Massachusetts
Looking for something to do? Try checking out one of these 11 oddball things to do in MA

People who swim in the winter at Walden Pond are a hardy bunch
Even in February, walkers at Walden Pond often see swimmers determined to do their own thing. It was in the 40s, sunny & the water was “very cold.”
Massachusetts is frequently listed as one of the top 10 states for tourism. Being a pivotal part of our nation’s founding and history, along with a rich cultural centers, this is not exactly news.
But destinations like Faneuil Hall, the Old State House, the New England Aquarium or Harvard Natural History Museum are on everyone’s list. These attractions will be on the front page of any tourist pamphlet or guidebook – and rightly so. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a wealth of other lesser known, unusual or weird things to check out in the Bay State that can be just as interesting.
Here’s a list of 11 things to see and do in Massachusetts that you may not have heard of, from passing curiosities to hidden daytrip destinations.
Places to spend an afternoon in Massachusetts
Places where you can go to spend an afternoon:
- Dr. Suess Museum, Springfield – Theodor Geisel, or better known by his pen name, Dr. Suess, was born in Springfield in 1904. In the summer of 2017, the city of Springfield opened a museum dedicated to the famed children’s author and his quirky, colorful books. The museum discusses the writer’s connection to the city, especially during his childhood years along with of course, interactive exhibits for kids based around his various stories and characters. Nearby is the Dr. Suess sculpture garden, featuring his most famous characters and the author himself.
- Hammond Castle Museum, Gloucester – A prolific inventor and personal friend of Thomas Edison, John Hayes Hammond Jr. was the quintessential wealthy eccentric. Some folks collect stamps, others collect…buildings? Hammond was known for picking any bits of buildings he liked while on his travels, which he would then put on display in his courtyard. The collection includes an ancient church archway of carved lava from Mt. Vesusvius. Oh, and someone’s house. With his love all things medieval, he built himself a literal castle in Gloucester – complete with drawbridge and secret passageways. Now a museum, visitors can explore his home, and the antiques and architecture he gathered from around the world.
- Whydah Pirate Museum, West Yarmouth – Named for the pirate ship of Captain Samuel Bellamy, this Cape Cod museum is home to the only authenticated pirate treasure on exhibit in the world. The loot, as well as about 200 other pirate artifacts, were collected in 1984 from the sunken wreck of the Whydah off the coast of Wellfleet, having been capsized in 1717 by one of Cape Cod’s famous nor’easters. This is currently the largest collection of pirate-related artifacts ever found on a single shipwreck.
Where you can go in MA for hidden history
For a state so steeped in history, it’s not surprising some things fell through the cracks. Here are few spots to stop by dedicated to historical factoids for the history buff and trivia lover in your traveling group.
4. Dinosaur footprints of Holyoke, Holyoke – This spot takes historic landmarks one step further into the realm of the prehistoric, dating back to the early Mesozoic era. Back then, the climate of this area was hot and semi-arid (think Arizona) rather than temperate like it is today. The valley here offered an important source of water to the animals, as well as ideal conditions to leave behind fossilized footprints. Now, it’s a seasonally open space, from April 1 to Nov. 30, free to the public, where you can literally follow in the footsteps of dinosaurs.
5. Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Concord – Sleepy Hollow Cemetery is the resting place of a number of Massachusetts’ most famous residents, such as Henry David Thoreau, Louisa May Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Nathanial Hawthorne, many of whom can be found in the section of the cemetery known as Author’s Ridge. But there are more recent historical figures entombed here who often get overlooked – Anne Rainsford French, the first woman ever to get a driver’s license in the United States. French received a license to operate four wheeled gas or steam powered vehicles when she was 21 years old on March 22, 1900. Anyone interested in the history of women’s rights or even automobiles should pay their respects. Her headstone is located near the intersection of Vesper Circle and Division Avenue, next to a small bush.
6. Telephone marker, Boston – A rather unassuming historical marker near the corner of Cambridge and Sudbury Street, on the grounds of the John F. Kennedy Federal Building, honors an event that had massive ramifications not only for national history, but human history. Especially if you’re reading this story on your smart phone. On June 2, 1875, Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas A. Watson were managed to transmit sound over wires for the first time in history. This initial experiment in Boston set the stage for the modern telephone. And everything else it has become.
Slightly creepy spots to visit in MA
If you feel your sightseeing tour isn’t complete without a dash of the macabre, there’s more than Salem out there.
7. S.K. Pierce Mansion, Gardner – Built by a wealthy furniture factory owner, this Victorian mansion has seen more than its fair share of death and tragedy, which many think has seeped into the very foundations of the building, with various reports of ghostly voices and other paranormal activity. As recently as 2011, a couple fled the house, having moved in two years prior, reporting frightening paranormal experiences. As of 2015, it’s been restored to its original state and is open for guided tours. Visitors and guests (because yes, of course people will pay to spend the night in a haunted house) have reported voices, screams, moving furniture, slamming doors, foul odors, strange shadows, sudden temperature changes, and more.
8. Dungeon Rock, Lynn – Hidden pirate treasure, ghosts, seances? Sounds like the trifecta of spookiness. Dungeon Rock itself is a rock formation in Lynn Woods reservation, where in 1852, a man excavated a cave looking for pirate treasure supposedly guided by the ghost of the treasure’s original owner. The area got its name from the story of pirate Thomas Veale, who hid in a cave with his loot, until he was killed in an earthquake that filled in the cave. Originally known as Pirate’s Dungeon, it was eventually shortened to Dungeon Rock. Enter Hiram Marble, who upon hearing the story, moved there and began searching for the treasure. He held seances to receive digging directions from the ghost of Veale himself. He never found any treasure, ghostly guidance or no, but it’s still worth checking out.
Odd spots in MA that you should visit
Random, strange things – good for an Instagram or Tik-Tok post – or postcard.
9. Webster Lake, Webster – A fairly unremarkable, if pretty, lake, Webster Lake’s official name is Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg. The lake has the honor of being the longest single-word place name in the country, and third in the world. Originally bearing the slightly shorter name of Chaubunagungamaugg, or “fishing place at the boundary” in the language of the indigenous people, it was a prime fishing spot. When settlers arrived, the name was expanded to its current version, which additionally described its status as a neutral fishing spot for both the settlers and the native people. If you’re wondering if anyone has tried to change the name in the intervening years – yes, in the 1950s. The town shut that down hard. Just about all standard lakeside recreation is available here, and if nothing else, you’ll make your conversation about the day at the lake slightly more interesting.
10. Museum of Bad Art, Boston – You’ve heard of New York’s MOMA, but what about Boston’s MOBA? The Museum of Bad Art is clearly predicated on the concept that beauty is in the eye of the beholder – even if said beholders are quite rare. The collection of, shall we say, unique paintings, began in 1994 when the founder took a painting out of a trash heap. Currently can be found at the Dorchester Brewing Company.
11. Head of the Egopantis, Shirley – Apparently, Massachusetts has – or had – its own cryptid. The egopantis was large creature that supposedly terrorized the settlers of the area, before being shot and killed by a local soldier. Now, its head is on display at the Bull Run Restaurant. Whether or not you believe you’re looking at the head of a mythical creature, the Bull Run is certainly worth a visit. The tavern was originally built in 1740 and allegedly got its name from an argument and brawl that broke out among the patrons shortly after hearing news about the First Battle of Bull Run in Virginia during the American Civil War.

Massachusetts
Facing economic uncertainty, Mass. lawmakers say they have agreement on state budget – The Boston Globe

Lawmakers plan to vote on the budget proposal Monday, they said, and send it to Governor Maura Healey. She will then have 10 days to review the bill. State law affords Healey the ability to veto specific items or sections, or return certain provisions with amendments.
In the meantime, state government won’t shut down. Healey has put forward a temporary spending bill that lawmakers are expected to pass as a stopgap while the governor reviews the year-long budget.
The nearly $62 billion proposal that House and Senate leaders negotiated will be, by most accounts, the most important piece of legislation to pass on Beacon Hill this year. It dictates how an array of state and quasi-public agencies are funded, spreads millions of dollars in earmarks to towns, cities, and projects, and often carries weighty policy implications.
The proposals represent a roughly 6 percent increase in state spending over the version Healey signed last summer.
Both versions of the budget, however, had spending differences.
The House, for example, carved out $187 million more more in funding for the cash-starved MBTA than the Senate did, while the Senate dedicated more money than the House for areas like education or housing, according to budget watchdog Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation.
The business-backed non-profit also said that the revenue estimates lawmakers used to build their budget may be overly generous, arguing that tax revenue may come in at least $600 million below what state officials’ projected for the July through June 2026 fiscal year based on current trends.
And that $600 million downgrade, MTF officials said, doesn’t even account for potential impacts of the Trump administration’s trade policies or the chance of an economic downturn. Accounting for those, the foundation wrote in a brief released Wednesday, “would likely result in a downgrade [of] over $1 billion.”
Just Friday, the Healey administration announced that the Trump administration cut more than $45 million in funding for to land conservation efforts across state, and cancelled a $25 million grant to Mass Audubon to protect forests and wetlands along the Connecticut River.
The state has so far been beating its revenue estimates this year. But that’s been fueled by revenue generated by the state’s surtax on wealthy residents and capital gains. They are both buckets of cash that state officials largely can’t use to balance the budget as a whole.
Whether a recession may hit the state or the country is also unclear. But budget-watchers have been warning lawmakers for months that they should dramatically pare back their spending plans and revenue projections. If tax revenue or federal help crumble, opening a hole in the budget, the decisions about what programs to cut could fall squarely on Healey to make.
The House and Senate’s roughly $61.5 billion proposals both seek to spend about $500 million less than what Healey proposed in January. But either version would push spending up 6.4 percent over the budget Healey signed last year, adding to an explosion in state spending since the time shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic.
The fate of several major policy initiatives also hangs in the balance.
The Senate, for example, attached a rider to its budget plan that would give local officials, not lawmakers on Beacon Hill, the power to determine the number of liquor licenses distributed in their city or town.
For decades, local officials have needed legislative approval to issue liquor licenses to restaurants and other businesses beyond a certain cap set in law, forcing them to navigate Beacon Hill’s sluggish home-rule petition process.
The Senate-passed proposal, which also sought to bar the transfer of liquor licenses between establishments, offered a potential sea change. It also faced immediate resistance in the House, where Majority Leader Michael Moran compared ceding legislative approval over the licenses to “political recklessness.”
The Senate’s budget also sought to make the state’s regional transit authorities fare-free, tucking in language banning them from charging passengers for rides while dedicating $40 million in revenue from the state’s surtax on wealthy residents to cover the costs. (The language was not in the House’s version.)
The House, meanwhile, moved to block a proposed change to lottery admissions for the state’s popular trade high schools, instead proposing to create a task force to make recommendations on admissions policies. (The Senate did not include that in its own plan.)
Both chambers included proposals they said would help protect renters from paying hefty broker’s fees, charges that typically amount to a month’s rent and which renters in virtually every other major American urban center are not obligated to pay.
But plans had stark differences. The Senate language put the onus of paying a fee on whoever “originally engaged and entered into a contract” with a broker, which is typically a landlord.
The House’s version left open the possibility of renters covering the fee if they “initiated contact” with the broker, which include by simply responding to an apartment listing.
Samantha J. Gross can be reached at samantha.gross@globe.com. Follow her @samanthajgross. Matt Stout can be reached at matt.stout@globe.com. Follow him @mattpstout.
Massachusetts
How a

Boston — For Arwa Ait-Chaib and her mother, Wafa El Hidar, summertime in Chelsea, Massachusetts, means trying to beat the heat.
“There are always some days that I feel like we live in the middle of the Sahara desert,” Ait-Chaib told CBS News.
Their Chelsea neighborhood, located just across the river from Boston, offers little shade.
“We had no trees over here at all,” El Hidar said.
Chelsea is plagued by what is known as the Urban Heat Island effect, where dense development and a lack of green space can cause some neighborhoods to bake.
“I just can’t stand it,” Ait-Chaib said. “It’s like, I feel sticky. It’s humid out, and if you go out the sun immediately burns your skin.”
Research from the nonprofit Climate Central shows peak temperatures in such urban areas can be 15 to 20 degrees Fahrenheit hotter than greener ones.
“We’re basically an island of hot stuff,” Bianca Bowman, a climate justice manager with GreenRoots, a local Boston environmental group, said of Chelsea.
GreenRoots is experimenting with cooling solutions on a single block in Chelsea that GreenRoots calls the “cool block.”
“We looked at those spots and said, ‘OK, where can we throw as many solutions as possible to cool those areas down?’” Bowman said.
In what it calls an “urban laboratory,” GreenRoots has planted more than 100 trees on the block, resurfaced the street in lighter colors to reflect heat, and painted nearby rooftops white. GreenRoots is partnering with the city of Chelsea on the project, which is receiving a combination of funding from the state and philanthropic foundations.
“So when you paint a rooftop white, it’s actually reflecting heat instead of absorbing heat,” Bowman said.
Fixes like these could help save lives as climate change makes heat waves worse. Climate Central research has found that 88% of 247 major U.S. cities now have more extremely hot summer days than they did 55 years ago. Climate Central defines an extremely hot summer day as one that has a maximum temperature hotter than 95% of all summer days between 1970 and 2024.
On Tuesday, Boston recorded a high of 102 degrees, the hottest June day in the city since 1872, according to the National Weather Service.
Boston University researchers are working with Chelsea residents this summer to study the problem even further. Some families are wearing small sensors to track heat exposure.
Their research shows parks, trees and green space can reduce peak urban temperatures by two to nine degrees Fahrenheit. Of course, finding space in big, crowded cities is not always easy, so those that design such spaces have to make the most of what they have.
A project is underway to replace pavement behind Ait-Chaib’s Chelsea home with a park that is being built by the city of Chelsea, but inspired by the “Cool Blocks” initiative. She says it feels like the neighborhood is improving.
Chris Reed, founder of the landscape architecture studio Stoss Landscape Urbanism, designed Boston’s groundbreaking Urban Forest Plan, first launched by the city in 2022. The plan established the city’s first urban forester position and urban forestry department. It also put in place procedures for preserving and extending the city’s tree canopy.
Under the plan, on one particular strip of land, about 400 trees were planted on just a single acre, Reed explains.
“So, you don’t need acres and acres and acres of land,” Reed told CBS News. “These kinds of places are in cities everywhere and can be transformed one by one.”
This story was produced in partnership with Climate Central.
Massachusetts
8-year-old pronounced dead after being found unresponsive in Clinton pond

An 8-year-old boy is dead after being pulled from the water Wednesday in Clinton, Massachusetts, authorities said.
Police responded around 2:30 p.m. to Lakeview Avenue after the child was found unresponsive in a nearby body of water, according to the Worcester County District Attorney’s Office and the Clinton Police Department. The road, home to the Clinton Housing Authority’s Harborview Apartments, is next to Mossy Pond.
The child was brought to an area hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
Authorities say the investigation is ongoing.
No further information was immediately available.
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