1701–1798
1701-1708
The Kemble house becomes the first writing school in the North End, with Captain and Mrs. Kemble's daughter, Mrs. Sarah Knight, as teacher. Benjamin Franklin and Samuel Mather will later attend this school.
1708
Sun Court Street, Moon Street, Garden Court Street and Bell Alley (now Prince Street) are named.
1711
Colonel Thomas Hutchinson inherits the John Foster Mansion on Garden Court Street. His son, Thomas Hutchinson, later governor of Massachusetts, resides there until the Revolution. Clark Mansion, on the corner of Garden Court Street and North Square, is built. Clark, a wine merchant, builds his house to vie with the Hutchinsons. Moses Pierce's mother builds a house two doors away from what is now the Paul Revere House.
1714
New North Meeting House is built, a commodious wooden building on North (now Hanover) Street. Rebuilt in 1803 by architect: Charles Bulfinch, this church is now known as St. Stephen's.
1721
New North Brick Church on Middle (now Hanover) Street built by congregants protesting the selection of a new minister at New North. Shem Drowne crafts a gilded cockerel weathervane for the spire. (Drowne later makes the grasshopper wearthervane for Faneuil Hall.) The cockerel weathervane, symbolizing the cock that crowed the morning after Peter denied Christ three times, served as a warning to the faithful.
1723
Disturbance occurs at the installation of Peter Thacher at New North Church, "so great it could no1 be regularly performed."
1734
Town of Boston appropriates £300 for erecting three permanent market buildings, one each in North Square, Dock Square and in the South End near Boylston Street. All three markets open on June 4. A bell rings for opening at sunrise and closing at one PM. Clark's Square becomes known as North Square when a market is established there. Many citizens oppose fixed markets due to fears of increased prices and that fixed markets may be a precursor to the establishment of the Anglican Church.
1737
A mob of men with blackened faces, some of whom are dressed as clergy, saw support posts; of the market house in North Square at midnight.
1765
In retaliation for the Stamp Act, a mob attacks and sacks Governor Thomas Hutchinson's mansion on Garden Court Street, scattering historical papers.
1770
Triangular in shape, North Square is cobbled with beach pebbles and features a town pump, public market and guardhouse. British troops are quartered in houses surrounding the square. Paul Revere purchases the former Howard house.
1771
Paul Revere illuminates drawings in the windows of his house to mark the first anniversary of the Boston Massacre. “Thousands" view the spectacle from North Square and are "struck with a solemn silence, and their countenances covered with a melancholy gloom" according lo a period newspaper.
1774
Revere attends a meeting to advise the city on the location of street lights in North Boston. On March 2, 310 street lights in Boston are lit for the first time. A twenty-pound fine is levied for damage to a lamp. Selectmen are empowered to remove posts or signs that block light from the lamps, and order the owners to take them down. If not removed in 48 hours, owners are fined six shillings for every 24 hours the obstructions remain in place. Boston's population is 16,000.
1775
Captain Atkins, a neighbor of Paul Revere, assists British troops in taking down Old North Meeting House for firewood to supply the transports sailing to England with the sick. Some suspect that the Meeting House was razed in part to make space for drilling troops. British abandon heavy guns and howitzers at Copp's Hill after the battle of Bunker Hill.
1786
The site of the Old North Meeting House is purchased by Dr. John Lathrop, who builds a "fine house" there. Five retail liquor licenses are held by North Square proprietors.
1788
Clark's Square is officially renamed North Square.
1789
A market for selling wood is established in North Square replacing the food market.
1798
Tax list reveals that 70 percent of the houses in the square are wooden rather than brick. Houses average 400-800 square feet.