Published July 12, 2010

The Public Garden is a great place. (Michael Durwin/Flickr)

Today the commonwealth releases a list of 1,000 great places — or is it the 1,000 greatest places? (The official Web page shows both. If it’s the latter, I pity the 1,000th greatest place in Massachusetts.)

Gov. Deval Patrick established a commission 19 months ago to round up the Bay State’s great places, and they came up with about 15,000, with help from the public. Someone — probably an editor — told them to get the list down to 1,000. Bob Oakes said it best this morning: “It’s almost as if you can’t throw a stone without hitting something great.”

In seriousness, Massachusetts is filled with great places. “Greatness is all around you,” said my favorite native, Ben Franklin. Boston Harbor, the Public Garden and the Common, the USS Constitution, the Old North Church, the Old South Church, the Granary Burying Ground, the Mt. Auburn Cemetery, the Longfellow Bridge, the Zakim Bridge, Mass MoCA, Walden Pond, Cape Cod, Harvard Square, Davis Square, Sullivan’s food stand, the little park behind my apartment, ooh, the Arnold Arboretum — OK, I see how you could generate a list pretty quickly.

What are you greatest places? Let’s get a list going. Share in the comments.

Update: Here’s the list (Scribd). It’s not weighted.