Historian Dee Morris continues her four-part series, "Medford's Compass Points," in which she discusses the city's four "cardinal point" neighborhoods. Today's focus will be on South Medford. Following Main Street from Medford Square and going past the 18th-century Royall House and Slave Quarters, you quickly arrive in the heart of South Medford. This densely populated neighborhood sits on a level plain except for the gradual rise of Winter Hill. Here in the 1880s, Mystic Trotting Park offered exciting harness races…

The Medford-Brooks Estate Land Trust introduces a new lecture series with the program, "Medford’s Brooks Estate: A Gift from the Past, a Legacy for the Future," an illustrated talk by M-BELT president Tom Lincoln. The Brooks Estate is 50 acres of conservation land, graced by Brooks Pond, wooded walking trails, and the historic Shepherd Brooks Manor and Carriage House. Owned by the residents of Medford since 1942 and permanently protected in 1998, the property is located on the northwest corner of…

The Medford Historical Commission presents "Keeping the Memories Alive," an evening full of history, near and far. Hear Hamilton resident Vern Chandler share his extraordinary journey in the footsteps of his relatives who participated in World War II. Among them was Private Kenneth E. Miller of Medford. He gave his life in defense of freedom and never returned home. Miller is memorialized overseas and a local family has adopted the grave of this fallen American liberator. Chandler will share the…

The Medford Public Library is presenting an online program, "Discovering American Drag," hosted by Matthew Wittmann, curator of the Harvard Theatre Collection. Wittmann will offer a virtual look at the history of drag performance in the United States through photographs, ephemera, and a variety of other archival materials held by Houghton Library at Harvard University. Register for the Zoom link through the library's online calendar.  

The Medford Historical Society & Museum present the program “ 'Coming Together' with Frederick Law Olmsted," with speaker Isabel Schulman of Frederick Law Olmsted National Historic Site in Brookline. As the nation's first landscape architect, Olmsted designed parks with purpose: to better connect people with their health, their spirit, with nature and with each other. Olmsted wrote how time spent in a public park could animate local citizens “with a common purpose . . ., each individual adding by his…

Medford historian Dee Morris's summer walking tour for 2023 is "The South Medford Experience," where famous horse racing tracks became a community of homes. In the summer of 1866, two investors threw open the gates of Mystic Trotting Park to a crowd in love with harness racing. The South Medford race track, supplied with over 100 horses, fronted on Main Street at Tufts Square. By the 20th century, these acres evolved into streets filled with comfortable homes owned by Italian…