Waltham – On and Off the Western Greenway - March 16, 2022

 HIKE REPORT

Wednesday, 16 March 2022, Waltham – On and Off the Western Greenway

Hike Leaders:  Barbara Jacobs & Ted Nyder

5 miles, 10:00 am start from Waltham, MA

Hikers (14):  Barbara, Ted, Ann Northup, Betsy Harper, Jack Mroczkowski, Judy Perrin, Marie Keutmann, Marlene Heroux, Mike Hanauer, Richard Vignoni, Susan Broome, Susan Sabin, Zach Woods, and first-timer Sharon Ellis.

We had a lovely five-mile hike on the Western Greenway and carriage roads of Waltham and Belmont.  The hike took us through the old lands of the Metropolitan State Hospital, around Waltham and into Belmont, with a loop around Rock Meadows and into the Audubon Habitat.  It is an amazing area with a lot of history, including the MetFern Cemetery which has 296 graves of forgotten persons, from Metropolitan State Hospital and The Fernald School, buried in the woods of Waltham.  The people of the MetFern Cemetery - a name which is a combination of the two institution’s names - were buried between 1947 and 1979.  Their bodies are segregated by religion in a place that was designed to accept only two faiths.  There is a Catholic side and a Protestant side, yet, according to the website, there is a Muslim man buried here and there are Jews as well.  For more information see the website developed by students at Gann Academy in Waltham:  https://www.metferncemetery.org/

Report by Barbara Jacobs.