Editing Inman Square (section)

=== 19th century ===
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Inman Square's origins lie in the growth of [[East Cambridge, Massachusetts|East Cambridge]], starting at around 1790, when a group of financiers led by [[Andrew Craigie]] began buying up land around [[Lechmere Point]], home to present-day [[CambridgeSide Galleria]] shopping mall, in an effort to build a [[toll bridge]] over the [[Charles River]]. After Craigie's bridge was built, he constructed roads from the Lechmere area that had been laid out with a gridwork of streets. One of these roads was the [[Middlesex Turnpike (Massachusetts)|Middlesex Turnpike]], the present-day Hampshire Street, which connected Cambridge with Lowell and Boston, bringing regional traffic through the area. Craigie also laid out Cambridge Street, which would intersect with Hampshire, producing Inman Square in 1809.

By the 1860s, horse carts were common in the area and contributed to dwellings popping up along their routes. By 1900, full streetcar service was in the area, led by the Charles River Street Railway, which built its first railway through Inman Square in 1881. By 1874 the region was an urban center called both "Atwood's Corner" and "Inman Square." This ambiguity was fixed a year later in a petition that would make official the Inman Square moniker.