Why you should experience Make Way for Ducklings in Boston, Massachusetts.
Make Way for Ducklings is Boston's sweetest salute to storytelling, a bronze parade of family, imagination, and joy that captures hearts across generations.
Tucked along the cobblestone path near the Charles Street entrance, the sculptures depict Mrs. Mallard and her eight ducklings, Jack, Kack, Lack, Mack, Nack, Ouack, Pack, and Quack, waddling proudly through the garden on their way to the lagoon. Children climb, hug, and pose with them year-round, while locals pause to smile at the familiar scene. Set amid blooming flowers and willow trees, the statues embody Boston's charm at its gentlest, a reminder that wonder, like family, belongs to everyone.
What you should know about Make Way for Ducklings.
The beloved sculptures were created by artist Nancy Schön in 1987, inspired by Robert McCloskey's 1941 Caldecott-winning children's book of the same name.
McCloskey's tale, set in the Public Garden and along the Charles River, tells the story of a duck family navigating the city with the help of kind policemen, a celebration of urban kindness and parental devotion. Schön's design was so adored that a second set of ducklings was cast and gifted to Moscow in 1991 as a symbol of friendship during the end of the Cold War. Over the years, Bostonians have made the statues part of local tradition, dressing them in holiday scarves, marathon medals, and Red Sox caps. Polished smooth by countless small hands, the ducks have become less a monument and more a ritual, a touchstone of innocence in the city's ever-turning story.
How to fold Make Way for Ducklings into your trip.
Find the ducklings along the garden's Charles Street entrance near Beacon Street, they're impossible to miss and even harder to leave without smiling.
Visit in the morning when sunlight catches the bronze or in early evening when the garden quiets and the statues glow under lamplight. If you're visiting in spring, time your stop with the annual Duckling Day Parade, when hundreds of children in yellow costumes waddle through the garden in celebration of McCloskey's story. Pair this stop with a Swan Boat ride or a walk across the footbridge for a perfect Boston afternoon. Make Way for Ducklings isn't just public art, they're a living embrace of warmth and whimsy, where joy is cast in bronze and childhood never really ends.
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