The Kenmore of today is not the Kenmore of 40 years ago. The coolest thing in Kenmore today is the giant apparatus that reads “Whoop.” But once you discover Whoop is nothing more than a company that sells plastic-y wristbands that pressure you into getting 10 hours of sleep and tell you when to recharge your social battery, the joke isn’t funny anymore.

Kenmore used to be dirty, dive-y, and home to the birthplace of Boston's punk scene, The Rat. This year marks the 50th anniversary of The Rat’s opening. The club closed 25 years before I moved to Boston, yet I somehow still feel a deep connection with a club that I never even got to experience.

Once described as a “subterranean cavern of lurid vice and glamor,” The Rat helped build Boston’s reputation in the punk scene, forging the city’s reputation as a fierce competitor to New York City’s iconic clubs. It was a place where Boston’s raw talent could unravel and make its debut to hungry audiences. Musicians felt like rock stars performing there, even if there were only three people in the audience. The Rat is responsible for the evolution of new musical genres like post-punk and new wave and introduced many bands to the world. As part of its anniversary celebration, Harvard University unveiled a new exhibit called “Making a Scene –The Boston-area rock scene of the 1970s-90s.”

The exhibit showcases flyers and various artifacts from The Rat, as well as Arthur Freedman’s Collection of recordings and memorabilia. Newton teenager Arthur “Artie” Freedman was among those who witnessed the dawn of punk firsthand and saw a cultural shift happen before his eyes. Artie began frequenting The Rat in the autumn of 1974, following Nixon’s resignation. Punk and the Ramones were still hot, and rock and roll was still the beating drum in music. After breathing in the Rat’s fumes, Artie soon realized that what he saw on stage and off was singular.

Artie began documenting these passioned performances in 1980 by bringing a tape recorder to every show he attended in Boston, and he continued this practice for three decades. Although The Rat eventually closed because of a Boston housing crisis, Artie knew what had emerged in a historically parochial town was special and worth preserving.

In the 80s, Artie and my mom were friends. He was the first person to introduce her to Indian food. They met at The Channel (another raucous club in South Boston that eventually became a strip club in 1992) through a mutual friend. I had no idea who Artie was until I asked my mom this summer if she’d ever gone to a club called The Channel. She immediately made the connection between The Channel and Artie Freedman and wanted to reconnect. Then, after several attempts to reach the people involved with Harvard’s Rat exhibit, I was able to track down Artie’s phone number and sent it over to my mom.

The exhibit offers visitors a window into Artie’s years spent discovering Boston’s music scene. I made it a priority to go as soon as it opened, since I often fantasize about Boston’s cooler and grittier times. It was important for me to get a glimpse of my mom’s youth, and learn more about these fire hazard/death trap clubs where she had seen legendary artists and made lasting friends.

When you enter the exhibit, you are immediately met by a stunning mural of rats and color, representative of Boston's grossest and grittiest trademark: the resilient rat population. Unlike the club, this rodent won’t ever be truly exterminated. It’s a survivor, similar to the spirit of a punk.

There is a monitor in the exhibit that plays Artie’s recordings of incendiary local rock groups (like the Organ Donors, Salem 66, The Neighbourhoods, and so on). The sheer quality of the music in these videos took me by surprise; I hadn’t expected these local bands to be so quintessentially Boston, yet irreverent.

Artie’s collection offers a direct view into the social texture of the scene. The music can be recorded on tapes, but who was there and what they felt is left to documents. There are excerpts in the exhibit declaring that there was no room for racism at The Rat and in music. Many of the excerpts are about love and believing in a world free of prejudice.

These are a few of the artists and bands that performed at The Rat. A mixture of local and global heroes. The Rat is remembered by people for being the first and sometimes last place that their bands had performed. People saw stars blossom in front of them, which inspired the young audiences to create and become better musicians themselves. People met partners and friends here, which is something Boston desperately needs. A home base for musicians and weirdos to create and cross-pollinate. It was a mythical place that will only grow in appreciation as the years go on and punk inevitably returns.