Massachusetts - 7 Million People and Four Centuries of Institutions
Massachusetts holds roughly 7 million residents on 10,555 square miles, making it the third most densely populated state. The commonwealth traces its English settlement to the Plymouth Colony in 1620 and the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630, and that long institutional history still shapes its economy. Boston, the capital and largest city, has about 675,000 people inside the city limits and anchors a metro area of 4.9 million that extends into southern New Hampshire and Rhode Island.
Higher education and medicine dominate the Boston region. Harvard University in Cambridge, founded in 1636, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, founded in 1861, sit a few miles apart along the Charles River. Tufts, Boston University, Northeastern, and Boston College add tens of thousands of additional students. Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women's, Beth Israel Deaconess, and Children's Hospital Boston form one of the most concentrated clusters of academic medicine in the world. The biotech and pharmaceutical corridor along Kendall Square in Cambridge houses Moderna, Biogen, Vertex, and hundreds of smaller firms.
Outside Greater Boston the state becomes less urban. Worcester, the second largest city at about 206,000, hosts a cluster of colleges and hospitals in central Massachusetts. Springfield and the Pioneer Valley along the Connecticut River form a separate metro area tied historically to manufacturing. The Berkshires in the far west are rural and forested, with tourism centered on Tanglewood, the Mass MoCA museum in North Adams, and the Appalachian Trail corridor. Cape Cod and the Islands see the state's population rise by several hundred thousand each summer.
The fishing ports of Gloucester and New Bedford remain commercially active, though scallops have overtaken cod as the dominant catch by value. New Bedford ranks as the highest-grossing commercial fishing port in the United States by dollar value of landings. Logan International Airport in East Boston handles more than 40 million passengers annually and is the busiest airport in New England.
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Massachusetts holds roughly 7 million residents on 10,555 square miles, making it the third most densely populated state. The commonwealth traces its English settlement to the Plymouth Colony in 1620 and the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630, and that long institutional history still shapes its economy. Boston, the capital and largest city, has about 675,000 people inside the city limits and anchors a metro area of 4.9 million that extends into southern New Hampshire and Rhode Island.
Higher education and medicine dominate the Boston region. Harvard University in Cambridge, founded in 1636, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, founded in 1861, sit a few miles apart along the Charles River. Tufts, Boston University, Northeastern, and Boston College add tens of thousands of additional students. Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women's, Beth Israel Deaconess, and Children's Hospital Boston form one of the most concentrated clusters of academic medicine in the world. The biotech and pharmaceutical corridor along Kendall Square in Cambridge houses Moderna, Biogen, Vertex, and hundreds of smaller firms.
Outside Greater Boston the state becomes less urban. Worcester, the second largest city at about 206,000, hosts a cluster of colleges and hospitals in central Massachusetts. Springfield and the Pioneer Valley along the Connecticut River form a separate metro area tied historically to manufacturing. The Berkshires in the far west are rural and forested, with tourism centered on Tanglewood, the Mass MoCA museum in North Adams, and the Appalachian Trail corridor. Cape Cod and the Islands see the state's population rise by several hundred thousand each summer.
The fishing ports of Gloucester and New Bedford remain commercially active, though scallops have overtaken cod as the dominant catch by value. New Bedford ranks as the highest-grossing commercial fishing port in the United States by dollar value of landings. Logan International Airport in East Boston handles more than 40 million passengers annually and is the busiest airport in New England.
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