University of Massachusetts Boston

The University of Massachusetts Boston, also known as UMass Boston, is an urban public research university and the third-largest campus in the five-campus University of Massachusetts system.

The university is located on 177 acres (0.72 km²) on the Columbia Point peninsula in the City of Boston, Massachusetts, United States. UMass Boston is the only public university in Boston. Students are primarily from Massachusetts but some are from other parts of the United States or foreign countries.

History

The University of Massachusetts Boston was established by vote of the state legislature in 1964. Freshmen classes started for 1,227 undergraduate students in September 1965 at a renovated building in the Park Square area of downtown Boston. The Founding Day Convocation was held December 10, 1966, at the Prudential Center in Boston. John W. Ryan was installed as the university's first chancellor. UMass Boston is part of the Greater Boston Urban Education Collaborative, In 1982 it merged with Boston State College (est. 1852).

Boston

Boston (pronounced ⁱ/ˈbɒstən/) is the capital and largest city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. Boston also served as the historic county seat of Suffolk County until Massachusetts disbanded county government in 1999. The city proper covers 48 square miles (124 km²) with an estimated population of 655,884 in 2014, making it the largest city in New England and the 24th largest city in the United States. The city is the economic and cultural anchor of a substantially larger metropolitan area called Greater Boston, home to 4.7 million people and the tenth-largest metropolitan statistical area in the country. Greater Boston as a commuting region is home to 8.1 million people, making it the sixth-largest combined statistical area in the United States.

One of the oldest cities in the United States, Boston was founded on the Shawmut Peninsula in 1630 by Puritan settlers from England. It was the scene of several key events of the American Revolution, such as the Boston Massacre, the Boston Tea Party, the Battle of Bunker Hill, and the Siege of Boston. Upon American independence from Great Britain, the city continued to be an important port and manufacturing hub, as well as a center for education and culture. Through land reclamation and municipal annexation, Boston has expanded beyond the original peninsula. Its rich history attracts many tourists, with Faneuil Hall alone drawing over 20 million visitors per year. Boston's many firsts include the United States' first public school, Boston Latin School (1635), and first subway system (1897).

University of Massachusetts

The University of Massachusetts is the five-campus public university system of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The system includes four universities, a medical school and a satellite campus. The system is accredited by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges and across its campuses enrolls 73,000 students.

The UMass system is ranked 57th in the World in 2015 for its Innovative Achievements according to Reuters and was ranked 91-100 in the world by reputation in 2015 by Times Higher Education World University Rankings.

In 2012, the state of Massachusetts introduced $607 million in new bond funding to advance high-quality instructional and research facility projects throughout the UMass system. In 2012, research expenditures for the UMass system were close to $600 million.

System

The University of Massachusetts Amherst is the flagship and largest school in the UMass system. It was also the first one established, dating back to 1863, when it was founded as the Massachusetts Agricultural College. The University of Massachusetts Medical School was founded in 1962, and is located in Worcester. The University of Massachusetts Boston, originally established in 1964, was merged with Boston State College in 1982. In 1991, the University of Lowell and Southeastern Massachusetts University joined the system as the University of Massachusetts Lowell and University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, respectively.

Just Imagine

Just Imagine is a 1930 American Pre-Code science fiction-musical comedy film, directed by David Butler. The film is known for its art direction and special effects in its portrayal of New York City in an imagined 1980. Just Imagine stars El Brendel, Maureen O'Sullivan, John Garrick and Marjorie White. The man from 1930 was played by El Brendel, an ethnic vaudeville comedian of a forgotten type: the Swedish immigrant.

The film starts with a preamble showing life in 1880, where the people believed themselves the "last word in speed". It switches to 1930, with the streets crowded with automobiles and lined with electric lights and telephone wires. It then switches to 1980, where the tenement houses have morphed into 250-story buildings, connected by suspension bridges and multi-lane elevated roads.

Plot

In 1980, J-21 (John Garrick) sets his aircraft on "hover" mode in New York, lands and converses with the beautiful LN-18 (Maureen O'Sullivan). He describes how the marriage tribunal had refused to consider J-21's marital filing and applications, and LN-18 is going to be forced to marry the conceited and mean MT-3 (Kenneth Thomson). J-21 plans to visit LN-18 that night.