A Brief History of the Charlestown Navy Yard

When the Martinos Center moved to the Charlestown Navy Yard, it joined a long, proud history, dating back nearly two centuries to the beginnings of a nation.

On June 17, 1800, in honor of the 25th anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill, the first major battle of the American Revolution, the Massachusetts legislature approved the purchase of a tract of land along the water in Charlestown. Standing in the shadow of Bunker Hill, the land would serve as a shipyard for the nation’s young Navy, which had been commissioned only six years before. Purchase of the first 23 acres was completed on August 16, 1800, for the sum of $19,350.

The first ship built in the yard, the 18-gun sloop USS Frolic, was launched on June 22, 1813. The next 55 years saw the construction of another 38 ships and the repair and outfitting of many hundreds more. The new ships included the USS Merrimack, which launched in 1855. Rechristened the CSS Virginia, this vessel later fought in a pivotal battle in the American Civil War, where it engaged the USS Monitor in the first-ever meeting of iron-clad warships.

After the Civil War, the Charlestown Navy Yard underwent several periods of retrenchment and expansion. The latter included the years spanning the Spanish-American War and World War I as well as the years before and during World War II, when the United States created and maintained a two-ocean Navy. By the end of the 1940s, shipbuilding activities slowed to a virtual halt as the Navy focused its attention on the modernization of its existing fleet. The last ship to launch from Charlestown was the Land Ship Tank USS Suffolk County in 1956.

The Charlestown Navy Yard was decommissioned in 1974, after 174 years of operation and service to hundreds of vessels. The last ship to undergo repair in the Navy Yard was also the first: the USS Constitution, a heavy frigate launched in 1797 as one of the first six ships authorized by the Naval Act of 1794. The Constitution entered the public imagination during the War of 1812, where it earned the nickname “Old Ironsides” after British cannonballs appeared to bounce off its wooden hull. The world’s oldest commissioned naval vessel still afloat, it remains to this day in the Historic Monument Area of the Charlestown Navy Yard, where its crew of active-duty Navy personnel participates in educational programs and occasional special events.

In 1977, the Charlestown Navy Yard was designated a National Landmark. The City of Boston acquired the land the following year and commenced a major redevelopment effort. By 1989, this effort had grown into the largest preservation and reuse project in the country, with $469 million in private sector investment.

Building 149: the Heart of the Martinos Center

One of the centerpieces of the Navy Yard redevelopment plan was the structure known as Building 149. Completed in 1919, this structure served as a general storehouse for most of its time as a Navy facility. From 1965 until the Yard was decommissioned in 1974, it housed the Computer Applications Support and Development Office, or CASDO, which sought to standardize Management Information Systems for all navy yards through its centralized office design, computer analysis, programming and maintenance efforts.

The southwest corner of Building 149, circa 1960s

In the first years after the city acquired the land, developers envisioned Building 149 as a combination of retail space and condominiums and began to renovate the building with this in mind, thus accounting for the marble and brass finishes on the first floor.

By 1983, though, they had come up with a new plan: Building 149 and the adjoining Building 199 would be converted into a combined space called “The Hatchery,” with twelve stories of light industrial/ research facilities, two rooftop telecommunications common-carrier ground-to-satellite stations and 960 parking spaces for Navy Yard tenants, employees and visitors. According to a report submitted to the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA) in November 1983, the space would support growth of the electronics, biogenetics and technology fields and other fields then exploding in the Boston area. “The major thrust of ‘The Hatchery,’ ” the developers wrote, “is to provide the needed space to young entrepreneurial companies which are in the forefront of technological evolution.”

There was a hitch, though. The BRA, concerned about the potential for “unacceptable” traffic conditions, wanted to be sure traffic was kept under control as the redevelopment project advanced. A study showed that conventional office space would generate approximately 2.3 times as many vehicle trips per day as biomedical research space, so the BRA proposed a combination of the two in the Navy Yard, with office space generally not exceeding 50% of the overall mix. Presumably based on this new mandate, at least in part, the preferred use of Building 149 shifted to biomedical research.

The rest, of course, is the history you now hold in your hands.

The Marine barracks in the Charlestown Navy Yard, looking east toward the current location of Building 149, in the late 19th century