Listen, my children, and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-Five;
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.

When he wrote those lines in 1860, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was correct — hardly anyone had heard of Paul Revere. The early histories of the American Revolutionary War didn’t even mention him.

But the poem changed that. Overnight, Paul Revere became one of America’s greatest heroes. Today, he is practically an industry in Boston. You can tour his house, see his portrait, buy reproductions of his silver work, walk the streets he walked, have a drink in his favorite tavern and even leave pennies on his grave.

Why did this practically unknown, stocky, 40-year-old artisan become one of the most cherished icons of freedom? Perhaps it’s because he did something that few other men have been able to accomplish: in one evening’s work he changed history.

On a day trip in Boston, it’s quite easy to follow the dramatic story. Every significant building associated with the famous ride has been preserved and many can be toured.

Three thousand British redcoats patrolled the streets of Boston in 1775, trying to suppress the growing rebellion.

Like many a good story, this one begins in a tavern. In 1775, Boston was a powder keg. Three thousand British soldiers patrolled the streets trying to crush a growing rebellion, while a ragtag group of rebels called the Sons of Liberty made their secret headquarters in the Green Dragon Tavern.

The original tavern was torn down in 1854, but a reconstruction was built nearby at 11 Marshall Street. Although not an exact reproduction, it does have the feel of a colonial inn with its dark wood beams, muskets on the walls and historical prints.

It’s easily possible to imagine the Green Dragon as it must have appeared in 1775, filled with rebels engaged in deep discussion while smoking clay pipes and downing tankards of ale.

One of these rebels was a silversmith named Paul Revere. An active patriot, he led a group of 30 “mechanics,” as artisans called themselves, whose purpose was to watch the redcoats. Whenever the British army attempted a foray into the countryside, Revere and his men acted as “express riders” to spread the alarm.

On the afternoon of April 18, a 13-year-old boy, Sam Ballard, overheard two British officers talking about a raid to Lexington and Concord to arrest revolutionary leaders Samuel Adams and John Hancock. Ballard told the landlord at the Green Dragon, who sent a messenger to Paul Revere’s house.

You too can walk to Paul Revere’s house in about ten minutes. Built in 1680, The Paul Revere House, where Revere lived for 30 years (1770-1800), is the oldest dwelling in Boston. It is the only colonial building of this type to survive in the heart of an American city.

The gray, two-story dwelling is now a museum where, on self-guided tours, you squeeze up narrow stairways to view rooms and exhibits that tell the story of Paul Revere. It was from this house that Paul Revere set off on a 20-mile ride to Lexington to spread the alarm.

His first stop was around the corner, at the Old North Church. Built in 1723, it is Boston’s oldest church building. A small museum at the back of a gift shop continues the story.

In 1775, Boston was built on a neck of land surrounded by water. If the British sealed off the neck, an express rider would be trapped. The answer was to send the message across the river by light. Revere planned to hang lanterns in the Old North, which had the highest steeple in the city. The code was one lantern if the British were leaving for Lexington by land, two if by sea.

About 10 p.m., with two lanterns dimly glowing across the water and the moon rising, Revere had himself rowed across the Charles River, directly under the guns of an English ship. On the other side, associates tipped off by the lanterns provided him with a swift horse named Brown Beauty, and he set off for Lexington.

A hurry of hoofs in a village street,
A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark,
And beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, a spark
Struck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet:
That was all! And yet, through the gloom and the light,
The fate of a nation was riding that night;