Thank you to the seventy or so who joined us Sunday evening at Decia Goodwin and Brian Conway’s for a very upbeat fundraiser featuring DCR’s Director of Cultural Resources, Patrice Kish; The Cambridge Historical Commission’s Ex. Director Charles Sullivan; Cambridge’s Director of Community Planning, Stuart Dash; and historic building expert Bill Finch, who’s working on the historic structure report for the powder magazine. The presenters shared a rendering of the powder magazine as we think it was originally and of what it could be come next. Sullivan also shared a newly discovered image of the 1818 powder magazine—without roof—found in the Cambridge Historical Society collection. Let us stabilize the building and fix the roof before the structure is reduced to a ruin once more!
The Old Magazine, 1890s
Courtesy of the Cambridge Historical Society, Old Cambridge Photographic Club Collection
Recent CRLS graduate Augie Cummings debuted his five-minute film, “Magazine Beach,” starring Cambridge historians Marilyn Wellons and Nina Cohen and landscape architect Bertha Pantoja. The film, just below, presents the history of Magazine Beach and it possibilities. Thank you to the New England Grassroots Environmental Fund for funding this project.
What a lovely gathering of community around a cause—to make improvements to our local park. We’re starting first with the powder magazine. Sullivan has said it is the oldest and possibly the most significant building on the Charles River Basin.
It’s not too late to make a donation. Send checks to CNA Board Member Olivia Fiske at 131 Magazine St., #2, Cambridge, MA 02139.
Photographs of the party by Mason D. Cox.
Magazine Beach 
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