ABSTRACT
Life in the eighteenth century did not only occur within the confines of four walls. Public spaces such as streets and gardens were as much a part of the social environment as interior spaces both public and private. In cities such as Philadelphia, Boston, and Charleston, the place of the street as a social space and significant to daily life for colonists has been lost. Public and private gardens have suffered a similar fate. For modern tourists to urban concentrations of historic sites such as Independence National Historical Park or old Charleston, the streets are merely a mode of conveyance to museums and historic homes, not locations of history themselves. Gardens at Colonial Williamsburg, Pennsbury, or Stenton are a place for visitors to eat lunch or for children to play, but not typically elements of the historical narrative. This lack of context for historic streets and gardens has been stagnant for ten years. While historiography continues to illuminate the significance of these spaces, interpretation has not kept apace. Visitors are left to consider these spaces in their modern context and not as part of a vibrant and knowable eighteenth-century life.
