Moon Island (Massachusetts)
The area around Marina Bay was salt marsh leaving a much wider mouth to the Neponset River.
[3] On June 2, 1641, by order of the General Court of Elections in Boston, Moon Island came under the jurisdiction of the Town of Dorchester.
During 1775, armed British barges chased a Colonial raiding party from Long Island to Dorchester.
In 1850, Boston's first comprehensive public report blamed poor sanitary conditions for the high mortality rates among immigrants.
These drains discharged directly into local streams, bays, and from docks, polluting the harbor waters, poisoning the air, and leaving effluent on mud flats that surrounded Boston.
In 1878, the Massachusetts State Legislature approved the construction of the Boston Main Drainage System, which was supposed to handle the sewage from 18 cities and towns by pumping it to Moon Island for storage and release into Quincy Bay on the outgoing tides.
Initially, this area was a long narrow land-filled peninsula but has been subsequently expanded many times to accommodate development.
Four huge cut-granite storage tanks with a 50-million-US-gallon (190,000 m3) capacity were built by the Cape Ann Granite Company to handle the sewage.
These vats were formed by digging out the northern section of the hill and cementing and bricking the sides of the excavation.
The situation worsened until the incoming tides distributed the unprocessed sewage throughout the sand flats and beaches of Boston Harbor and Quincy Bay.
In 1889, The Metropolitan Sewerage District (MSD) was formed to build one of the first regional sewer systems in the United States.
By 1919, severe pollution from the Moon Island sewage outflow caused the closing of many of the clam beds and beaches in Boston Harbor and Quincy Bay.
In 1933, the pollution of Boston Harbor worsened to the point that all clams taken in the area required purification processing before sale or consumption.
In 1939, a legislature committee found that Quincy Bay and Hingham Harbor were "revolting" and "in violation of all public health requirements."
On August 4, 1951, then Secretary of Labor, Maurice J. Tobin, dedicated the two-lane steel bridge from Moon Head to Long Island.
In 1959, The Boston Fire Department constructed a fire-fighting training facility at the northern end of Moon Island.
In 1960, the Boston Police Department established an outdoor pistol range on the southern side of Moon Island.
As a result, the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA) was created to manage the cleanup of Boston Harbor.
Judge Troy made a judicial decision that prohibited the attachment of any new buildings or homes to the existing sewer system until a plan was established to solve the sewerage overflow problem in Boston Harbor.
In 1993, National Guard bulldozers, with little public notice, began clearing the woods on Moon Island for a firing range that was planned to have lights for night shooting.
Outraged local Squantum residents feared that the increased shooting on Moon Island would endanger them or even passing boat operators.
In 1996, the Boston Globe reported that Mayor Tom Menino and MIT engineer Clifford Goudey were planning a program to revitalize the aquaculture system in Boston Harbor and use the great tanks on Moon Island as a fish farm or a temporary home for tuna or lobster.
