As we walk forward, we step back to 1729 when the Old South Meeting House was built. It was originally a Puritan meetinghouse for years and around the time of the Revolution, it became an influential site of debate and sharing of information. It even prompted the Boston Tea Party after Samuel Adams motioned that the Sons of Liberty set forth to the Boston Harbor to dump 342 chests of tea into the sea.
In the 19th century, there was a movement for the demolition of the Old South Meeting House. An organization called the "twenty women of Boston" along with notable Boston figures such as Louisa May Alcott and Ralph Waldo Emerson helped to raise enough money to purchase the building and save it from destruction. It's been a meeting house and museum since 1877.
