The Boston Marathon Mosaic Mural Project: Teamwork in Action

Michelle Murdock, Freelance Writer | June 2015

Eight students at Hopkinton High have just finished a nine-month long project; creating a mosaic mural that includes 4,042 photos representing staff members and students from the graduating class of 2015 to 2027, plus a few pre-school students from 2028.  The backdrop picture is the women’s start of the 2015 Boston Marathon. The project carries on the tradition started 13 years ago by Hopkinton resident John Copley who created the first mosaic mural in 2001, using photos of every student and staff member in the Hopkinton Public Schools at that time with a backdrop of the men’s start of the 2002 Boston Marathon, to commemorate the opening of Hopkinton’s new high school.  Combined, the two murals represent 26.2 years’ worth of history of the Hopkinton Public Schools. And in Hopkinton, we all know that 26.2 is a magic number.

The project was announced at last year’s Senior Recognition Night by then seniors John Nadeau and Olivia Harvey who laid the groundwork for the mural. The seniors involved in this year’s project are Nina Augustini, Mackenzie Burke, Jordan Carroll, Erin Keefe, Avery McKenna, Mary Marquedant, Stephanie Puig, and Sasha Hagen, a sophomore.  The project was once again guided and managed by John Copley, but the students took the over 10,000 pictures needed for the mosaic: cataloging, ranking and naming them. They started in September of 2014 and ended in May of 2015. 

“We could have used all of the pictures from the School District yearbook/ID company,” said Copley, “but all the backgrounds would have been similar colors; that would not have lent itself to the mosaic premise of randomly colored pictures ending up in the right spot on the mosaic backdrop picture, in this case the 2015 Boston Marathon Women’s start. That would have been like going to the drive through for supper. Ultimately, it’s not very satisfying.”

When the project first started and the first round of photos was complete, Copley says the students did not initially understand the amount of effort that would be required to catalog and name the pictures.  “The effort to cross reference the pictures taken against the list of kids/staff was much more than they expected,” said Copley, “and jokingly one girl said, ‘I didn’t sign up for this’”.

But the students were not deterred by the amount of work to be done and instead were very dedicated as the months went by. Copley described an example of their dedication when they took pictures at the high school. 

“There are not homerooms,” said Copley, so it’s hard to locate all the kids, but on Thursdays there is a high school “advisory” period that last for 20 minutes. There is normally 10+ kids in each advisory class/location. So, every Thursday, the kids went out in pairs (one photographer and one person to catalog) to take high school pictures and averaged five advisory classes per week.  That process took about 20 weeks to complete and then the effort to track down all of the absentees or misplaced kids was enormous.”

As the project neared completion, even more effort went into finishing the project in time for it to be unveiled prior to graduation.  

“To meet the deadlines, it seemed like they came to my house for like 10 nights straight in May,” said Copley.  “Sometimes we started around 5:00 p.m. and they didn’t leave until after 11:00 p.m. It was really amazing to me that during the month of May in their senior year, known for “senioritis”, the amount of effort and dedication they showed to complete the project and the effort to make sure we included as many kids as possible.”

“Even though doing this project was a lot of work,” said Mary Marquedant, “it was totally worth it. My favorite part of this project was being able to take pictures at the start of the Boston Marathon, but also taking pictures of the little kids who would be part of the mosaic.”

“I think the best part of this project was being able to see the progress as time went on,” said Stephanie Puig. “What started out as an idea came to life over the span of seven months.”

And then came the unveiling.

“When I first saw the mural when it was presented, I was so proud of everyone who was involved in the project,” said Puig.  “All the hard work we put into it was finally paid off when I saw the mural completely done.  No one really knows how much time and effort was put into this project until they really see the detail in it.  I am ecstatic that we are leaving this amazing gift to our school.”

“It makes me feel so proud and happy knowing that this mosaic will be part of Hopkinton for a very long time,” said Marquedant.  “It makes me so happy knowing that I can tell my kids or people who are visiting Hopkinton for the very first time that I helped to make the mosaic. I can also tell them the whole story behind it and how this mosaic shows how much Hopkinton loves hosting the Boston Marathon.”

“The mural taught me to dig deeper than the picture itself,” said Puig. “As you stand far away, you can see one large picture of the women’s start of the Boston Marathon, but if you get closer, you will see thousands of small pictures of smiling children and staff members who make up the starting town of the Boston Marathon; Hopkinton.”