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Just heard that Elliot’s in all its locations was shut down today! This Lowell culinary institution opened its doors in 1920. Long a staple for hot dog lovers - including the venerable Johnny Carson side-kick Ed McMahon - it’s hard to imagine Lowell without access to an Elliot’s hot dog. Rumors also abound about the relocation or maybe even the demise of the Lawrence landmark for hot dogs -Laughton’s. Time marches on as they say…  remember the Dutch Tea Room, the B.C., the Epicure, the Speare House, Bishop’s, the Prince Grotto, D.L. Page, the Rex and so many more? Let’s hope that the Owl Diner, Good Thymes, the River Road Cafe, the Club Diner and other favorites of that ilk survive.

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Daylight Savings Time ends at 2 a.m. on Sunday.  Don’t forget to turn back your clocks.

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The Lowell School Committee’s wisdom in selecting Dr. Chris Scott to succeed Karla Baehr as school superintendent was ratified by events in southeastern Massachusetts today.  You may recall that the school committee felt some sense of urgency in its selection process because both Dr Scott and Dr. Portia Bonner, another finalist for the Lowell position, were also finalists for the New Bedford superintendent’s job.  As events played out, New Bedford chose first, electing Dr. Bonner.  Shortly thereafter, Lowell selected Dr. Scott. 

What’s happened since?  Dr. Scott handled the transition from Dr. Baehr seamlessly and has won rave reviews from all quarters for her work here in Lowell.  She even takes the local newspaper to task today in a letter to the editor for the inaccuracies of a recent oped column that was critical of the city’s school principals. 

Contrast that with what’s going on in New Bedford.  Dr. Bonner and the president of the teachers union are locked in a bitter dispute, with the union chief complaining in a letter to the mayor that Dr. Bonner has a “strong anti-union, dictatorial style” and that she only “pays lip service to collaboration with teachers.”

Just another thing to like about Lowell. 

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Nicholas Kristof writes today about the work of psychologists and neurologists in understanding how Americans act towards people of other races.  The scholars conducting this research have found evidence that racial attitudes are a function of evolution – “the ability to form snap judgments about who is likely to be a friend or a foe” – and that there is a gap between people’s “unconscious ideals of equality and our unconscious proclivity to discriminate.” 

Recent experiments that used “implicit association tests” to gauge subjects’ attitudes towards Barack Obama found that many people, including his own supporters, tended to judge him to be “less American” than John McCain.  Someone on the McCain campaign must have been aware of this research.  How else can you explain the endless barrage of “he’s not like us” and “he doesn’t represent the real America” vitriol that’s been a staple of that campaign. 

Kristof’s point is not to get racists off the hook.  Instead, he wants all of us, particularly those who honestly believe that they are unbiased, to be aware of the possibility of subconscious reactions that are embedded in our DNA.   

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My colleague Dick Howe and Jackie Doherty on her blog have already recounted their experience at the 5th Annual Lowell High School Distinguished Alumni event last night. I attended as well so just a few more comments from me…

This was indeed an impressive event with an impressive group of distinguished alums. Since I never schmooze at these events, I went right to a seat up-front on the aisle. I was able to watch the JR. ROTC go through their moves, listen to the concert band tune-up, watch committee member Jim Moriarty ‘73 go over the program with emcee Jay McQuaid ‘87 and see the newly elected senior class officers walk through the “handshake” for each distinguished guest. This was an extra-special evening for me as my former student Marty Meehan was part of this 2008 group. I thought of how proud his parents Buster and Sissy (also LHS alums) would be especially since grandson LHS freshman Max Meehan did the biographical presentation of his Uncle Marty. Each honoree spoke of the special place Lowell High School and the city of Lowell had in their lives and their hearts. Patrick Sullivan seemed to channel his father Billy’s Lowell devotion in a witty and thoughtful way. As artist Janet Lambert Moore spoke I could see her in my mind’s eye as she sat with paint, brushes and canvass plying her art on Merrimack Street in those early years for local and visitor to see, question and enjoy. As I listened to writer Deborah Hopkinson speak and recount the letters she received from kids, I planned how I would buy her books for my four granddaughters - eager to make the Lowell connection for them. As businesman and philanthropist Luis Pedrosa told his story, the line of immigrant students whose shoulders he stood on and those that have come after came alive as he extolled hard work, determinaion and achievement. For years Marty Meehan has touted the value, importance and diversity of the public schools and in particular Lowell High School and the tremendous effect it had on him. As UML Chancellor he declared his continued commitment to strengthen the connection to UMass Lowell working with new Superintendent Chris Augusta Scott through the new “Pathways” project. No one present could have left the auditorium unaffected. Kudos to the students past and present and to all who made this evening with alums happen. If you have the opportunity to watch the replay on Channel 22, please do and let us know what you think.

Note: As always when I sit in the Cyrus W. Irish Auditorium at Lowell High, I cannot help but remember friends and colleagues  ”working the room” at special events and assemblies - especially the late Frank McHugh, Tom Grady, Ray Riddick, Peter Stamas, Gert Thomas, Mary Fitzgerald, Brendan Sullivan, Joe Reagan, Rita Sullivan, Helen Shea, Dick Dacey, Wyman Trull, Steve Ronan,  Billy notini, Helen Droney, Danny Sullivan, Arthur Pard as well as  the happily retired folks - Sheila Hallissy, Jerry LeBlanc, Dennis Canney, Pat and Bob Kealy, Jonalyn O’Connor, Beatrice Hoar, Mike Sokolowski, Phil Dancause, Walter Nelson and so many more. The venerable former Sub-Master Tom Murphy long a champion of the High School is struggling with his health right now - please remember him with a thought and a prayer. He would have loved last night’s celebration!

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This week’s edition of the Tewksbury Town Crier just arrived. There’s a front page report that long-time Town Manager David Cressman is one of the four finalists out of a pool of seventy-five applicants for the top “administrator” position in the toney mid- cape resort town of Dennis. The search committee headed by Thomas Saltonstall started it’s search in May:

We were looking for highly experienced municipal leaders, highly skilled in team building and financial planning and management… We wanted innovative people who have demonstrated the capacity of cost effectiveness of town government and who would have the capacity to inspire our municipal work force.

Cressman it seems made the first cut on his written answers and then again after an interview. Saltonstall said regarding Cressman - ”We believe he is an extraordinarily qualified candidate.” The plan is to make an offer to someone and have  a new administrator in place by January.

What’s going on? I’m out of the loop on Tewksbury street talk. Did someone give Dave a message? (Of course he gets messages regularly on the in-your-face comments made on TewksburyIssues, the local squawk forum!) Is he looking for a transition into a nice retirement community? Is the prospect of the financial future in town so egregious that he’s decided to downsize from town manager to a mere adminstrator? Dennis has a population of less than 14,000 with a sandy beach and lots of history, a town meeting form of government with selectmen and a newly formed affordable housing trust fund. The Commonwealth certified free cash for Dennis minus the “pothole” money to be $1.8 million. ps - The town is also looking for a part-time Children’s Librarian.

Twenty years ago I chaired the Town Manager Search Committee that submitted David Cressman’s name to the Board of Selectmen to be our first town manager. That happened after much ado about other possible candidates being too political. (That’s another story for another day.) David came with good financial credentials but I frankly never expected him to last beyond his three year contact. He did and he has served the town well. Now he apparently wants out. I wish him success if the town of Dennis so chooses him. Then fun begins anew with another Town Manager search!

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If you’re a fan of the HBO series “The Wire” (like I am, via Netflix) you might find this campaign ad interesting:

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As the presidential race grows tighter, and red states and blue states are decided (or not), the country just might find itself in need of an election tie-breaker…

Here is one suggestion from ThaOgStylez on YouTube.

Still wondering about the power of YouTube? Well, this video has been around for only one week and it has been viewed 330,000 times.

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The death spiral of the daily newspaper continues.  Gannett, the largest newspaper publisher in America, just announced that it’s laying off 3000 employees which is 10% of its workforce.  The Los Angeles Times and the Newark Star-Ledger both announced more layoffs.  Time, Inc is cutting 600 jobs.  But cutting jobs is only a short-term fix.  What can be done to “reinvent the crumbling newspaper business?”  Two very distinct strategies have emerged:

Yesterday, the Christian Science Monitor announced that it would cease producing a print version of its daily newspaper so as to preserve reporting and editorial employees who could then focus exclusively on the Monitor’s constantly updated website.  This is certainly a radical step and traditionalists will be quick to point out that revenue derived from the internet has only been a fraction of that earned by print editions.  Realists might respond that no one cares since everyday, more and more people are getting their news from the web and fewer and fewer are reading paper versions of newspapers.

The other newspaper survival strategy that’s recently surfaced has as its foremost advocate Dean Singleton, owner of MediaNews Group which in turn owns the Lowell Sun.  Earlier this week in a speech to the Southern Newspaper Publishers Association, Singleton declared that outsourcing nearly every aspect of newspaper operations was seriously being considered by MediaNews.

“In today’s world, whether your desk is down the hall or around the world, from a computer standpoint, it doesn’t matter,” Singleton said after his speech . . . He also said sending copy editing and design jobs overseas may even be called for.  “One thing we’re exploring is having one news desk for all of our newspapers in MediaNews . . . maybe even offshore,” he said during the speech.

Some newspapers have already sent “ad production and non-editorial functions” overseas.  A website in California, pasadenanow.com, employs reporters living in India to write about the Pasadena City Council by watching real time streaming video of council meetings.

So here’s the choice: local reporters writing about local events on a web-based, paperless newspaper; or local content created by someone living on the other side of the world but delivered in a traditional newspaper that’s left on your front porch each afternoon.  Which would you prefer? 

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Tonight was the fifth annual Lowell High School Distinguished Alumni event which raises money for scholarships for LHS students by honoring five graduates each year.  Tonight’s honorees:

William H Sullivan Jr, 1933 – Founder of the New England (Boston) Patriots and a co-founder of the Jimmy Fund.

Janet Lambert Moore, 1956 – renowned local artist.

Deborah Hopkinson, 1969 – Authored more than 30 books for young readers and winner of numerous writing awards.

Marty Meehan, 1974 – former Congressman and current Chancellor of University of Massachusetts, Lowell

Luis Pedroso, 1980 – founder of two local hi-tech companies and a local philanthropist.

This was a well-run, inspiring event.  Each of the honorees had a wonderful story to tell.  They joined an impressive group:

From 2004:

• Jack Kerouac, 1939

• George Behrakis, 1951

• Paul Tsongas, 1958

• Donna McCallum, 1961

• Elkin McCallum, 1961

From 2005:

• Brendan Leahey, MD, 1922

• James Conway Jr, 1941

• Joseph McCarthy, MD, 1956

• Elinor Lipman, 1968

• Ted Leonsis, 1973

 From 2006:

• Benjamin Butler, 1831

• Homer Bourgeois, 1920

• Herbert Zarkin, 1956

• Thomas Sexton, 1958

• Gerald Chertavian, 1983

From 2007:

• Teresa Garland Lew, 1912

• F Bradford Morse, 1938

• Rosalind Elias, 1947

• George Duncan, 1957

• Kendall Wallace, 1959

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