Happy birthday MFA

This month marks the hundredth anniversary of the opening of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts’ Huntington Avenue building in November 1909.

The museum first opened in Copley Square in 1876 (pictured at left) in the then recently filled-in Back Bay. But as the enterprise grew and Copley Square grew up around it, the museum looked for a place to expand – and to continue expanding into the future (the MFA’s new American Wing is scheduled to open a year from now) – so it bought land where it now resides on Huntington Avenue.

I’m a bit unclear of the exact date the Huntington Avenue building opened. A 1920 “Handbook of the Museum of Fine Arts” and a 1922 Encyclopedia Britannica say the building opened on Nov. 15, 1909. But a 1999 MFA “Guide to the Collection” says it opened on Nov. 2, 1909.

Regardless, happy birthday.