Somerville

Sister cities

• Ribeira Grande
• Gaeta

History

The area that would become Somerville was inhabited for thousands of years prior to European colonization, with multiple archaeological sites indicating habitation in the Mystic River watershed as early as the beginning of the Archaic Period (8000–1000 BCE). At the time of English contact in the 1600s, the Somerville area was inhabited by the Mystic Tribe of the Naumkeag people, headed by the Squaw Sachem and her son Wonohaquaham. Though no archaeological sites within Somerville have been identified from this time period, an indigenous settlement near College Hill in Somerville can be inferred from contemporary written records. The Mystic River continued to be an important regional core for the Naumkeag into the period of European colonization in the 16th and 17th centuries. which then included present-day Somerville. In 1639, his mother the Squaw Sachem deeded the land that would become Somerville to English settlers. The territory now constituting the city of Somerville was first settled by Europeans in 1629 as part of Charlestown. In 1629, English surveyor Thomas Graves led a scouting party of 100 Puritans from the settlement of Salem to prepare the site for the Great Migration of Puritans from England. Graves was attracted to the narrow Mishawum Peninsula between the Charles and Mystic rivers, linked to the mainland at the present-day Sullivan Square. The area of earliest settlement was based at City Square on the peninsula, though the territory of Charlestown officially included all of what is now Somerville, as well as Medford, Everett, Malden, Stoneham, Melrose, Woburn, Burlington, and parts of Arlington and Cambridge. From that time until 1842, the area of present-day Somerville was referred to as "beyond the Neck" in reference to the thin spit of land, the…

Geography

According to the United States Census Bureau, Somerville has a total area of , of which is land and , or 2.61%, is water. Somerville is bordered by the cities of Cambridge, Medford, Everett, Arlington and the Boston neighborhood of Charlestown. It is located on the west bank of the Mystic River. Millennia ago, glaciation left a series of drumlins running west to east across the landscape of what would become Somerville. These ridges would later become known as the "Seven Hills" of Somerville (like many other cities claiming to be built on seven hills, following the seven hills of Rome): # Central Hill # Clarendon Hill # Cobble Hill # Ploughed Hill (or Mount Benedict) # Prospect Hill (or Mount Pisgah) # Spring Hill # Winter Hill These hills rise from the floodplain of the Mystic River, and generally run west to east, providing views of Boston to the south and Medford/Everett to the north. Physical boundaries are also defined by prominent waterways: the Mystic River to the north, its tributary Alewife Brook to the west, and the Miller's River to the southeast. Land in early Somerville was used primarily as grazing commons and small farms. After the proliferation of the railroads in the area during the mid-1800s, industrialization transformed the landscape. In the 1800s, the Millers River was used as a sewer and dumping ground for local industry and would be ordered filled by the Commonwealth before the end of the century, for health reasons. As a result of landfill and the elimination of former Cobble Hill, the Millers River marsh was turned into railyards, slaughterhouses and other large-scale land uses. Somerville's commercial property is not concentrated in a recognized downtown central business district but instead is spread over many different nodes or…

Race & ethnicity

Most-observed species

• American Robin

  Turdus migratorius Linnaeus, 1766 · Aves
  172,571
• Blue Jay

  Cyanocitta cristata (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  158,406
• Northern Cardinal

  Cardinalis cardinalis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  143,404
• Black-capped Chickadee

  Poecile atricapillus (Linnaeus, 1766) · Aves
  133,287
• Mourning Dove

  Zenaida macroura (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  131,902
• House Sparrow

  Passer domesticus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  130,621
• Song Sparrow

  Melospiza melodia (A.Wilson, 1810) · Aves
  127,612
• Mallard

  Anas platyrhynchos Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  112,332

Largest nearby schools

• Lexington High
  High · Lexington · 2,303 students · 12.3:1 ratio
• Everett High
  High · Everett · 2,231 students · 13.4:1 ratio
• Newton North High
  High · Newtonville · 2,099 students · 10.9:1 ratio
• Cambridge Rindge and Latin
  High · Cambridge · 1,867 students · 8.7:1 ratio
• Malden High
  High · Malden · 1,856 students · 16:1 ratio
• Newton South High
  High · Newton Centre · 1,837 students · 11.8:1 ratio
• Waltham Sr High
  High · Waltham · 1,751 students · 10.9:1 ratio
• Mystic Valley Regional Charter School
  Other · Malden · 1,608 students · 16.8:1 ratio

Most recent

• M 3.8 — 2025-01-27
  9 km SE of York Harbor, Maine
• M 2.7 — 2023-12-23
  5 km SW of Chichester, New Hampshire
• M 3.6 — 2020-11-08
  10 km S of Bliss Corner, Massachusetts
• M 2.7 — 2018-02-15
  0 km SE of East Kingston, New Hampshire
• M 2.6 — 2015-01-13
  2 km E of Wauregan, Connecticut
• M 3.3 — 2015-01-12
  0 km NE of Wauregan, Connecticut