In the hours after the Boston Marathon bombing on April 15 , 2013 , the slogan " Boston Strong " appeared as a highly popular hashtag on Twitter and rapidly spread around the world . It was a T-shirt campaign created by Christopher Dobens and Nicholas Reynolds , students at Emerson College . An expression of Boston 's unity after the bombings , the slogan showed up on T-shirts and other products , and was emblazoned on the " Green Monster " wall at Boston 's Fenway Park . The Boston Bruins displayed the slogan on their helmets at their game two days after the bombings , and at the first baseball game in Fenway Park after the bombings , the stadium announcer told the crowd : " We are one . We are strong . We are Boston . We are Boston strong . " On April 17 , two days after the bombings , a T-shirt vendor and another private individual submitted separate trademark registration applications to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office , seeking to obtain ownership of the " Boston Strong " slogan for use on commercial products . One of the applicants said he wanted the trademark in order to prevent people from outside the Boston area from benefiting from it . A trademark attorney was quoted in '' The Huffington Post '' as predicting that the government office would deny the registration on the grounds that the slogan was already in the public domain and could not be linked to any specific entity
Boston Marathon bombing
Boston Marathon bombing
Boston Strong