City Prepares To Celebrate 350th Birthday

Cambridge will kickoff a weekend-long celebration of the city's 350th anniversary today with a re-enactment of the town's founding in 16.30 and a massive fireworks show.

With weather forecasters promising sunny skies, 350 Committee organizers said yesterday crowds would begin assembling shortly after noon today on the banks of the Charles to watch the "small ships" parade. Actors representing the founders of what was then called Newtowne will sail down the Charles, landing near Harvard Square.

After the re-enactment, the dignitaries and the crowd will walk to Winthrop Square, for a commemorative program highlighted by an address from Mayor Francis H. Duehay '55 on current problems in local government.

Tonight's fireworks extravaganza--produced by the Grucci fireworks company, which won last year's international fireworks contest in Monte Carlo--will begin at about 8:30 p.m. If it rains, organizers said, the fireworks will be postponed to the following evening.

"People coming for the fireworks show should carry transistor radios tuned to WBZ 1030 AM 1030, which will provide simultaneous music," Mary Ellen Fitzgerald, coordinator of the celebration, said yesterday.

Author George Plimpton, New York City's fireworks marshal, will narrate the fireworks presentation.

Cantabrigians of every stripe will join in a parade through the city's streets tomorrow.

Thomas P. O'Neill Jr., Speaker of the House, will march in the first column of the procession, along with other famous native sons and local leaders, as the parade winds down Cambridge and Prospects streets, Mass.Ave., Mt. Auburn St. and Boylston St. to the foot of the river