Harvard Square - Other Features

Other Features

At the center of the Square is the old Harvard Square Subway Kiosk, now a newsstand, Out of Town News, stocking newspapers and magazines from around the world. A video of it appears in transitional clips used on CNN. A public motion art installation, Lumen Eclipse, has been introduced at the Tourist Information Booth showing monthly exhibitions of local, national and international artists.

In the southwest area of the Square neighborhood, on Mount Auburn St, stands the Igor Fokin Memorial. This memorial, created by sculptor Konstantin Simun, pays tribute not only to the late "beloved puppeteer," but to all street performers that are an integral part of the square, especially during summer months.

The office of NPR's Car Talk radio show faces the square, with a stencil in the window that reads "Dewey, Cheetham & Howe," the fictional law firm often referenced on the show. The popular show references this by asking its viewers to send in answers to the "Puzzler" to "Puzzler Tower, Car Talk Plaza, Harvard Square, Cambridge (our fair city), MA 02138".

The sunken region next to the newsstand and the subway entrance is called "The Pit." Its arena-like appearance attracts skateboarders and, more generally, young, high-school aged people from surrounding neighborhoods who are associated with countercultural movements such as the punk, hardcore, straight edge, and goth subcultures. The contrast between these congregants and the often older and more conservatively dressed people associated with nearby Harvard University and the businesses in the Square occasionally leads to tension. Harvard sports teams and clubs, including the track teams and all-male social clubs, are known to make use of this contrast through encouraging or sometimes forcing their newest members to engage in humorous or humiliating performances in "The Pit" as part of these members' initiations into the group. Across the street to the east of the pit, an outdoor cafe features always-busy tables for chess players, including Murray Turnbull, with his ever-present "Play the Chessmaster" sign.

A number of other public squares dot the surrounding streets, notably Brattle Square and Winthrop Square, with a wide variety of street performers throughout the year. Brattle Street itself is home to the Brattle Theater (a non-profit arthouse theater) and the American Repertory Theater. The John F. Kennedy Memorial Park, one block further down JFK Street, is on the bank of the Charles River. Cambridge Common is two blocks north.

The square often attracts activists for the Communist Party USA, Lyndon LaRouche and other non-mainstream political factions. It is also known for its large number of panhandlers; Tom Magliozzi has called it "the bum capital of the world".

"The Garage" is a small, multi-story shopping mall, named thus because it was formerly a parking garage. The original car ramp has been preserved, and is a central feature of this adaptive reuse project. One of the main attractions in The Garage is a Newbury Comics store.