Local city information for Lexington, MA

Lexington is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 30,355 at the 2000 census.

The town is famous for being the site of the opening shots of the American Revolution, in the Battle of Lexington on April 19, 1775.

Lexington was first settled circa 1642 as part of Cambridge, Massachusetts. What is now Lexington was first incorporated as a Parish, called Cambridge Farms, in 1691, and was incorporated as a separate town in 1713. It was then that it got the name Lexington. How it received its name is the subject of some controversy. Some people believe that it was named in honor of Lord Lexington, a British nobleman. Some, on the other hand, believe that it was named after Lexington (which was pronounced and today spelled Laxton) in Nottinghamshire, England.

In the early Colonial days, the Vine Brook, which runs through Lexington, Burlington, and Bedford, and then empties into the Shawsheen River, was a focal point of the farming and industry of the town. It provided for many types of mills, and later, in the 20th Century for farm irrigation.

For decades, Lexington showed modest growth while remaining largely a farming community, providing Boston with much of its produce. It always had a bustling downtown area, which remains so to this day. Lexington began to prosper, helped by its close proximity to Boston, and having a rail line (originally the Lexington and West Cambridge Railroad, later renamed, and now the Minuteman Bikeway) service its citizens and businesses, beginning in 1846. For many years, East Lexington was considered a separate entity from the rest of the town, and it still retains its own sense of identity, due in part to some of its blue-collar neighborhoods, a contrast to many of the wealthier parts of town. Most of the farms of Lexington became housing developments by the end of the 1960s.

Lexington, as well as many of the towns along the Route 128 corridor, experienced a jump in population in the 1960s and 70s, due to the high-tech boom. Property values in the town soared, and the school system became nationally recognized for its excellence. The town participates in the METCO program, which buses minority students from Boston to suburban towns to (in theory)receive a better education in a safer environment than in Boston Public Schools.

On April 19, 1775, Lexington was the location of the first battle of the American Revolutionary War. Every year, on the third Monday of April, the town observes Patriots' Day. Events begin with Paul Revere's Ride, with a special re-enactment of the Battles of Lexington and Concord. At 6 a.m., there is a re-enactment of the skirmish on the Battle Green, with shots fired from the Battle Green and the nearby Buckman Tavern (to account for the fact that no one knows where the first shot was fired from, or by whom). After the rout, the British march on toward Concord. The battle in Lexington allowed the Concord militia time to organize at the Old North Bridge, where they were able to turn back the British and prevent them from capturing and destroying the militia's arms stores.

Throughout the rest of the year many tourists enjoy tours of the town's historic landmarks such as Buckman Tavern, Munroe Tavern, and the Hancock-Clarke House, which are maintained by the town's historical society.

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