It is roughly 8 miles (13 km) west of downtown Boston, and comprises a patchwork of thirteen villages.

It is served by several streets and highways (including Route 9, Hammond Pond Parkway, and the Mass Pike), as well as the Green Line D branch run by the MBTA.

Historically, the area that is now Newton was settled in 1639, and was originally first part of Cambridge (then called "the newe towne").

Roxbury minister John Eliot persuaded the Native American people of Nonantum, a sub-tribe of the Massachusett led by a sachem named Waban, to relocate to Natick in 1651, fearing that they would be exploited by colonists.

In the early 1600s, Watertown had claimed a large area of land on the south side of the Charles River (modern-day Newton).

Snuff, chocolate, glue, paper and other products were produced in these small mills but, according to Muir, the water power available in Newton was not sufficient to turn Newton into a manufacturing city, although it was, beginning in 1902, the home of the Stanley Motor Carriage Company, the maker of the Stanley Steamer.

Wealthy Bostonian businessmen took advantage of the new commuting opportunity offered by the railroad, building gracious homes on erstwhile farmland of West Newton hill and on Commonwealth Street.

Muir points out that these early commuters needed sufficient wealth to employ a groom and keep horses, to drive them from their hilltop homes to the station.

One wave began with the streetcar lines that made many parts of Newton accessible for commuters in the late nineteenth century.

Even then, however, Oak Hill continued to be farmed, mostly market gardening, until the prosperity of the 1950s made all of Newton more densely settled.

The hijackers of American Airlines Flight 11 spent their last night in Newton's Park Inn, an economy motel across the street from the Chestnut Hill Mall and within walking distance of The Atrium.

[8] Each April on Patriots' Day, the Boston Marathon is run through the city, entering from Wellesley on Route 16 (Washington Street) where runners encounter the first of the four infamous Newton Hills.

Residents and visitors line the race route along Washington Street and Commonwealth Avenue to cheer on the runners.

Newton is a suburban city approximately 7 mi (11 km) from downtown Boston, in Middlesex County.

Geologically Newton is located within the topographic lowland of the Boston Basin of the Appalachian Mountain chain.

[9][10] This lowland is surrounded by a ring of highland drumlins which were left after the last glaciation twelve thousand years ago.

[11][12] There are several unique outcroppings of rocks around Newton where geologic history revealing of how territory have formed and has changed over the past hundreds millions of years of drift supercontinents and ancient oceans, earthquake activity associated with volcanism and related faulting activity and changing climate.

The Boston Border Fault and the Shawmut anticline of Newton formed as the alpine mountains of east-central Massachusetts were created.

[13][14][15][16][17][18] Unique outcroppings rocks exposure has steadily declined as Newton area has become increasingly developed.

"[19] Rather than having a single city center, Newton is a patchwork of thirteen villages, many boasting small downtown areas of their own.

Hispanic or Latino residents of any race were 4.1% of the population (0.7% Puerto Rican, 0.6% Mexican, 0.4% Colombian, 0.3% Guatemalan, 0.3% Argentine).

Until July 2015, Newton was also home to the global headquarters of TripAdvisor, the world's largest travel site, reaching nearly 280 million unique monthly visitors.

The Green Line B branch ends across from Boston College on Commonwealth Avenue, virtually at the border of Boston's Brighton neighborhood and the City of Newton (an area which encompasses an unincorporated suburban village referred to as Chestnut Hill).

The MBTA Worcester commuter rail, serving the northern villages of Newton that are proximate to Waltham, offers less frequent service to Boston.

The northern villages are also served by frequent express buses that go to downtown Boston via the Massachusetts Turnpike as well as Waltham.

[112] The Massachusetts Turnpike (Interstate 90), which basically follows the old Boston and Albany Railroad main line right-of-way, runs east and west through Newton, while Route 128 (Interstate 95) slices through the extreme western part of the city in the Lower Falls area.