2004 was a great year for Boston! The Patriots won the Super Bowl! Boston hosted its first national political convention! And - the Red Sox won the World Series!

Diversity gives our city a competitive edge.

Boston is the engine of the state's economy.

And it was from Boston that one in every six American families began their journey into the land of the free.

I am also committed to providing city employees with housing assistance.

Here's what I see all across this great city - people working together to make Boston a better place to live and to raise children, to grow and pursue dreams.

One of our key strategies has been to restructure traditional high schools into small learning communities with personalized attention and a range of options.

Children need continuity as they grow and learn.

I'm proud to report that in 2004 alone, we approved 3,600 new units of housing - our best year ever!

Let's use the energy of this historic year to propel us toward our shared vision of a greater Boston.

The true privilege of being Mayor is that I have the opportunity to be everyone's neighbor.

We were the first urban school system in the country to wire all of our schools for the Internet.

Currently, Boston has only nine percent of the state's population - but we provide more than 16 percent of the jobs and 19 percent of the state's revenues.

I brought together experts from health care, business, academic institutions, and the community to develop a comprehensive blueprint for eliminating racial and ethnic disparities in health care in the City of Boston.

Boston is safe. And we're going to keep it safe.

Tonight, I am pleased to announce that I have secured $1 million from the Convention Host Committee to fund the beautification of Boston's neighborhoods.

The true value of sport is more than the skills that young people learn.

Preparing our city to achieve its destiny will require strong leadership.

And for the city's birthday, we will host events in every neighborhood of the city, inviting all of our residents to share in the celebration of Boston's great epic - the story of neighbors who support one another where it matters most.

For every $5 that Boston's economy sends up to Beacon Hill, the state gives only $1 back to us.

We must be vigilant in our actions towards criminals, and innovative in our approach towards solving crime.

I am working hard to ensure that working families can continue to afford to live in our city.

Boston is known for its innovation.

In the 1990s, we introduced Boston's community policing strategy. We reversed the tide of violent crime that threatened our city, and we established a national model for preventing and fighting crime.

My fellow citizens, the state of our city is strong.

2004 was a great year for Boston! The Patriots won the Super Bowl! Boston hosted its first national political convention! And - the Red Sox won the World Series!

These are national problems that require national solutions.

This is a bad day for Boston, but I think if we pull together we'll get through it.

Boston is the engine of the states economy.

I grew up with a Christmas tree Im going to stay with a Christmas tree.

There was a time when I was wondering about this business of going public, so I visited about a half-dozen companies in the Boston area, all of them formed by MIT faculty and all had gone public.

Was the crew well? Was I not? I had profited in many ways by the voyage. I had even gained flesh, and actually weighed a pound more than when I sailed from Boston.

Our situation here, without any exaggeration, is beyond description almost; it is such as eye has not seen nor ear heard, nor hath it ever entered into the heart of men to conceive Boston ever to arrive at.

A very considerable body of the German people live in America and propose to fight that Government. Bourke in his great speech last week welcoming the Belgian mission to Boston worked out the President's meaning with care.

At a Boston signing, someone from the audience asked why I was so obsessed with furniture in my books. The question rattled around in my head. I had no idea that I was obsessed with furniture.

My father was the orphaned son of immigrants to the United States from Ireland. My father never knew his parents. His mother died - we're not sure - either at or shortly after his birth, and he and all of his siblings were placed in orphanages in the Boston area.

Boston is the engine of the state's economy.

And it was from Boston that one in every six American families began their journey into the land of the free.

I don't believe a manager ever won a pennant. Casey Stengel won all those pennants with the Yankees. How many did he win with the Boston Braves and Mets?

There isn't much discussion of ruling class in America even in Boston, probably one of the most class-conscious cities in the country?

In my freshman year in high school, I went to the only public high school in Boston with a theatre program.

The word survivor suggests someone who has emerged alive from a plane crash or a natural disaster. But the word can also refer to the loved ones of murder victims, and this was the sense in which it was used at a four-day conference in early June at Boston College.

Probably the biggest thing that surprises people is that I am obsessed with hockey. I grew up in the Boston area so I am obsessed with hockey since I was a little kid.

When I go abroad I always sail from Boston because it is such a pleasant place to get away from.

I'd rather entrust the government of the United States to the first 400 people listed in the Boston telephone directory than to the faculty of Harvard University.

Here's what I see all across this great city - people working together to make Boston a better place to live and to raise children, to grow and pursue dreams.

Paul Farmer has helped to build amazing health care system in one of the poorest areas of Haiti. He founded Partners in Health, which serves the destitute and the sick in many parts of the world from Haiti to Boston and from Russia to Peru.

I recently did a piece for the Boston Pops and John Williams, and I hope that it's as well a composed piece as I've ever done for any other medium or occasion.

If you're writing a piece for the Boston Pops, the balance is towards one end. If you're writing a piece for a chamber music society, then it's towards another point. I won't make a final answer on that. I think it changes with every piece.