Looking back at Boston’s West End, and the forces that led to its destruction

A new lecture series at the West End Museum will take a closer look at the urban renewal efforts that led to the demolition of one of Boston’s most densely populated and diverse neighborhoods.

Titled “Reflections on Boston’s West End: The Origins & Lessons of Urban Renewal,” the seven-part series kicks off at the West End Museum on Feb. 19.

“Attendees will learn how an entire Boston neighborhood vanished, displacing about 7,500 people who called it home,” museum officials said in a press release. “Tenement houses with mom-and-pop storefronts fell to the wrecking ball, ultimately to be replaced by high-rises with professed suburban amenities, all in the name of progress. The destruction of the West End came to be seen as a landmark case in urban planning circles. Its simplistic, top-down approach became a textbook example of how NOT to transform a city. As Winston Churchill said, ‘Those who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat it.’”

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