lexington Historical Society, with exhibits highlighting the role and perspective of the British soldiers during the outbreak of the war. The house is open for guided tours on weekends starting in April and daily from Memorial Day weekend until the end of October.
Buckman Tavern is a historic American Revolutionary War site associated with the revolution's very first battle, the 1775 Battle of Lexington and Concord. It is located on the Battle Green in Lexington, Massachusetts and operated as a museum by the Lexington Historical Society.
Henry Hudson Kitson was an English-American sculptor who sculpted many representations of American military heroes.
The Battles of Lexington and Concord were the first military engagements of the American Revolutionary War. The battles were fought on April 19, 1775, in Middlesex County, Province of Massachusetts Bay, within the towns of Lexington, Concord, Lincoln, Menotomy, and Cambridge. They marked the outbreak of armed conflict between the Kingdom of Great Britain and its thirteen colonies in America.
The Church Park Historic District is a historic district and part of downtown Goshen, the seat of Orange County, New York, United States. It takes its name from the large triangular park formed at the center of the village by Main Street, Park Place and South Church Street. It is defined as bounded by Green Street on the south, Main Street, Webster Avenue, and then back across Main at Erie Street across the Historic Track to Kelsey Lane, South Church Street, South Street and back to Green. There are 107 buildings and three objects within the district.
The Concord Monument Square–Lexington Road Historic District is an historic district in Concord, Massachusetts. Monument Square, at the center of the district, was laid out in 1635. The district includes a collection of well-preserved residential houses stretching along Lexington Street southeast from the square, and along Lowell northwest of the square. The square is prominently known as the site of British activities on April 19, 1775, the day of the Battles of Lexington and Concord which began the American Revolutionary War, and of earlier meetings by Massachusetts Patriots which were held in the First Parish Church and Wright's Tavern. The Tavern and the Ralph Waldo Emerson House, which stands near the eastern end of the district, are both National Historic Landmarks. The district was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1977.
Seton Hill Historic District is a historic district in Baltimore, Maryland. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.
The Taunton Green Historic District encompasses the core area of the historic 19th-century commercial downtown business district of Taunton, Massachusetts. It is centered on the town green, laid out in the 1740s, and now stands at the intersection of U.S. Route 44 and State routes 140 and 138. The district was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985.
Battle Road, formerly known as the Old Concord Road and the Bay Road, is a historic road in Massachusetts, United States. It was formerly part of the main road connecting Lexington, Lincoln and Concord, three of the main towns involved in the American Revolutionary War. It was on Battle Road that thousands of colonial militia and British regulars fought during the redcoats' retreat from Concord to Boston on the morning and afternoon of April 19, 1775.
The following are minor or locally celebrated holidays related to the American Revolution.
Prince Estabrook was an enslaved black man and Minutemen Private who fought and was wounded at the Battle of Lexington and Concord, the first battle of the American Revolutionary War. An undated broadside from the time identified him as "a Negro Man", spelled his name Easterbrooks, and listed him among the wounded from Lexington, Massachusetts. Born around 1741, he was a slave belonging to the family of Benjamin Estabrook from whom he most likely took his name. He was freed.
Lexington Centre, often simply called the Centre by locals, is both the geographic and retail center of Lexington, Massachusetts on Massachusetts Avenue. It is home to numerous restaurants, banks, retail shops, beauty parlors, a small cinema, a museum, the Cary Memorial Library, and many historic landmarks, including Lexington Common.
Hartwell Tavern is a historic American Revolutionary War site associated with the revolution's first battle, the 1775 battles of Lexington and Concord. It is located on North County Road, just off Battle Road in Lincoln, Massachusetts, and operated as a historic house museum by the National Park Service as part of the Minute Man National Historical Park. Built in 1733, in what was then Concord, it is staffed from Memorial Day (May) weekend to October by park rangers dressed in colonial attire who offer programs daily.
The Minute Man is an 1874 sculpture by Daniel Chester French in Minute Man National Historical Park, Concord, Massachusetts. It was created between 1871 and 1874 after extensive research, and was originally intended to be made of stone. The medium was switched to bronze and it was cast from ten Civil War-era cannons appropriated by Congress.
Amos Doolittle's engraving of the Battle of Lexington [lower-alpha 1]
Buckman Tavern in 2005
Lexington Battle Green in 2003, looking northwest
Inscription on the 1799 Revolutionary Monument
Memorial to the Lexington Minute Men (1948) by B. Paeff
The Minuteman Statue (1899) by H. H. Kitson, a bequest of Francis Brown Hayes to the Town of Lexington
