Some of my favorite runs with the Winchester Highlanders were through the spacious and gorgeous Middlesex Fell Reservation - directly adjacent to Winchester, MA, USA. One sunny and cool Saturday, we took a slightly different route and came across the mysterious structure below (map). Looks like an old pump house. Or … is that just a cover?
Pump House or Home of the Web?
Check out the inscription (photo below) above the massive doors: “WWW 1890″. Could it be that this is where the World Wide Web was invented? And could the Web have been invented nearly 100 years before history records that Sir Tim Berners-Lee is believed to have conceived of the world’s most important communications medium?
Inscription reads, “WWW 1890″ .. and also “Big Russ”
Could it be that the entire Web is controlled from this very spot — perhaps in a massive subterranean complex beneath Spot Pond? And the inscription on the left door suggests that the Web may have been invented by a guy named “Big Russ” (click on photo above to enlarge), and not Sir Tim.
This is all in fun (I REALLY hope that was obvious). It’s a good bet that “WWW” is an abbreviation for “Winchester Water Works”. Though it is hard to image how anyone survived without the Web (and how billions around the world are not yet benefiting from it), it’s been pretty cool being alive during its invention, being one of the early adopters, and having had the pleasure to work with Tim and other Web pioneers over the last decade. Sorry Big Russ!
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