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Deer Island is part of the Boston Harbor Islands National Recreation Area. Although still an island by name, Deer Island has in fact been has been connected to the mainland since the former Shirley Gut, a channel which once separating the island from the town of Winthrop, was filled in by a hurricane in 1938. Today Deer Island is best known as the location of the Deer Island Waste Water Treatment Plant, whose 150 foot tall egg-like sludge digesters are major harbor landmarks.•• The island has a permanent size of 185 acres, plus an intertidal zone of a further 80 acres. Two-thirds of the island's area is taken up with the waste water plant, which treats sewage from 43 nearby cities and towns, and is the second largest such plant in the United States. The remainder of the island consists of park land surrounding the treatment plant, and offers walking, jogging, sightseeing, picnicking, and fishing.•• It was once leased to Sir Thomas Temple (1614-1674) , a British proprietor and governor of Nova Scotia, and a descendent of the renowned Lady Godiva of Coventry. Sir Thomas Temple was also the uncle of John Nelson (1654-1734), a New England trader and statesman, who owned neighboring Long Island in Boston Harbor which at one time was also known as "Nelson's Island". Over the years, Deer Island has had several different uses. During King Philip's War in the 1670s, it was used as a place of internment. Christian "praying Indians" were moved from Marlborough and Natick under the auspices of John Eliot, the minister of Roxbury, mostly to Deer Island, but at least one colony was sent to Long Island. During the winter of 1675-76 some 500 American Indians were held on the island and, without adequate food or shelter, many died. In the middle of the 19th century, the island was the landing point for thousands of refugees from the Irish Potato Famine, many sick and poverty-stricken. In 1847, a hospital was established to treat incoming immigrants, and during the following two years approximately 4,800 men, women, and children were admitted. Many recovered and went on to new lives, but more than 800 died. In 1850, an almshouse was built to house paupers. The first sewage treatment plant was constructed on Deer Island in the late 19th century, and expanded in the 1960s. The current plant dates from the 1990s.•
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