Centre/South History

One of America’s Earliest Neighborhoods
JP’s origins date to the mid-1600s, when the area was part of the Town of Roxbury. In 1851 JP and West Roxbury separated from Roxbury, and the area officially became the Town of West Roxbury. As the nation’s industrial revolution moved forward, demands for common water supplies, streets, and sewer systems made it necessary for the JP area to become a part of Boston. In 1874, JP separated from West Roxbury and formally became a Boston neighborhood.

Looking at today’s Centre Street it’s a hard to imagine the JP of colonial times, when the area was a summer resort for Bostonians and a home to wealthy farmers. Centre Street was always a major thoroughfare, serving as the only route connecting Boston to points south.

As JP moved into the 19th century, travel along Centre Street progressed from stagecoach to streetcars. With easy access to the Boston, Bostonians who wanted to live outside the city and commute to work began to move to JP in record numbers, creating one of America’s first suburban communities. JP also attracted thousands of Irish and German immigrants who came to the area to find work within the town’s factories and breweries, and to establish businesses on Centre Street.

*Into the twentieth century, JP was affected by the same economic cycles as other urban neighborhoods throughout the country. Challenging times were followed by periods renewal, spurred in great part by programs like Centre/South Main Streets. Now in 2004, the JP Centre/South neighborhood is a bustling, highly diverse downtown area.*

What’s in a name?
No discussion of JP’s history would be complete without a look at how the town got its unusual name. Some say the name “Jamaica Plain” reflects the colonists’ enjoyment of rum from Jamaica and the fact they liked their drink served “plain.”

Others think “Jamaica” was the name of a very hospitable Native American woman who lived on the shore of the pond. Another theory says the name can be attributed to Oliver Cromwell’s taking of Jamaica from the Spaniards in 1655 and the subsequent importation of Jamaican goods into nearby Boston. Whatever its exact origin, it is known from existing documents that the JP area was referred to as “Jamaica” as far back as the 1600s.*

*Information for this section was obtained from the excellent Jamaica Plain Historical Society web site, http://www.geocities.com/jphistoricalsociety/. Additional information came from Anthony Mitchell Sammarco’s wonderful book, Images of America: Jamaica Plain, published by Arcadia in 1997.

More information about JP’s community and history can be found through the Boston Public Library web site at: http://www.bpl.org/branches/jamaica.htm.