Current residents of the area seem to converge on a broad definition of Inman Square as the region centered on the intersection of Cambridge and Hampshire Streets.

Inman also owned a "large, three-story rambling mansion" in a "little genteel Town about 4 Miles off (from Boston) calld Cambridge, where a number of Gentlemen's Families live upon their Estates."

Inman Square's origins lie in the growth of East Cambridge, starting at around 1790, when a group of financiers led by Andrew Craigie began buying up land around Lechmere Point, home to present-day CambridgeSide Galleria shopping mall, in an effort to build a toll bridge over the Charles River.

One of these roads was the Middlesex Turnpike, the present-day Hampshire Street, which connected Cambridge with Lowell and Boston, bringing regional traffic through the area.

From 1910 up until the early 1950s, streetcar, automobile, and foot traffic shuffled people to and from the square where architectural instead of transportation construction was taking place.

During this period commercial dwellings popped up to service the local community: drugstores, taverns, markets, bakeries, delis, and an insurance company were among the many stores that called Inman Square home.

The regional restaurant chain Legal Sea Foods began in Inman Square in 1950 as a fish market that also did a takeout business.

Alumni of the troupe include actors Josh Mostel, Judith Kahan Paul Kreppel and original Saturday Night Live cast member Jane Curtin.

Later, in the 1980s, at the Ding Ho[3][4] restaurant at 11 Springfield Street[5] (where Ole Mexican Grill is presently located), such comedians as Steven Wright, Jimmy Tingle, Bobcat Goldthwait, and club founder Barry Crimmins got their start.

[6][7] Most, including future Tonight Show host Jay Leno, began by performing between sets of musical acts at the "Ding", as it was known to locals.

[citation needed] Inman Square is a culturally diverse neighborhood, home to professionals, working people, and students and professors from neighboring MIT and Harvard.

Run by a group of artists, musicians and activists, it was a focal point for art, music and community activism, and fostered avant garde, experimental and underground work.

The piece was funded via the City of Cambridge’s Percent-for-Art ordinance, which requires that 1 percent of costs of municipal construction projects be spent to develop public artwork.