Student/actors Emmaleigh DaSilva and Hana Belanger play teens who are discovering the history behind the Prospect Hill Tower in the CPA funded video George Washington on Prospect Hill?

By Jim Clark

A video tour of the Prospect Hill Tower, which was produced in association with and funded by the Community Preservation Act Committee, was premiered for those in attendance at the most recent regular meeting of the Board of Alderman on Thursday, February 23.

The presentation took place at the behest of Alderman At-Large Mary Jo Rossetti and Ward 3 Alderman Robert J. McWatters, who sponsored a resolution to have the video shown at the Board meeting.

Introductory remarks were made by Community Preservation Committee and Historic Preservation Commission Chair Dick Bauer, as well as the video’s actors, Hana Belanger, Emmaleigh DaSilva, and Lawrence Willwerth.

Bauer reminded those present that one of the first projects taken on by the CPA was the restoration of the Prospect Hill Tower. “For the first time in years, people can go up [the Tower],” Bauer said. “However, not everybody can go up, and so we also produced the video so that people can see what it would be like even if they themselves can not go up.”

Bauer then introduce the three actors featured in the video, beginning with Docent Lawrence Willwerth who read a prepared statement that said in part, “Thank you for the opportunity to introduce Prospect Hill and the history it witnessed. As a longtime Somerville resident-citizen soldier, I am honored to be a guide for all citizens to witness and to participate in our common history and heritage.”

Emmaleigh DaSilva, who plays one of the two teens in the video, offered her thanks to the city for making the video possible, saying, “I think it’s very important for so many youths in Somerville to watch this video because not many people know about the history that Prospect Hill has. As a Somerville resident, all my life I heard of it but hadn’t grasped the history behind it. So showing this video means a lot to me.”

Hana Belanger, who played the other teen, said of her experience, “I’m a disability advocate, and also an activist for disability, rare disease, mental illness, etc., and this film is really important to me because handicap accessibility around historical places is often either non-existent or not that easily accessible. This makes it hard for the disabled using mobility aids to access historic areas and get the full experience, as an able-bodied person would. Using modern technology and ingenuity, the disabled have access to historical sites just as well as their able-bodied peers.”

Prospect Hill Tower was built in 1903 with funds from the Union Square Women’s Organization to commemorate the site where the first American flag was raised during the Revolutionary War. The video, entitled George Washington on Prospect Hill?, provides viewers with a tour of the interior of the Tower, with views of Boston, Cambridge and Somerville from the top, and information about the history of Prospect Hill.

Because the Tower is closed during cold weather and the many stairs mean that not everyone can climb to the top themselves, the Community Preservation Committee, Board of Aldermen, and the City of Somerville wanted to provide an option to give people an immersive experience from the comfort of their own homes.

The video includes closed captioning in English, Portuguese, and Spanish with Haitian Kreyol coming soon. People who cannot climb the stairs are also encouraged to come to events at the Tower, as docents use smart phones to provide real time virtual tours for participants.

The video was created by local production company, Hendrix Productions. The cast includes local Somerville historian Willwerth, along with actors Belanger and DaSilva.

The information-packed, visually stunning video can be viewed by going to www.somervillema.gov/prospecthilltour.