Boston, Mass – I am excited that I will be spending the next several months working on a series of guidebooks about Boston and New England, revisiting all the old favorite places and discovering some new ones. I always appreciate the opportunity to work in my own city, as there are way too many things to see and do than I can accomplish in my free time. Case in point: I have never brought the twins to the Mapparium, a unique, eye-popping creation at the Mary Baker Eddy Library.
The Mapparium is a small but worthwhile exhibit that asks the question: How do you see the world?
And the answer is completely unexpected. When you go to the Mapparium, you see the world from the inside out!
First, some background. Mary Baker Eddy is an extraordinary woman who founded the Christian Science Church. (And the First Church of Christ, Scientist, aka the Mother Church, is right here in Boston.) The church’s key teachings emphasize the healing power of prayer, eschewing medical intervention. Yes, she was out there.
But she was also a champion of women’s rights and a key player in the suffrage movement. She was a dedicated student of the Bible, focusing on how to incorporate its teachings into everyday life. And she was a prolific writer and publisher, founding the respected weekly newspaper The Christian Science Monitor. Eddy’s deep faith resulted in a truly global outlook, believing that an individual’s positive actions could and did change the world for the better. This is a philosophy I can get behind.
And that brings us to the Mapparium. This unusual piece of art is a vibrant, multicolored, stained-glass globe that is three stories high. Visitors walk right through the middle of it on a glass bridge. This offers a brand new perspective on the world – seeing it from the inside out.
The Mapparium has not changed since since it was created in 1935. So the globe is a sort of geopolitical “time capsule”, reflecting countries and borders as they were nearly a century ago.
Another fun feature is the acoustics, which broadcast the tiniest whisper across the entire room.
Outside the Mapparium, other exhibits highlight all the progress that humanity has made since 1935. This includes advancements in human rights, exploration, scientific breakthroughs, etc (not medical breakthroughs, but never mind).