Faneuil Hall (first) opens.

Architect: John Smibert. The wooden building hosts a town meeting at today’s 4 South Market Street. Its construction was supported by merchant Peter Faneuil and James Otis later calls the building the Cradle of Liberty, although it was financed, at least in part, by profits made by Faneuil in the slave trade. The building includes a first-floor market (whose stalls are empty for decades due to merchants protesting their existence) and a second floor that serves as Boston Town Hall and the home of the Massachusetts General Court and Supreme Judicial Court. The building soon falls into disuse, and is closed periodically between 1747 and 1753. Badly damaged by fire on January 13, 1761, its reconstruction is financed through a public lottery, and it reopens on March 14, 1763. It is almost completely rebuilt and enlarged dramatically in 1806.*