Boston. Cultural life and recreation. Libraries and museums

The arts. Boston has long been a great cultural center. The distinguished Boston Symphony Orchestra performs from mid-September through April at Symphony Hall in Back Bay. The Boston "Pops " Orchestra presents concerts of light music at Symphony Hall in May and June.

The "Pops" gives free outdoor concerts during July in Hatch Memorial Shell on the Esplanade, a park on the south bank of the Charles River. The New England Conservatory of Music, the nation’s oldest music school, also offers many concerts. The Boston Ballet and the Boston Lyric Opera have won critical acclaim.

The Boston "Pops" Orchestra gives free outdoor concerts during July in Hatch Memorial Shell on the Esplanade, a riverbank panic. The performance shown here celebrates the Fourth of July.

The areas professional theater groups include the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge. In addition, dozens of community and college theater groups are active in Greater Boston.

Libraries and museums. The Boston Public Library, founded in 1 854, was the first major free library in the United States. The massive main library in Copley Square is a city landmark. The Boston Athenaeum, a small, private library in the downtown area, has many rare volumes, including books owned by George Washington, the first president of the United States.

The libraries at Harvard, the Massachusetts State House, and many Boston museums attract scholars from throughout the world. The John F. Kennedy Library has papers and mementos of the 35th president of the United States.

The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston's largest museum, stands in Back Bay. Its art collection represents nearly every culture of the last 5,000 years. The museum's large exhibits of American art; Asian art; ancient Egyptian, Greek, and Roman art; and French Impressionist paintings are especially outstanding. Nearby, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum houses Renaissance paintings and sculptures in a beautifully furnished mansion. The Institute of Contemporary Art in Back Bay and Harvard University's Fogg Museum also have fine art collections.

Boston's Museum of Fine Arts is the city's largest museum, its outstanding collections include sculpture from ancient Egypt, shown here, Greece, and Rome.

Boston's huge Museum of Science stands on the Charles River Dam Bridge. The museum has a dinosaur model, a machine shop, and displays of airplanes, ships, and spacecraft. The museum also includes the Charles Hayden Planetarium, which shows the movements of the stars and planets.

The New England Aquarium on Central Wharf has hundreds of kinds of fish and other water animals. The Children's Museum in South Boston lets visitors operate a computer and make toy tops on an assembly line. The Arnold Arboretum in Jamaica Plain is a 265-acre (107-hectare) park and forest with thousands of kinds of trees and shrubs.

Recreation. Boston has more than 4,500 acres (1,820 hectares) of public parks. Franklin Park, the city's largest park, is in Dorchester. The park includes a main zoo, a children's zoo, and an African tropical forest. Nine public bathing beaches lie along Boston Harbor in the communities of Dorchester, East Boston, and South Boston. A massive harbor sewerage project, completed in 2000, greatly improved water quality.

Bostonians are enthusiastic fans of the city's four professional sports teams. The Boston Red Sox of baseball's American League, the Boston Celtics of the National Basketball Association, and the Boston Bruins of the National Hockey League play their home games in the city. The New England Patriots of the National Football League play in a south suburban stadium.

A traditional Boston sports event takes place on Patriots' Day, the third Monday in April. Thousands of people compete in the Boston Marathon, a foot race of 26 miles 385 yards (42.2 kilometers) from the suburb of Hopkinton to Back Bay.