The Naked Truth about Worcester's Turtle Boy

(A photo of Worcester's infamous Turtle Boy statue that I just saw on Facebook inspired me to re-post  from August 2010 my inside story of the 102-year-old statue, which has earned a web site, its own song and an endless number of smutty jokes.  When you read Turtle Boy's story, keep in mind that this was written four years ago and some of the events celebrating him that are mentioned here may no longer be available.)

Once upon a time, (in 1905 to be exact), in the city of Worcester, MA, there was a wealthy woman named Harriett P.F. Burnside who worried about the poor horses who pulled carriages and carts all over town. And she wanted to do something to honor the memory of her late father, a prominent Worcester attorney. So she gave $5,000 to the city of Worcester to create a fountain in Central Square that would provide four drinking basins for the thirsty horses (and a lower trough for the city’s dogs.)

The artist chosen to design the sculpture that would be the fountain was Daniel Chester French, famous for the seated statue of Old Abe at the Lincoln Memorial, but he was so busy that he gave the job to his protégé Charles Harvey, who designed and sculpted it. When Harvey died, (slashed his own throat in Bronx Park because of “phantom voices of unseen persons who bade him take his life” as The New York Times described it in Jan.,1912) another sculptor called Sherry Fry finished it and it was unveiled to Worcester in 1912. By then automobiles were beginning to crowd out the city’s horses.

What the schizophrenic Harvey created was a statue of a naked boy riding on the back of a hawksbill sea turtle, who seems to be in mid-flight. Originally water gushed from the turtle’s mouth, but like many things in Worcester, the fountain outlived its usefulness, and in 1969 the sculpture was moved across the street to a spot behind City Hall.

The statue, universally called “Turtle Boy” by Worcester natives, has had a colorful career. In April of 1970, according to Albert Southwick of the Worcester Telegram, vandals struck and the extremely large and heavy statue vanished. Several months later it reappeared just as mysteriously. According to Southwick “It was said that the Worcester police had agreed not to prosecute whoever was responsible.”

Southwick also revealed that “many years ago” Margaret Getchell, daughter of a noted Worcester physician, wrote a children’s book “The Cloud Bird” of eight chapters—each chapter about a Worcester landmark. Chapter eight, “The Adventurer in Armor” tells about a girl named Dorothy Ann who approaches Turtle Boy and sees that he is struggling to hold the Turtle in place. The boy tells her the turtle is “a great adventurer. See he is girding up his armor now.”

Dorothy Ann learns that the boy is a faun who persuades the girl to climb on the back of the turtle with him. It immediately runs down the street “all four legs going so fast you could barely see them.” They reach the ocean, the turtle leaps off a high rock cliff and sinks down into the green waters below. The peculiar trio spend a day sporting in the water until the Turtle truckles back to Salem Square.

According to Wikipedia, “Turtle Boy has become a mascot for Worcester in a way analogous to the Little Mermaid in Copenhagen.”

But if you study my Turtle Boy photo above, you will see that, unlike the Little Mermaid in Copenhagen, our city’s mascot, like so many other things in Worcester, is a little weird. A hundred years ago no one smirked at the statue and made smutty remarks about the relationship of Boy to Turtle, but nowadays, when WAAF personality Hill Man declared Turtle Boy to be one of the 25 great places in Massachusetts and interviewed passers-by on camera as to what exactly they thought was happening between the boy and the turtle, most of them blushed and waffled about an answer.

The boy’s infamous love affair with the Turtle has made him a huge favorite. “Turtle Boy is the reason I decided to stay in Worcester” declared Scott Dezrah Blinn on the website “Worcesterturtleboy.com.”  Yes, Turtle Boy has his own website. He also has a fan club on Facebook. A yearly Turtle Boy Music Award caps a series of third Thursdays when local musicians vie for the honor.

If you want more, I suggest that you check into the Turtle Boy website, created by Claudia Snell, and click on the video of the Roadkill Orchestra, Dr. Gonzo’s house band, performing their song “Turtle Boy” at Dr. Gonzo’s Xtreme Freaky Tiki Grilling Championship on 6/3/10. (Dr. Gonzo’s store, which features “Uncommon Condiments” along with musical performances, is also one of Worcester's landmarks.)

As you can see, Turtle Boy’s popularity is boundless among his followers in Worcester, who lovingly refer to their city as "Wormtown" and “The Paris of the Eighties”.

The Saga of Turtle Boy

Once upon a time,(in 1905 to be exact), in the city of Worcester, MA, there was a wealthy woman named Harriett P.F. Burnside who worried about the poor horses who pulled carriages and carts all over town. And she wanted to do something to honor the memory of her late father, a prominent Worcester attorney. So she gave $5,000 to the city of Worcester to create a fountain in Central Square that would provide four drinking basins for the thirsty horses (and a lower trough for the city’s dogs.)

The artist chosen to design the sculpture that would be the fountain was Daniel Chester French, famous for the seated statue of Old Abe at the Lincoln Memorial, but he was so busy that he gave the job to his protégé Charles Harvey, who designed and sculpted it. When Harvey died, (slashed his own throat in Bronx Park because of “phantom voices of unseen persons who bade him take his life” as the New York Times described it in Jan.,1912) another sculptor called Sherry Fry finished it and it was unveiled to Worcester in 1912. By then automobiles were beginning to crowd out the city’s horses.

What the schizophrenic Harvey created was a statue of a naked boy riding on the back of a hawksbill sea turtle, who seems to be in mid-flight. Originally water gushed from the turtle’s mouth, but like many things in Worcester, the fountain outlived its usefulness, and in 1969 the sculpture was moved across the street to a spot behind City Hall.

The statue, universally called “Turtle Boy” by Worcester natives, has had a colorful career. In April of 1970, according to Albert Southwick of the Worcester Telegram, vandals struck and the extremely large and heavy statue vanished. Several months later it reappeared just as mysteriously. According to Southwick “It was said that the Worcester police had agreed not to prosecute whoever was responsible.”

Southwick also revealed that “many years ago” Margaret Getchell, daughter of a noted Worcester physician, wrote a children’s book “The Cloud Bird” of eight chapters—each chapter about a Worcester landmark. Chapter eight, “The Adventurer in Armor” tells about a girl named Dorothy Ann who approaches Turtle Boy and sees that he is struggling to hold the Turtle in place. The boy tells her the turtle is “a great adventurer. See he is girding up his armor now.”

Dorothy Ann learns that the boy is a faun who persuades the girl to climb on the back of the turtle with him. It immediately runs down the street “all four legs going so fast you could barely see them.” They reach the ocean, the turtle leaps off a high rock cliff and sinks down into the green waters below. The peculiar trio spend a day sporting in the water until the Turtle truckles back to Salem Square.

According to Wikipedia, “Turtle Boy has become a mascot for Worcester in a way analogous to the Little Mermaid in Copenhagen.”

But if you study my Turtle Boy photo above, you will see that, unlike the Little Mermaid in Copenhagen, our city’s mascot, like so many other things in Worcester, is a little weird. A hundred years ago no one smirked at the statue and made smutty remarks about the relationship of Boy to Turtle, but nowadays, when WAAF personality Hill Man declared Turtle Boy to be one of the 25 great places in Massachusetts and interviewed passers-by on camera as to what exactly they thought was happening between the boy and the turtle, most of them blushed and waffled about an answer.

The boy’s infamous love affair with the Turtle has made him a huge favorite. “Turtle Boy is the reason I decided to stay in Worcester” declared Scott Dezrah Blinn on the website “Worcesterturtleboy.com.”

Yes, Turtle Boy has his own website. He also has a fan club on Facebook and often stars in the Worcester Magazine cartoon Zanzo Moxie by Veronica Hebard. A yearly Turtle Boy Music Award caps a series of third Thursdays when local musicians vie for the honor.

If you want more, I suggest that you check into the Turtle Boy website, created by Claudia Snell, and click on the video of the Roadkill Orchestra, Dr. Gonzo’s house band, performing their song “Turtle Boy” at Dr. Gonzo’s Xtreme Freaky Tiki Grilling Championship on 6/3/10.

Turtle Boy’s popularity is boundless among his Wormtown followers, which is why I included his photo in the Worcester icons featured in the “Welcome to Worcester” art show now on view at the Futon Company on Highland Street throughout September. (Dr. Gonzo’s store, which features “Uncommon Condiments” along with musical performances, is also one of the landmarks celebrated in my digitally enhanced photos and Doug Chapel’s illustrations.)

The reception for the “Welcome to Worcester” show, at the Futon Company store, 129 Highland Street, opposite the Sole Proprietor Restaurant, will be held on Thursday Sept. 9 from 6 to 8 p.m. offering goodies from another Worcester icon—Coney Island Hot Dogs.

College students new to Worcester are especially welcome to drop by and learn more lore about the city its inhabitants lovingly call “The Paris of the Eighties”.

Tales Of Worcester's Famous Diners and Other Icons

(Please click on these photos to make them bigger--wish I knew why they appear so small here!)

On Friday I took to the Futon Company the photos I had framed for the “Welcome to Worcester” art exhibit which opens today and lasts until Sept. 30. The owner of the Futon Company, Elizabeth Hughes, came up with the idea of putting together a show celebrating certain Worcester landmarks as portrayed by two artists in different media: Doug Chapel’s illustrations and my digitally enhanced photographs.

On Sunday, Aug. 8, the show will move across Highland Street to the parking lot of the Sole Proprietor Restaurant, as part of “Art in the Parking Lot” . And on Sept. 9, from 6 to 8 p.m. there will be a reception at the Futon Company, 129 Highland Street, which will include hot dogs from Coney Island, whose famous sign is featured on the postcard for the show.

Here is a sneak preview of the photos I took. (Don’t know how many of them will be hung on the walls, but smaller, inexpensive prints of all these and more will be for sale at “Art in the Parking Lot” on Aug. 8.)



The Owl Shop, on Main Street, was opened in 1946 by George Photakis, offering tobaccos, cigars, pipe tobaccos, even hookahs. George’s son John Photakis took it over in the seventies but died in a fatal car accident in 2002 at age 51. His son Zack now runs the store.The Owl Shop, with its green-eyed neon owl, has been attracting photographers for over 60 years. I printed a day photo and a night one, but I think my favorite is a shot of just the sign with the Italianate tower of City Hall looming behind it.


The Boulevard Diner is even more a magnet to photographers. (Madonna ate spaghetti here one night after her show at the Centrum. ) It’s the most beautiful of Worcester’s famous diners. (I hope you know that just about all the diners in the Northeast were produced in Worcester at the Worcester Lunch Car Company.) The “Bully” was #730, produced in 1936 and was put on the National Register of Historic Places in 2000. It’s open 24 hours a day, seven days a week except for Sunday nights. I tried both day and night shots of this iconic diner, which frequently has a host of motorcycles parked outside. My favorite is the photo in the center with the word “Diner” against the sky. It has a lonely Edward Hopper atmosphere even though the people are hanging out together—yet they seem isolated in the glare of the neon.



The Aurora on Main Street was originally an elegant hotel built in 1897, but it deteriorated drastically along with the neighborhood. It was rehabilitated to be inexpensive apartments, especially for artists. Arts Worcester has its gallery and headquarters in the building, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1988. I shot the building at an angle to capture the feeling of the neighborhood. Then I noticed the reflection of the Aurora in a window of what I think is an empty store—perhaps it’s public art, judging from the mannequins. I thought the reflection provided an interesting perspective on the venerable Victorian tenement.



The Corner Lunch and Miss Worcester are two more of the famous Worcester Diners. Corner Lunch on Lamartine Street, no longer in its prime, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2000. Everyone raves about its breakfasts. According to one fan, it was originally in Babylon, NY only to make it to Worcester in 1968.

A block away, at 302 Southbridge Street, is the Miss Worcester Diner. According to Wikipedia: “ Worcester Lunch Car # 812 was built in 1948 by Worcester Lunch Car Company and is located across the street from the company's (now defunct) Worcester factory. While independently owned and operated, it was used by the Lunch Car Company as a "showroom" diner, and a test bed for new features.” It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2003.



The other Worcester Icons I photographed for “Welcome to Worcester” include Dr. Gonzo’s—as you can see it’s a store for “Uncommon Condiments”. It also has its own house band--- The Roadkill Orchestra. A few days ago, the Worcester Telegram & Gazette published a column by Dianne Williamson titled “Dr. Gonzo is Wooville’s Biggest Fan.” She wrote, “He’s a merchant, musician, unofficial city ambassador, unpaid local organizer and proud purveyor of all natural spices and sauces with names such as Wicked Wiener Wonder Relish, One Hump Dry Rub No. 2 and another rub whose name could test the tolerance of my editor”. She quoted Dr. Gonzo, who was born J Stuart Esty, as saying,“This town is going through a transformation, and it has an amazing collection of human beings. I’ve traveled around the country and lived in Europe and you can’t replicate Worcester anywhere in the world.”

My last photo shows Turtle Boy on Worcester Common. He is the city’s mascot and has his own facebook page and web site. But he has such a lurid and tumultuous story that I’ll have to save it for my next blog post.